Facile Surface Modification with Croconaine-Functionalized Polymer on Polypropylene for Antifouling and NIR-Light-Mediated Photothermal Sterilization.

Biomedical-device-associated infection (BAI) is undoubtedly a major concern and a serious challenge in modern medicine. Therefore, the development of biomedical materials that are capable of resisting or killing bacteria is of great importance. In this work, a croconaine-functionalized polymer with antifouling and near-infrared (NIR) photothermal bactericidal properties was prepared and facilely modified on polypropylene (PP) to combat medical device infections.

NIR-Photocontrolled Aqueous RAFT Polymerization with Polymerizable Water-Soluble Zinc Phthalocyanine as Photocatalyst.

In order to give an answer for the challenges of long wavelength-photocontrolled radical polymerization in aqueous solutions and to address the shortcomings of conventional near-infrared (NIR) photocatalysts (PCs) that are difficult to subject to post-treatment, we designed and synthesized a series of β-tetra-substituted water-soluble zinc phthalocyanines (β-TS-Zns) as the NIR PCs for reversible addition-fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization successfully under irradiation with NIR (λ = 730 nm) light at room temperature. Importantly, the NIR PCs can also be designed as polymerizable monomers and covalently loaded on the polymer chains, which are endowed with permanent NIR photocatalysis of the resultant polymers. Moreover, the polymerization can not only be carried out in water but also in phosphate buffer saline (PBS) solution, yielding polymers with controlled molar mass and narrow dispersities ( = 1.

Unimolecular micelles from star-shaped block polymers by photocontrolled BIT-RDRP for PTT/PDT synergistic therapy.

Unimolecular micelles (UIMs) exhibit promising potential in the precise diagnosis and accurate treatment of tumor tissues, a pressing problem in the field of medical treatment, because of their perfect stability in the complex and variable microenvironment. In this study, porphyrin-based four-armed star-shaped block polymers with narrow molar mass dispersity ( = 1.34) were facilely prepared by photocontrolled bromine-iodine transformation reversible-deactivation radical polymerization (BIT-RDRP).