Stilbene-cored poly(glutamate) dendrimers

A new class of photoresponsive poly(glutamate) dendrimers based on a stilbene core unit was successfully synthesized. The core stilbene was used to probe the polarity inside the dendrimer based on changes in the absorption and fluorescence spectra under various solvent conditions. Upon acidification of a solution of one of the dendrimers, wG1, the absorption band decreased with red-shift and the fluorescence band decreased with blue-shift, indicating that the groups at dendrimer periphery were protonated, resulting in shrinking of the dendrimer via hydrophobic interactions, and the inside of the dendrimer became more hydrophobic than under neutral pH conditions. In addition, the core stilbene unit underwent photoisomerization to give the cis-isomer with concomitant structural change in the poly(glutamate) dendrimer.