Novel regular polyimide-graft-(polymethacrylic acid) brushes: Synthesis and possible applications as nanocontainers of cyanoporphyrazine agents for photodynamic therapy

An approach to the synthesis of new regular graft-copolymers polyimide (PI)-graft-polymethacrylic acid is elaborated, including (1) synthesis of multicenter PI macroinitiators, (2) controlled ATRP of tert-butylmethacrylate on the prepared macroinitiators, and (3) protonolysis of tert-butyl ester groups of side chains of the resulting PI-graft-poly(tert-butylmethacrylate). Experimental conditions for attaining complete conversions of the first and the third stages of the process are determined by means of 1H NMR and FTIR-spectroscopy. Polymer products of the first and the second stages of the process, as well as poly(tert-butylmethacrylate) side chains cleaved from the PI-graft-poly(tert-butylmethacrylate) copolymers by complete decomposition of the PI backbone under alkaline hydrolysis conditions, are characterized by GPC. The kinetics of poly(tert-butylmethacrylate) chain growth on a PI macroinitiator under ATRP conditions are studied. The results obtained provide evidence for the controlled character of the ATRP process and the regular structure of the synthesized graft-copolymers. It is shown that PI-g-PMAA PI brushes are significantly more efficient intracellular delivery agents for the potential photosensitizer [tetra(4-fluorophenyl)tetracyanoporhyrazine free base] than are the commonly used PEG-micelles. © 2013 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2013, 51, 4267–4281