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Published May 15, 1991 | public
Journal Article

Photoinduced, polyelectrolyte-driven release of contents of phosphatidylcholine bilayer vesicles

Abstract

We report herein a new approach to the photoinduced release of contents of lipid bilayer vesicles. The method builds on prior work from this laboratory, in which it was shown that adsorption of the hydrophobic polyelectrolyte poly(2-ethylacrylic acid) (PEAA, 1) on phosphatidylcholine (PC, 2) membranes causes conversion of the lipid from vesicular to mixed micellar form. The adsorption of PEAA and the attendant vesicle-to-micelle transition are driven by increasing proton concentration, such that PC vesicles that are resistant to leakage at pH 7.4 can be induced to release their contents rapidly and quantitatively upon mild acidification. In the work described herein, we have used 3,3'-dicarboxydiphenyliodonium salts (3) as water-soluble, photosensitive proton sources. Irradiation of vesicular PC suspensions prepared in dilute aqueous solutions of 1 and 3 results in rapid loss of vesicle contents.

Additional Information

© 1991 American Chemical Society. Received January 18, 1991; Revised Manuscript Received March 18, 1991. This work was supported by US. Army Research Office Grant DAAL03-88-K-0038.

Additional details

Created:
August 20, 2023
Modified:
October 19, 2023