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Bionic Smart Polymers

A special issue of Molecules (ISSN 1420-3049). This special issue belongs to the section "Materials Chemistry".

Deadline for manuscript submissions: closed (30 September 2022) | Viewed by 8018

Special Issue Editor


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Guest Editor
State Key Laboratory of Medicinal Chemical Biology, Key Laboratory of Functional Polymer Materials (Ministry of Education), Collaborative Innovation Center of Chemical Science and Engineering (Tianjin), and College of Chemistry, Nankai University, Tianjin 300071, China
Interests: controlled/"living" radical polymerization; molecularly imprinted polymers; photoresponsive liquid crystalline polymers

Special Issue Information

Dear Colleagues,

Bionic smart polymers are a class of functional polymers prepared with a biologically inspired design method that have biomimetic properties, including stimuli-responsivity, self-healing, self-cleaning, molecular recognition, and biocompatibility. In recent years, there has been tremendous interest in these polymers because of their great potential for use in a wide range of valuable applications, such as sensors, actuators, smart wearable devices, self-cleaning coatings, and biomedical areas (e.g., drug delivery nanocarriers, non-invasive surgery and medical diagnosis devices, and tissue engineering). Current research efforts in this field are centered on the development of novel and versatile biomimetic strategies for the preparation of advanced bionic smart polymers with highly designable structures and multifunctionality, mainly through combining a deep understanding of chemical structures and fine micro/nanostructures in biological systems and the use of new synthetic techniques and materials from the polymer and materials science areas.

With this Special Issue, I intend to provide a platform for authors to demonstrate their recent research progress in this rapidly developing area. I believe this Special Issue will be of interest to a broad range of readers working in the fields of polymer chemistry, materials science, biomedical area, and engineering technology. Prospective authors are kindly encouraged to contribute research articles on the design, preparation, and applications of new bionic smart polymers, as well as reviews of related topics.

Prof. Dr. Huiqi Zhang
Guest Editor

Manuscript Submission Information

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Keywords

  • stimuli-responsive polymer
  • photodeformable polymer
  • shape memory polymer
  • self-healing polymer
  • self-cleaning coating
  • synthetic receptor
  • smart hydrogel

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Published Papers (2 papers)

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Research

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11 pages, 2222 KiB  
Article
Biomimetic Cascade Polymer Nanoreactors for Starvation and Photodynamic Cancer Therapy
by Shengda Liu, Tengfei Yan, Jianxin Sun, Fei Li, Jiayun Xu, Hongcheng Sun, Shuangjiang Yu and Junqiu Liu
Molecules 2021, 26(18), 5609; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules26185609 - 16 Sep 2021
Cited by 12 | Viewed by 3079
Abstract
The selective disruption of nutritional supplements and the metabolic routes of cancer cells offer a promising opportunity for more efficient cancer therapeutics. Herein, a biomimetic cascade polymer nanoreactor (GOx/CAT-NC) was fabricated by encapsulating glucose oxidase (GOx) and catalase (CAT) in a porphyrin polymer [...] Read more.
The selective disruption of nutritional supplements and the metabolic routes of cancer cells offer a promising opportunity for more efficient cancer therapeutics. Herein, a biomimetic cascade polymer nanoreactor (GOx/CAT-NC) was fabricated by encapsulating glucose oxidase (GOx) and catalase (CAT) in a porphyrin polymer nanocapsule for combined starvation and photodynamic anticancer therapy. Internalized by cancer cells, the GOx/CAT-NCs facilitate microenvironmental oxidation by catalyzing endogenous H2O2 to form O2, thereby accelerating intracellular glucose catabolism and enhancing cytotoxic singlet oxygen (1O2) production with infrared irradiation. The GOx/CAT-NCs have demonstrated synergistic advantages in long-term starvation therapy and powerful photodynamic therapy (PDT) in cancer treatment, which inhibits tumor cells at more than twice the rate of starvation therapy alone. The biomimetic polymer nanoreactor will further contribute to the advancement of complementary modes of spatiotemporal control of cancer therapy. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Bionic Smart Polymers)
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Review

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30 pages, 5868 KiB  
Review
Reprocessable Photodeformable Azobenzene Polymers
by Huiqi Zhang
Molecules 2021, 26(15), 4455; https://doi.org/10.3390/molecules26154455 - 23 Jul 2021
Cited by 13 | Viewed by 4224
Abstract
Photodeformable azobenzene (azo) polymers are a class of smart polymers that can efficiently convert light energy into mechanical power, holding great promise in various photoactuating applications. They are typically of crosslinked polymer networks with highly oriented azo mesogens embedded inside. Upon exposure to [...] Read more.
Photodeformable azobenzene (azo) polymers are a class of smart polymers that can efficiently convert light energy into mechanical power, holding great promise in various photoactuating applications. They are typically of crosslinked polymer networks with highly oriented azo mesogens embedded inside. Upon exposure to the light of appropriate wavelength, they experience dramatic order parameter change following the configuration change of the azo units. This could result in the generation and accumulation of the gradient microscopic photomechanical force in the crosslinked polymer networks, thus leading to their macroscopic deformation. So far, a great number of photodeformable azo polymers have been developed, including some unoriented ones showing photodeformation based on different mechanisms. Among them, photodeformable azo polymers with dynamic crosslinking networks (and some uncrosslinked ones) have aroused particular interest recently because of their obvious advantages over those with stable chemical crosslinking structures such as high recyclability and reprocessability. In this paper, I provide a detailed overview of the recent progress in such reprocessable photodeformable polymers. In addition, some challenges and perspectives are also presented. Full article
(This article belongs to the Special Issue Bionic Smart Polymers)
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