Adaptive Morphology of Surface‐Segregated Micelles Synthesized from Polymerization‐Induced Self‐Assembly Co‐Mediated by a Binary Mixture of Macro‐RAFT Agents

Surface‐segregated micelles (SSMs) have shown potential applications in drug delivery, bioimaging, and Pickering emulsions due to their adaptive characteristics. A diverse set of SSMs are prepared by reversible addition–fragmentation transfer (RAFT)‐mediated polymerization‐induced self‐assembly (PIS...

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Bibliographic Details
Published in:Macromolecular chemistry and physics 2021-09, Vol.222 (18), p.n/a
Main Authors: Zhang, Tongtong, Zhan, Chengdong, Huang, Xiangyue, Huang, Yinghui, Zong, Lina, Hong, Liangzhi, Ngai, To
Format: Article
Language:English
Subjects:
Addition polymerization
Assembly
Binary mixtures
dispersion polymerization
Emulsions
macro‐RAFT
Medical imaging
Micelles
Molecular chains
Morphology
Polydimethylsiloxane
Polymerization
polymerization‐induced self‐assembly
Structural hierarchy
surface‐segregated micelles
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Summary:Surface‐segregated micelles (SSMs) have shown potential applications in drug delivery, bioimaging, and Pickering emulsions due to their adaptive characteristics. A diverse set of SSMs are prepared by reversible addition–fragmentation transfer (RAFT)‐mediated polymerization‐induced self‐assembly (PISA). However, the obtained self‐assembled structures are mostly limited to spherical forms, and SSMs with a hierarchical structure are not yet prepared. In this study, SSMs with various hierarchical structures are generated by the dispersion polymerization of benzyl methacrylate (BzMA) co‐mediated by a binary mixture of poly(2‐(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate) and polydimethylsiloxane as macromolecular chain‐transfer agents (macro‐CTAs). The obtained structures include cylinders, vesicles, large compound micelles, and bundles of hoops. The morphological evolution of these structures and vesicle size can be readily tuned by varying the composition of the binary mixture of macro‐CTAs. This study expands the scope of RAFT‐mediated PISA for synthesizing well‐defined polymer nano‐objects with higher‐order morphologies for various applications. Surface‐segregated micelles with various hierarchical morphologies, including cylinders, vesicles, large compound micelles, and bundles of loops, are obtained by the dispersion polymerization of benzyl methacrylate (BzMA) in isopropanol using a binary mixture of poly(2‐(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate) and polydimethylsiloxane as macromolecular chain‐transfer agents.
ISSN:1022-1352
1521-3935
DOI:10.1002/macp.202100128