Tunable UCST thermoresponsive copolymers based on natural glycyrrhetinic acid

Abstract Water-soluble thermoresponsive polymers present either upper critical solution temperature (UCST) or lower (LCST) depending on the location of their miscibility range with water at high temperatures low temperatures. Compared LCST polymers, water-soluble UCST are still less explored until now. In this work three copolymers P(AAm-co-GAA) were synthesized by copolymerizing two acrylamide monomers, (AAm) and functionalized natural glycyrrhetinic acid (GAA), using reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization. These exhibited typical behavior, phase transition could be easily tuned to around 37 °C for potential biological applications. Moreover, can adjusted not only content (GA) polymer concentrations, but also host-guest interactions between GA cyclodextrins (β- γ-CD). The suitable value biocompatible nature CDs may endow these practical applications in biomedical chemistry