Amino acid and poly(ethylene glycol) based self-organizing polymeric systems: Chemo-enzymatic synthesis and characterization

A chemo/regio selective enzymatic methodology has been designed to synthesize amphiphilic copolymers based on amino acid diesters and poly(ethylene glycol) [PEG]. The condensation polymerization was catalyzed by immobilized Candida antarctica lipase B (Novozyme 435) under solvent-less conditions. The synthesized polymers 3a-c were derivatized with long chain acid chlorides by chemical acylation to get the amphiphilic polymers 4a-c. The physical properties of the synthesized amphiphilic polymers viz: aggregation number, critical micelle concentration (CMC), radius of gyration (R-g), hydrodynamic radius (R-h) and particle size distribution were studied by static and dynamic light scattering (SLS and DLS) techniques. The polymers were found to be promising in drug delivery applications.