Blue LED light-activated RAFT polymerization of PEG acrylate with high chain-end fidelity for efficient PEGylation

Abstract

A challenge in PEGylation strategies is the site-specific conjugation of peptides, proteins, and antibodies onto a “clickable” well-defined PEG architecture whilst retaining the therapeutic potency of the parent molecule. Here, we investigated several activation processes of reversible addition–fragmentation chain transfer (RAFT) polymerization to prepare well-defined brush poly(poly(ethylene glycol) methyl ether acrylate) (PPEGA) with a long backbone of up to DP = 50 and a high fraction of living chains at near-total conversions and therefore potential applicability in PEGylation. The thermal and UV light activation methods used in the RAFT polymerization of PEGA in DMF showed the loss of c..