Degradation of poly(β-amino ester) gels in alcohols through transesterification: Method to conjugate drugs to polymer matrices

Poly(β amino ester) (PβAE) polymers have received growing attention in the literature, owing to their ease of synthesis, versatile co-monomer selection, and highly tunable degradation kinetics. As such, they have shown extensive potential in many biomedical applications as well. In this work, it is demonstrated for the first time that PβAE polymers containing primary and secondary amine groups can undergo degradation by primary alcohols via transesterification mechanism. While this work emphasizes an important aspect of solvent compatibility of these networks, it also represents an interesting, simple mechanism for post synthesis drug incorporation, with riboflavin conjugation being demonstrated as a model compound.