Synthesis of semicrystalline nanocapsular structures obtained by Thermally Induced Phase Separation in nanoconfinement.

ABSTRACT: Phase separation of a polymer solution exhibits a peculiar behavior when induced in a nanoconfinement. The energetic constraints introduce additional interactions between the polymer segments that reduce the number of available configurations. In our work, this effect is exploited in a one-step strategy called nanoconfined-Thermally Induced Phase Separation (nc-TIPS) to promote the crystallization of polymer chains into nanocapsular structures of controlled size and shell thickness. This is accomplished by performing a quench step of a low-concentrated PLLA-dioxane-water solution included in emulsions of mean droplet size <500 nm acting as nanodomains. The control of nanoconfinement conditions enables not only the production of nanocapsules with a minimum mean particle diameter of 70 nm bu

SUBMITTER: Torino E 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC5015022 | biostudies-literature | 2016 Sep

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature