Search results for "Macromolecule"
showing 10 items of 235 documents
Polyaspartamide based hydrogel with cell recruitment properties for the local administration of hydrophobic anticancer drugs
2019
Abstract By exploiting the chemical versatility and the high water dispersibility of α,β-poly(N-2-hydroxyethyl)D,L-aspartamide, in this work, two different polymer derivatives were synthesized for the first time. Obtained macromolecules were characterized and used to produce hydrogels exploitable for the local release of hydrophobic anticancer drugs. The first derivative, bearing pendant β-cyclodextrins, was employed to solubilize tamoxifen, chosen as a model drug, and to produce a water soluble supramolecular complex, as evidenced through tamoxifen phase solubility studies. The second derivative, bearing pendant Cyclo(Arginine-Glyicine-Asparagine-D-Phenilyalanine-Cysteine) peptide moieties…
Catalytic one-handed helix-induction and memory of amphiphilic poly(biphenylylacetylene)s in water
2020
Abstract A series of amphiphilic biphenylylacetylene-based homo- and copolymers (PBPAs) carrying chiral and/or achiral oligo(ethylene glycol) pendants at the 4’-position of the biphenyl units were synthesized and the amplification of the macromolecular helicity through noncovalent and/or covalent chiral interactions followed by the memory of the helicity were investigated in both water and organic solvents. The macromolecular helicity was efficiently induced in the homopolymers of achiral monomers through specific encapsulation of a catalytic amount of hydrophobic chiral guests in water and their induced helicities were stably memorized in water after complete removal of the optically-activ…
Microfluidics and Macromolecules: Top-Down Analytics and Bottom-Up Engineering of Soft Matter at Small Scales
2016
Microfluidics is the art of creating and manipulating small portions of fluids. A typical variant of this art is fluid transport within small channels, either in form of laminar co-flow of miscible streams or in form of segmented-flow dripping and jetting of immiscible streams. Either method provides means to expose components of interest to defined local conditions such as spatially controlled concentration profiles that could not be established without the microfluidic auxiliaries. This ability renders microfluidics uniquely useful as both a method for advanced analytics and synthesis. This article sheds a spotlight on the use and utility of this method in macromolecular chemistry and phy…
A Monte Carlo Study of Knots in Long Double-Stranded DNA Chains.
2016
We determine knotting probabilities and typical sizes of knots in double-stranded DNA for chains of up to half a million base pairs with computer simulations of a coarse-grained bead-stick model: Single trefoil knots and composite knots which include at least one trefoil as a prime factor are shown to be common in DNA chains exceeding 250,000 base pairs, assuming physiologically relevant salt conditions. The analysis is motivated by the emergence of DNA nanopore sequencing technology, as knots are a potential cause of erroneous nucleotide reads in nanopore sequencing devices and may severely limit read lengths in the foreseeable future. Even though our coarse-grained model is only based on …
Controlling the semi-permeability of protein nanocapsules influences the cellular response to macromolecular payloads.
2021
Nanocapsules are an excellent platform for the delivery of macromolecular payloads such as proteins, nucleic acids or polyprodrugs, since they can both protect the sensitive cargo and target its delivery to the desired site of action. However, the release of macromolecules from nanocapsules remains a challenge due to their restricted diffusion through the nanoshell compared to small molecule cargo. Here, we designed degradable protein nanocapsules with varying crosslinking densities of the nanoshell to control the release of model macromolecules. While the crosslinking did not influence the degradability of the capsules by natural proteases, it significantly affected the release profiles. F…
Single Unlabeled Protein Detection on Individual Plasmonic Nanoparticles
2012
The ultimate detection limit in analytic chemistry and biology is the single molecule. Commonly, fluorescent dye labels or enzymatic amplification are employed. This requires additional labeling of the analyte, which modifies the species under investigation and therefore influences biological processes. Here, we utilize single gold nanoparticles to detect single unlabeled proteins with extremely high temporal resolution. This allows for monitoring the dynamic evolution of a single protein binding event on a millisecond time scale. The technique even resolves equilibrium coverage fluctuations, opening a window into Brownian dynamics of unlabeled macromolecules. Therefore, our method enables …
How Well Can Coarse-Grained Models of Real Polymers Describe Their Structure? The Case of Polybutadiene
2015
Coarse-graining of chemical structure of macromolecules in the melt is investigated using extensive molecular dynamics simulation data which are based on a united atom force-field model of polybutadiene. Systematically increasing the number, n, of the united atoms approximated by an effective coarse-grained monomer, we study the influence of degree of coarse-graining on the structure functions such as the segment-segment intermolecular and intramolecular correlation functions. These results are compared to Monte Carlo simulations of the corresponding coarse-grained bead-spring model and Chen-Kreglewski potential for chain molecules. In contrast to the atomistic chemically realistic model of…
On the applicability of density dependent effective interactions in cluster-forming systems
2016
We systematically studied the validity and transferability of effective, coarse-grained, pair potentials in ultrasoft colloidal systems. We focused on amphiphilic dendrimers, macromolecules which can aggregate into clusters of overlapping particles to minimize the contact area with the surrounding (implicit) solvent. Simulations were performed for both the monomeric and coarse-grained model in the liquid phase at densities ranging from infinite dilution up to values close to the freezing point. For every state point, each macromolecule was mapped onto a single interaction site and the effective pair potential was computed using a coarse-graining technique based on force-matching. We found e…
Stretching of Free Chains Confined in Concave Brush-Coated Nanocylinders
2012
The structure of a free flexible macromolecule confined in a cylindrical nanopore whose wall is coated by a polymer brush is studied by Monte Carlo simulation, varying the grafting density as well as the radius of the cylindrical pore. Because of this confinement, the free chain is stretched in axial direction; while for small grafting densities of the brush the end-to-end distance increases monotonously with decreasing pore radius, a nonmonotonic variation occurs for larger grafting densities. We show that this effect is due to strong interpenetration of the free chain and the brush chains; for very narrow pores a strong layering of cylindrical shells is found, and comparison with self-con…
Local Viscosity in the Vicinity of a Wall Coated by Polymer Brush from Green-Kubo Relations
2008
When fluids are confined in slit pores between parallel walls, their static structures and their dynamical properties exhibit inhomogeneity in the z-direction perpendicular to the wall. Of particular interest are local bulk viscosity η b (z) and shear viscosity η s (z). Here, we discuss an algorithm to estimate these quantities from Green-Kubo relations using equilibrium molecular dynamics. As an application example, a polymer brush (macromolecules end-grafted to a substrate at z= 0) interacting with a solvent formed from point-like particles is given.