Compartmentalization, i.e. the ability to create controlled volumes and separate molecules one from another is possibly the most important requisite for complex manipulations. Indeed, compartmentalization has been the first step to iso- late the building blocks of life and ensure the dynamic nature that today makes the complexity of any living system. For decades scientists have tried using many syn- thetic approaches to imitate such ability and one the most successful comes from mimicking the biological component responsible for the compartmentalization: the phospholipid.We are now able to synthesize macromolecular analogues of the phos- pholipid using advanced co-polymerization techniques. Copolymers that comprise hydrophilic and hydrophobic components (i.e. amphiphilic) can be designed to self assemble into membrane enclosed structures. The simplest of those is represented by a sac resulting from the enclosure of a membrane into a sphere: the vesicle. Vesicles made of amphiphilic copolymers are commonly known as polymersomes and are now one of the most important nanotechnological tool for many applica- tions spanning from drug delivery, gene therapy, medical imaging, electronics and nanoreactors. Herein we review the molecular properties, the fabrication processes and
CITATION STYLE
Massignani, M., Lomas, H., & Battaglia, G. (2010). Polymersomes: A Synthetic Biological Approach to Encapsulation and Delivery (pp. 115–154). https://doi.org/10.1007/12_2009_40
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