Abstract

Among drug delivery systems, polymer microspheres have been proved to be the most promising carriers during the past several years. In this paper we describe the preparation of poly(L-lactide-co-glycolide-co-ε-caprolactone) (PLLGC) random terpolymer microspheres; their in-vitro degradation behaviors, including the changes of pH value, mass loss, molecular mass and surface morphology, were investigated during various degradation periods and compared with poly(lactic-co-glycolic acid) (PLGA) microspheres. The results showed that the introduction of the ε-caprolactone (ε-CL) unit reduced the degradation rate of the PLGA polymers. Therefore, we suggest the PLLGC microspheres with controllable degradation rate could supply a wider application future in drug delivery field than pure PLGA microspheres.

摘要

在药物输送系统中，聚合物微球在过去几年中被证明是最有前途的载体。在本文中，我们描述了聚（L-丙交酯-乙交酯-ε-己内酯）（PLLGC）无规三元共聚物微球的制备；在不同降解期间研究了它们的体外降解行为，包括pH值的变化，质量损失，分子质量和表面形态，并与聚乳酸-乙醇酸（PLGA）微球进行了比较。结果表明，ε-己内酯（ε-CL）单元的引入降低了PLGA聚合物的降解率。因此，我们认为降解速率可控的PLLGC微球比纯PLGA微球可以在药物输送领域提供更广阔的应用前景。