Photo-responsive Self-Reducible Polymers: Overcoming the Spatiotemporal Barriers for Hypersensitivity
Chuang Weng, Haodong Chen, Taoran Xu, Zifen Li, Xinfu Liu, Mingming Ding, Qin Zhang, Hong Tan, Qiang Fu
Abstract
To overcome the spatiotemporal barriers to conventional stimuli-responsive polymeric materials, we report a photo-responsive self-reducible polymer with a built-in photo-locked stimulus precursor derived from dithiothreitol. The smart polymer could hierarchically self-assemble into a layered vesicular structure in an aqueous solution, and undergo a self-cleavage of l-cystine residues in the backbone, in response to reducing moieties uncaged by ultraviolet light in the side chains. The photo-generation of stimulus in situ can potentially overcome the steric hindrance and temporal limitation, leading to a site-specific and ultrafast release of payloads for effective delivery of therapeutics. Our work provides a new approach to the development of smart responsive biodegradable polymers.