Supramolecular co-assembly of water-soluble nucleobase-containing copolymers: bioinspired synthetic platforms towards new biomimetic materials
Résumé
This study presents the development of co-assembled copolymer architectures at physiological pH (pH
7.4) formed via H-bonds between complementary nucleobase-containing copolymers. Well-defined
hydrophilic copolymers were synthesised by RAFT polymerisation: statistical uracil- and thiomorpholine
oxide-containing copolymers P(UrMAn-stat-THOXMAm) as well as diblock copolymers PEG112-b-P
(AdMAn-stat-THOXMAm) composed of a PEG block and a second block of a copolymer of adenine- and
thiomorpholine oxide-derived methacrylates. Binary mixtures of the resulting copolymers formed coassembled
nanoobjects in aqueous solution as a result of the H-bonds established between nucleobases.
The influences of the polymer architecture (degree of polymerisation, co-monomer composition, length
of the nucleobase-containing block), the ratio between complementary nucleobases, and the impact of
H-bond competitors on the self-assembly properties were investigated. Light scattering techniques (SLS,
DLS) and transmission electron microscopy (TEM) were used to characterise the co-assembled objects.
This study demonstrates that the size of the resulting co-assemblies was mainly governed by the type and
content of nucleobases, and by the length of the nucleobase block. Moreover, the in vitro evaluation of
the nucleobase-containing polymers revealed that they were non-cytotoxic and hemocompatible. This
study increases the understanding of nucleobase pairing in artificial copolymer architectures which are
potential platforms for further use in biosciences.
Domaines
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