Facile synthesis of Antibacterial, Biocompatible, quaternized Poly(ionic liquid)s with pendant saccharides

Glycopolymer has been developed in bactericidal applications, but the traditional synthesis, such as click chemistry, needs poly-step reactions and complicated processes. Herein, incorporating the glyco-units into the polymers by quaternization has been exploited to give a facile strategy by Copper-mediated reversible deactivation radical polymerization (Cu(0)-RDRP) to prepare quaternized poly(ionic liquid)s (PILs) with pendant saccharide. The obtained PILs have the suitable property of killing typical Gram-negative Escherichia coli and Gram-positive Staphylococcus aureus. Simultaneously, they perform the lower hemolytic rate of blood cells, higher selectivity index against bacteria, and higher affinity with Concanavalin A (ConA) than those quaternized by bromohydrin at the same quaternization degree. This result demonstrated that the introduced saccharide units, such as glucose and mannose, could maintain the electrostatic interaction to kill bacteria, perform lectin recognition behavior and interaction with ConA, and relatively harmlessness against red blood cells. Moreover, the sugar-containing PILs became insoluble and still antibacterial after anion exchange reaction. These new findings illuminated that such quaternized antibacterial agents with saccharide units that are easy-to-prepare, low cytotoxic could pave the way for further water disinfectant and pathogen control application.

Automated summary

By incorporating sugar units into polymers through copper-mediated reactions, quaternized poly(ionic liquid)s with pendant saccharide were prepared, showing high antibacterial properties and low cytotoxicity. These polymers demonstrated high selectivity against bacteria and could potentially pave the way for water disinfectant and pathogen control applications.