Self-beating artificial cells: design of cross-linked polymersomes showing self-oscillating motion

Ryota Tamate; Takeshi Ueki; Ryo Yoshida

doi:10.1002/adma.201404757

Self-beating artificial cells: design of cross-linked polymersomes showing self-oscillating motion

Adv Mater. 2015 Feb 4;27(5):837-42. doi: 10.1002/adma.201404757. Epub 2014 Dec 15.

Authors

Ryota Tamate¹, Takeshi Ueki, Ryo Yoshida

Affiliation

¹ Department of Materials Engineering, School of Engineering, The University of Tokyo, 7-3-1 Hongo, Bunkyo-ku, Tokyo, 113-8656, Japan.

PMID: 25504232
DOI: 10.1002/adma.201404757

Abstract

Biomimetic cross-linked polymersomes that exhibit a self-beating motion without any on-off switching are developed. The polymersomes are made from a well-defined synthetic thermoresponsive diblock copolymer, and the thermoresponsive segment includes ruthenium catalysts for the oscillatory chemical reaction and vinylidene groups to cross-link the polymersomes. Autonomous volume and shape oscillations of the cross-linked polymersomes are realized following redox changes of the catalysts.

Keywords: artificial cell; biomimetics; block copolymer; polymersome; self-oscillation.