Polymer conetworks, a class of nanophasic macromolecular assemblies: From synthesis to intelligent drug carriers, poly(ionic liquid) gels and highly active nanohybrid catalysts

Prof. Dr. Béla Iván, Research Centre for Natural Sciences, Budapest

Multicomponent polymer assemblies have gained significant interest over the years due to their special properties and to the large variety of application possibilities. Among such macromolecular materials, polymer conetworks, especially amphiphilic conetworks (APCNs), composed of chemically (covalently) bonded polymer chains, belong to a special class of rapidly emerging nanostructured materials with various unique structural features and characteristics. Due to the immiscibility of the components of APCNs, the synthesis of such macromolecular assemblies is quite challenging. Several successful synthetic routes have recently been developed by us, including various protection-deprotection schemes. Unique bicontinuous (cocontinuous) nanophase separated morphology exists in polymer conetworks in a broad composition window with domain sizes in the range of ~3-30 nm. This provides unprecedented possibilities to obtain various new specialty intelligent (smart, responsive) and organic solvent selective superabsorbent poly(ionic liquid) conetwork gels, and catalytically active special organic-inorganic nanohybrids by applying one of the nanophases as nanoreactor. These novel materials have a variety of high value-added potential applications from specialty nanohybrids to biomaterials, sensors, optical devices, organic superabsorbents, nanocatalysts etc.