The synthesis of amphiphilic aggregation-induced emission (ALE) dyes based organic nanoparticles has recently attracted in- creasing attention in the biomedical fields. These AlE dyes based nanoparticles could effectively overcome the aggregation caused quenching effect of conventional organic dyes, making them promising candidates for fabrication of ultrabright organic luminescent nanomaterials. In this work, AIE-active luminescent polymeric nanoparticles (4-NH2-PEG-TPE-E LPNs) were facilely fabricated through Michael addition reaction between tetraphenylethene acrylate (TPE-E) and 4-arm-poly(ethylene glycol)-amine (4-NH2-PEG) in rather mild ambient. The 4-NH2-PEG can not only endow these AlE-active LPNs good water dispersibility, but also provide functional groups for further conjugation reaction. The size, morphology and luminescent prop- erties of 4-NH2-PEG-TPE-E LPNs were characterized by a series of techniques in detail. Results suggested that these AlE-active LPNs showed spherical morphology with diameter about 100-200 nm. The obtained 4-NH2-PEG-TPE-E LPNs display high water dispersibility and strong fluorescence intensity because of their self assembly and AlE properties of TPE-E. Biological evaluation results demonstrated that 4-NH2-PEG-TPE-E LPNs showed negative toxicity toward cancer cells and good fluorescent imaging performance. All of these features make 4-NHz-PEG-TPE-E LPNs promising candidates for biolog- ical imaging and therapeutic applications.
Jun ChuQiulan LvChunliang GuoDazhuang XuKe WangMeiying LiuHongye HuangXiaoyong ZhangYen Wei
Four kinds of poly(ethylene glycol) (PEG) derivatives with the similar backbone and different side groups have been synthesized successfully. When both catecholamine and double bond are tethered to polymer backbone, i.e., the PEG backbone, simultaneously, the polymer can accelerate the curing speed of ethyl a-cyanoacrylate (commer- cially available as 502) greatly under the same conditions (the curing time of such system is no more than 5 s). Probably this is due to the autoxidation of catecholamines. Through the redox-cycling, catecholamines can produce, collect free radicals, and thus initiate the free radical polymerization. Due to the fast-curing of such material when mixed with a-cyanoacrylate, we could design and develop a new bicomponent super bioglue used in the dentistry or other bioenvironment requiring super fast settlement for further surgical operations.