Hydrogels incorporating donor–acceptor Stenhouse adducts as a platform for photoinduced, on‐off switchable release of small molecule cargos
Author(s)
Type
Journal Article
Abstract
Modulating biomaterial properties using light holds great promise for biomedical applications, such as drug delivery, as it is non-invasive and offers both spatial and temporal control. Visible light is particularly salient for stimulation of cell-interfacing materials, as it is cyto-compatible; however, this limits the number of photoswitches appropriate for these applications. In this work, we use donor–acceptor Stenhouse adduct (DASA) functionalized polymers comprising poly(ethylene glycol)-b-poly(hexyl methacrylate) to make visible light-responsive polymersomes, and use these to encapsulate a model drug cargo. We demonstrate that release of the model cargo can be triggered using visible light when the polymersomes are loaded into poly(ethylene glycol) hydrogels. Moreover, ON/OFF switchable cargo release was demonstrated by modulating the light stimulation of the hydrogel. We envisage this could be used to dynamically modulate hydrogel properties in clinically relevant applications for controlled delivery of small molecule therapeutic agents, such as advanced in vitro tissue models and implantable drug-eluting scaffolds.
Date Issued
2026-04-17
Date Acceptance
2026-01-19
Citation
Macromolecular Rapid Communications, 2026, 47 (8)
ISSN
1022-1336
Publisher
Wiley
Journal / Book Title
Macromolecular Rapid Communications
Volume
47
Issue
8
Copyright Statement
© 2026 The Author(s). Macromolecular Rapid Communications published by Wiley-VCH GmbH This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited.
License URL
Identifier
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pubmed/41619178
Subjects
Donor–acceptor Stenhouse adducts
Drug release
Hydrogels
Photoswitches
Polymersomes
Hydrogels
Light
Polyethylene Glycols
Drug Liberation
Methacrylates
Drug Delivery Systems
Publication Status
Published
Coverage Spatial
Germany
Article Number
e00868
Date Publish Online
2026-01-31