Chemical degradation as an enabling pathway to polymersome functionalization.

Readiness and the ability to functionalize are the fundamental features of natural living systems. Understanding the chemical roots of functionalization is a basic quest for the generation of new materials in the laboratory and chemistry-based natural-life-mimicking artificial or synthetic living systems. Using polymerization-induced self-assembly (PISA) and starting from a homogeneous aqueous blend of a few strictly non-biochemical compounds, it is possible to create amphiphiles that can self-boot into submicron supramolecular objects (micelles).