Abstract

　　Non-specific protein adsorption from complex biological media, especially from blood plasma, is an urgent challenge for the application of nanoparticles as delivery systems, diagnostics and other biomedical applications. The surface modification of nanoparticles by physically anchoring hydrophilic biocompatible polymers (A), by coating the NPs core with polymer brush layers with well-controlled thickness at the nanometer scale through ATRP techniques in water or phosphate buffered saline or by the synthesis of defined hydrophobic-hydrophilic block copolymers (B), are simple and commercially attractive approaches to produce drug-delivery systems resistant to nonspecific protein adsorption. Herein, we report the preparation, characterization and the evaluation of the interaction by placing the aforementioned systems in contact with complex biological media. Several techniques were employed, such as, dynamic (DLS), static (SLS) and electrophoretic (ELS) light-scattering techniques, as well as, isothermal titration calorimetry (ITC), circular dichroism (CD) spectroscopy and surface plasmon resonance (SPR).

Biosketch
　　P. Stepanek obtained his PhD from the Charles University in Prague in 1981. After a postdoctoral stay at Commissariat a l’Energie Atomique in Saclay (France) he took a position at the Institute of Macromolecular Chemistry in Prague. He spent a sabbatical year at the Department of Chemistry, University of Minnesota, Minneapolis (USA). His work represents a wide study of the structure and dynamics of many different polymer systems using a variety of experimental techniques, in particular scattering techniques: static and dynamic light scattering, small angle X-ray and neutron scattering. His current work includes research on polymer materials, their self-association properties and applications of self-associated polymer systems in bio-related research, polymer drug and radionuclide delivery systems (micellar, soluble polymers, nanoparticles, nanocapsules), dynamics of hydrophobic and hydrophilic polymers in dilute and concentrated solutions and in bulk, physicochemical characterization of polymeric systems.