Colloidal Jamming by Interfacial Self‐Assembled Polymers: A Robust Route for Ultrahigh Efficient Encapsulation
Qingqing Huo, Yue Gao, Wenbo Wu, S. P. Hu, Zifan Zhang, Zhi Li, Yuling Tian, Peng Quan, Wen J. Li, Dongfei Liu
Abstract
The control of cargo phase-transfer is of interest for many applications in science and technology. Herein, we report a simple, versatile and robust method to block the phase-transfer of cargo colloids by interfacial self-assembled amphiphilic polymer molecules. After simply increasing the concentration of amphiphilic polymers, the orientation of interfacial polymer molecules changed from flat to upright, forming a thick three-dimensional polymer layer at the oil-water interface. Even under fierce external force, this thick interfacial layer robustly prevented the phase-transfer of cargo colloids, resulting in an ultrahigh encapsulation efficiency (up to 97.1 %) for proteins and peptides. One single injection of high insulin-loaded microcomposites (58.3 wt%) kept the blood glucose level within the normoglycemic state for 10 days in type 1 diabetic rats. The mass of administrated amphiphilic polymers was 1889 times smaller than that of microcomposites prepared with non-amphiphilic ones.