Specific delivery of chemotherapy drugs and magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) contrast agent into tumor cells is one of the issues to highly efficient tumor targeting therapy and magnetic resonance imaging. Here, A54 peptide-functionalized poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid)-grafted dextran (A54-Dex-PLGA) was synthesized. The synthesized A54-Dex-PLGA could self-assemble to form micelles with a low cri...

Unimolecular polymeric micelles have several features, such as thermodynamic stability, small particle size, biocompatibility, and the ability to internalize hydrophobic molecules. These micelles have recently attracted significant attention in various applications, such as nano-reactors, catalysis, and drug delivery. However, few attempts have explored the formation mechanisms and conditions o...

Peptide nucleic acid amphiphiles (PNAA) are a promising set of materials for sequence-specific separation of nucleic acids from complex mixtures. To implement PNAA in micellar separations, the morphology and size of PNAA micelles in the presence and absence of a sodium dodecyl sulfate (SDS) cosurfactant have been studied by small-angle X-ray scattering and dynamic light scattering. We find that...

Development of multidrug resistance against antitumor agents is a major limiting factor for the successful chemotherapy. Currently, both amphiphilic polymeric micelles and chemosensitizers have been proposed to overcome MDR during chemotherapy. Herein, the redox-responsive polymeric micelles composed of dextran and indomethacin (as chemosensitizer) using a disulfide bond as the linker are prepa...

It is generally assumed that polymeric micelles, upon administration into the blood stream, carry drug molecules until they are taken up into cells followed by intracellular release. The current work revisits this conventional wisdom. The study using dual-labeled micelles containing fluorescently labeled copolymers and hydrophobic fluorescent probes entrapped in the polymeric micelle core showe...

Present research is a preliminary report on the novel pH-responsive micelles based on an amphiphilic brush copolymer P(PEGMA)-b-P(DMAEMA-co-CPLAMA) used as the promising drug carrier. The copolymer was synthesized using cholesteryl poly(L-lactic acid) methacrylate (CPLAMA), poly(ethylene glycol) monomethyl ether methacrylate (PEGMA) and 2-(dimethylamino)ethyl methacrylate (DMAEMA) with appropri...

Zwitterionic polymers have unique features, such as good compatibility, and show promise in the application of drug delivery. In this study, the zwitterionic copolymers, poly(ε-caprolactone)-b-poly(2-methacryloyloxyethyl phosphorylcholine) with disulfide (PCL-ss-PMPC) or poly(ε-caprolactone)-b-poly(2-methacryloyloxyethyl phosphorylcholine) or without disulfide (PCL-PMPC) and with different bloc...

Since polymeric micelles are promising and have potential in drug delivery systems, people have become more interested in studying the compatibility of polymeric carriers and drugs, which might help them to simplify the preparation method and increase the micellar stability. In this article, we report that cationic amphiphilic drugs can be easily encapsulated into PEGylated phospholipid (PEG-PE...

Biodegradable amphiphilic poly (ethylene glycol) (PEG) based ether-anhydride terpolymer, consisting of PEG, 1, 3-bis (p-carboxyphenoxy) propane (CPP) and sebacic acid (SA), namely PEG-CPP-SA terpolymer, was employed to self-assemble into micelles by adding water into a solution of the terpolymer in tetrahydrofuran (THF). The shape of polyanhydride micelles can be regulated by simply adjusting t...

To improve the pharmacokinetics and stability of recombinant human erythropoietin (rhEPO), rhEPO was successfully formulated into poly(ethylene glycol)-poly(d,l-lactide) (PEG-PLA) di-block copolymeric micelles at diameters ranging from 60 to 200 nm with narrow polydispersity indices (PDIs; PDI < 0.3) and trace amount of protein aggregation. The zeta potential of the spherical micelles was in th...