Micellar Carriers of Active Substances Based on Amphiphilic PEG/PDMS Heterograft Copolymers: Synthesis and Biological Evaluation of Safe Use on Skin

Abstract

Amphiphilic copolymers containing polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS) and polyethylene glycol methyl ether (MPEG) were obtained via an azide-alkyne cycloaddition reaction between alkyne-functionalized copolymer of MPEG methacrylate and azide-functionalized PDMS. “Click” reactions were carried out with an efficiency of 33–47% increasing grafting degrees. The grafted copolymers were able to carry out the micellization and encapsulation of active substances, such as vitamin C (VitC), ferulic acid (FA) and arginine (ARG) with drug loading content (DLC) in the range of 2–68% (VitC), and 51–89% (FA or ARG). In vitro release studies (phosphate buffer saline, PBS; pH = 7.4 or 5.5) demonstrated that the maximum release of active substances was mainly after 1–2 h. The permeability of released active substances through membrane mimicking skin evaluated by transdermal tests in Franz diffusion cells indicated slight diffusion into the solution (2–16%) and their remaining in the membrane. Studies on the selected carrier with FA showed no negative effect on cell viability, proliferation capacity or senescence, as well as cell apoptosis/necrosis differences or cell cycle interruption in comparison with control cells. These results indicated that the presented micellar systems are good candidates for carriers of cosmetic substances according to physicochemical characterization and biological studies.

Dopant-Dependent Electrical and Biological Functionality of PEDOT in Bioelectronics

“…Most cell death occurred by necrosis (6%), and only less than 1% entered the physiological apoptosis phase. It is supposed that this cell death distribution might be just a characteristic of this specific cell line, as indicated in a previous study [66]. A high percentage of healthy cells was also noted for PEDOT/ClO 4 , with a similar level of necrotic cells as in the control group.…”

One-step synthesis of amphiphilic copolymers PDMS-b-PEG using tris(pentafluorophenyl)borane and subsequent study of encapsulation and release of curcumin

“…In addition, PR11 and PR12 exhibit advantages over other BCPs because the methodology to synthesize PR11 and PR12 was a one-step reaction in contrast to methods like reversible addition fragment chain-transfer (RAFT) polymerization, click chemistry accompanied with previous reactions, atom transfer radical polymerization, and RAFT accompanied with the ringopening polymerization, where they showed several synthesis steps to obtain the BCPs. [70][71][72][73]79,80 It is essential to highlight that our methodology saves time, effort, and cost compared to carrying out each reaction separately or several reaction steps. Therefore, reducing chemical reagents can increase efficiency and have a positive impact on the environment.…”