1. State Key Laboratory of Polymer Physics and Chemistry, Changchun Institute of Applied Chemistry, Chinese Academy of Sciences, Changchun 130022, China;2. Graduate School of Chinese Academy of Sciences, Beijing 100039, China
Abstract:
A biodegradable amphiphilic block copolymer, PEG‐b‐P(LA‐co‐MAC), was used to prepare spherical micelles consisting of a hydrophobic P(LA‐co‐MAC) core and a hydrophilic PEG shell. To improve their stability, the micelles were crosslinked by radical polymerization of the double bonds in the hydrophobic blocks. The crosslinked micelles had similar sizes and a narrow size distribution compared to their uncrosslinked precursor. The improved stability of the crosslinked micelles was confirmed by measurements of the CMC and a thermodynamic investigation. These micelles can internalize into Hela cells in vitro as demonstrated by inverted fluorescence microscopy and CLSM. These stabilized nanoscale micelles have potential use in biomedical applications such as drug delivery and disease diagnosis.
