Aliphatic polycarbonates: A new class of broadly applicable biologics

Abstract

Amongst these use cases for aliphatic polycarbonates, application to biomedicine requires the most diverse functional group arsenal. Although there exist over 700 1, 3- diols that can be transformed to 6-membered cyclic carbonates, the vast majority of reports use 2,2- bis(hydroxymethyl) propionic acid (bis-MPA) as a foundational building block owing to the cost, ease of installation of functional groups, and since the subsequent monomer is derivatized at the 5-position, distal to the polymerization site, polymerization conditions (ROP) tend to be universal. Similarly, inexpensive and readily available functional 1, 5- diols have been exploited as precursors to 8-membered cyclic carbonates. Transformation of these functional monomers and subsequent polymers have been applied to numerous applications that include drug, gene and cell delivery as well as the use of the polymer as a stand-alone therapeutic including antimicrobials, anticancer agents and antiviral therapies packaged as micelles, hydrogels or coacervates. Specifically, we address the multi-faceted problem of drug-resistance as well as other important concerns in disease treatment exploiting polymer science to develop novel macromolecular therapeutics for treating infectious disease and cancer. Overall, the field of macromolecular therapeutics offers significant promise for improving human health by applying the tools of polymer and supramolecular chemistries together with nanotechnology to create materials for precise, highly effective disease treatment that does not induce resistance.