Synthesis and properties of amphiphilic and biodegradable poly(ε-caprolactone-<i>co</i>-glycidol) copolymers

Abstract

We have synthesized poly(ε-caprolactone-co-tert-butyl glycidyl ether) (CL-co-BGE) statistical copolymers using 1-tert-butyl-4,4,4-tris(dimethylamino)-2,2-bis [tris(dimethylamino)phophoranylidenamino]-2Λ5,4Λ5-catenadi(phosphazene) (t-BuP4) as the catalyst. The hydrolysis of the resulting polymers yields amphiphilic poly(ε-caprolactone-co-glycidol) (CL-co-GD) copolymers. By use of the quartz crystal microbalance with dissipation (QCM-D), we have investigated the enzymatic degradation of the copolymers. It is shown that the degradation rate increases with the content of hydrophilic (GD) units. (3-(4,5-Dimethylthiazol-2-yl)-2,5-diphenyl tetrazolium bromide) (MTT) assay experiments demonstrate that the CL-co-GD copolymers have low cytotoxicity. © 2015 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J. Polym. Sci., Part A: Polym. Chem. 2015, 53, 846–853