Facile Obtainment of Fluorescent PEG Hydrogels Bearing Pyrene Groups by Frontal Polymerization.

Frontal polymerization (FP) was used to prepare poly(ethylene glycol) methyl ether acrylate (PEGMA) fluorescent polymer hydrogels containing pyrenebutyl pendant groups as fluorescent probes. The polymerization procedure was carried out under solvent-free conditions, with different molar quantities of pyrenebutyl methyl ether methacrylate (PybuMA) and PEGMA, in the presence of tricaprylmethylammonium (Aliquat 336®) persulfate as a radical initiator. The obtained PEGPy hydrogels were characterized by FT-IR spectroscopy, confirming the effective incorporation of the PybuMA monomer into the polymer backbone. The thermal properties of the hydrogels were determined using thermogravimetric analysis (TGA) and differential scanning calorimetry (DSC). After immersing the hydrogels in deionized water at 25 °C and pH = 7, their swelling behavior was investigated by mass gain at different pH and temperature values. The introduction of PybuMA comonomer into the hydrogel resulted in a decreased swelling ability due to the hydrophobicity of PybuMA. The optical properties of PEGPy were determined by UV-visible absorption and fluorescence spectroscopies. Both monomer and excimer emission bands were observed at 379-397 and 486 nm, respectively, and the fluorescence spectra of the PEGPy hydrogel series were recorded in different solvents to explore the coexistence of monomer and excimer emissions.

Efficient modification of PAMAM G1 dendrimer surface with ß-cyclodextrin units by CuAAC: impact on the water solubility and cytotoxicity.

The toxicity of the poly(amidoamine) dendrimers (PAMAM) caused by the peripheral amino groups has been a limitation for their use as drug carriers in clinical applications. In this work, we completely modified the periphery of PAMAM dendrimer generation 1 (PAMAM G1) with ß-cyclodextrin (ß-CD) units through the Cu(i)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAC) to obtain the PAMAM G1-ß-CD dendrimer with high yield. The PAMAM G1-ß-CD was characterized by 1H- and 13C-NMR and mass spectrometry studies. Moreover, the PAMAM G1-ß-CD dendrimer showed remarkably higher water solubility than native ß-CD. Finally, we studied the toxicity of PAMAM G1-ß-CD dendrimer in four different cell lines, human breast cancer cells (MCF-7 and MDA-MB-231), human cervical adenocarcinoma cancer cells (HeLa) and pig kidney epithelial cells (LLC-PK1). The PAMAM G1-ß-CD dendrimer did not present any cytotoxicity in cell lines tested which shows the potentiality of this new class of dendrimers.