Polymers Containing Side Chain Peptide Moieties

Polymers Containing Side Chain Peptide Moieties 

---

Polymers Containing Side Chain Peptide Moieties... 

There are in general two ways to synthesize side chain polymers, polymerization of peptide-functional monomers or introduction of the peptide moiety afterwards, by grafting. The latter technique is based on the synthesis of polymers containing some form of functionality in the side chain, normally an activated ester moiety, which can further react with a peptide. The most commonly used method for the polymerization of monomers containing active esters is free radical polymerization. In particular many activated acrylate esters have been polymerized in this manner [12] (Table 1) for use in a wide variety of applications, from the preparation of polymer drug conjugates [13,14] to supports for solid phase peptide synthesis [15,16]. 

The major drawback to using the grafting approach is that it is very difficult to achieve and/or determine 100% functionalization of the polymer side chains. To overcome this problem, another approach has been developed, in which the monomer already contains the peptide fragment of interest. Therefore, after polymerization, every monomer unit is inherently functionalized [21]. The disadvantage of this method is that synthesizing peptide-based monomers is not trivial, and compatibility issues between polymerization method and peptide moiety have to be taken into account. 

---