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Journal of Polymer & Composites Review Article

DEVELOPMENT OF POLYMERSOMES AS MACROMOLECULAR PLATFORMS FOR NANOMEDICINE

  1. Ashok Singh Yadav Department of Botany, Satish Chandra College, Ballia
  2. Seema Verma Department of Zoology, Satish Chandra College, Ballia
  3. Sahil Mehta Department of Botany, Hansraj College, University of Delhi
  4. Santosh Singh Yadav Department of Botany, Asha P.G College, sikhari ghazipur -275202
  5. Trivender Kumar Department of Chemistry, Satish Chandra College, Ballia

Abstract

The conventional method of drug delivery is plagued with instability, low targeting and low bioavailability. A solution to these shortcomings is the use of polymer Somes, artificial vesicles that are produced through self-assembly of amphiphilic block copolymer, and they are suggested as universal nanoscale carriers. They have stiff, tunable membranes (thickness = 2-50 nm) due to accurate control of polymer chemistry, chain length, and hydrophilic mass fraction (f), which allows predictability of the drug loading and programmable release kinetics. Stimuli-responsive Polymer Somes. Polymer Somes can be designed to be responsive to stimuli (pH, redox/ROS, temperature/LCST) and disease-specific (disease-signal) delivery by modulating block composition (e.g., PEG-b-PCL/PLA, PMOXA-b-PDMS), glass transition (Tg), and critical packing parameter. PEGylation of surfaces or zwitterionic coronas decreases opsonisation and increases circulation, whereas click-chemistry (azide-alkyne, thiol-maleimide) and EDC/NHS-based coupling allow site-specific functionalization with antibodies, peptides, sugars, vitamins or small molecules to result in receptor-mediated targeting and further endosomal escape. The use of degradable polyesters (PLA, PLGA, PCL) or ROS-cleavable blocks (PPS) gives controllable biodegradation and good pharmacokinetics. In contrast, RAFT/ATRP synthesis pathways give low-dispersity (Đ) materials that can be scaled up by microfluidics, dual asymmetric centrifugation, or tangential-flow processing. Polymer Somes mimic cellular membranes: they can be loaded with hydrophilic, hydrophobic and macromolecular cargos (proteins, peptides, nucleic acids) and reduce off-target toxicity by the rigidity of the membrane and steric stabilisation. This regulated discharge profile and biomimetic architecture locate polymer Somes as second-generation macromolecular platforms in nanomedicine, having the potential to repair and regenerate tissues in systemic environments. Their formation, structure-property-function, and workflow relationships, highly developed surface chemistry, and scalable production make them an important emerging part of developing highly efficient, targeted drug-delivery systems.

Keywords

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