Lv Shixian, Kim Hojun, Song Ziyuan, Feng Lin, Yang Yingfeng, Baumgartner Ryan, Tseng Kuan-Ying, Dillon Shen J, Leal Cecilia, Yin Lichen, Cheng Jianjun
Department of Materials Science and Engineering, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, Urbana, Illinois 61801, United States.
Jiangsu Key Laboratory for Carbon-Based Functional Materials and Devices, Institute of Functional Nano and Soft Materials (FUNSOM), Collaborative Innovation Center of Suzhou Nano Science and Technology, Soochow University, Suzhou 215123, China.
J Am Chem Soc. 2020 May 13;142(19):8570-8574. doi: 10.1021/jacs.0c01173. Epub 2020 May 1.
Polypeptide micelles are widely used as biocompatible nanoplatforms but often suffer from their poor structural stability. Unimolecular polypeptide micelles can effectively address the structure instability issue, but their synthesis with uniform structure and well-controlled and desired sizes remains challenging. Herein we report the convenient preparation of spherical unimolecular micelles through dendritic polyamine-initiated ultrafast ring-opening polymerization of -carboxyanhydrides (NCAs). Synthetic polypeptides with exceptionally high molecular weights (up to 85 MDa) and low dispersity ( < 1.05) can be readily obtained, which are the biggest synthetic polypeptides ever reported. The degree of polymerization was controlled in a vast range (25-3200), giving access to nearly monodisperse unimolecular micelles with predictable sizes. Many NCA monomers can be polymerized using this ultrafast polymerization method, which enables the incorporation of various structural and functional moieties into the unimolecular micelles. Because of the simplicity of the synthesis and superior control over the structure, the unimolecular polypeptide micelles may find applications in nanomedicine, supermolecular chemistry, and bionanotechnology.
多肽胶束作为生物相容性纳米平台被广泛应用，但常常存在结构稳定性差的问题。单分子多肽胶束能够有效解决结构不稳定问题，但其具有均匀结构且尺寸可控、符合预期的合成仍具有挑战性。在此，我们报道了通过树枝状多胺引发的α-羧基环酸酐（NCA）的超快开环聚合来便捷制备球形单分子胶束。能够轻松获得具有极高分子量（高达85 MDa）和低分散度（<1.05）的合成多肽，这是迄今报道的最大的合成多肽。聚合度在很大范围内可控（25 - 3200），从而能够得到尺寸可预测的近乎单分散的单分子胶束。使用这种超快聚合方法可以聚合许多NCA单体，这使得各种结构和功能部分能够引入到单分子胶束中。由于合成的简便性以及对结构的卓越控制，单分子多肽胶束可能在纳米医学、超分子化学和生物纳米技术中得到应用。
