A water-soluble conjugated polymer brush with multihydroxy dendritic side chains
作者：Li Zhou, Junlong Geng, Guan Wang, Jie Liu, Bin Liu
關鍵字：conjugated polymer，hyperbranched polyglycerol ，brush ，multihydroxy dendritic side chains
論文來源：期刊
具體來源：Polym. Chem. 2013, 4, 5243-5251
發表時間：2013年
A brush-like water-soluble conjugated polymer bearing a poly[9,9''-dihexylfluorene-co-alt-4,7-(2,1,3-benzothiadiazole)] (PFBT) backbone and multihydroxy hyperbranched polyglycerol (HPG) side chains is facilely synthesized by combination of "grafting from" strategy and the ring-opening polymerization (ROP) technique. The PFBT-g-HPG brush shows bright fluorescence in water with an emission maximum at 587 nm and a quantum yield of 15%. Laser light scattering (LLS), transmission electron microscopy (TEM) and atomic force microscopy (AFM) analyses reveal that PFBT-g-HPG adopts a spherical shape in water and a wormlike conformation in N,N-dimethylformamide (DMF). PFBT-g-HPG shows stable fluorescence against the variation of pH and ionic strength as well as interference of biomolecules. MCF-7 cancer cell imaging results show that the PFBT-g-HPG exhibits low cytotoxicity and high photostability, which allows fluorescence imaging in a high contrast manner. On the basis of the numerous hydroxyl groups of the grafted HPG, post-functionalization of PFBT-g-HPG could afford various PFBT-g-HPG-based brushes with adjustable surface functionality (e.g., carboxylic groups) and solubility. This study thus provides a versatile brush approach to water-soluble conjugated polymers for advanced sensing and imaging applications.