title: Dendritic nanoglobules with polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane core and their biomedical applications.
abstract: Dendrimers have been recognized as promising materials for biomedical applications due to their unique properties, such as well-defined unimolecular structures, precise molecular weights and high degrees of branching and surface functionality. The dendrimers with a polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane core - nanoglobules - have many advantageous features over traditional dendrimers, including more functional groups at the same generation of dendrimers, well-defined 3D structures and relatively compact morphologies. Various nanoglobules of polyhedral oligomeric silsesquioxane-core dendrimers have been synthesized and investigated for biomedical applications. Nanoglobules have been used as carriers for developing drug-delivery systems, gene-delivery systems and imaging contrast agents with precisely defined structures and sizes. This article summarizes the recent developments in nanoglobules for biomedical applications.
authors.affiliation: Department of Biomedical Engineering, Case Western Reserve University, 10900 Euclid Avenue, Cleveland, OH 44106, USA.
authors.forename: Zhuxian
authors.initials: Z
authors.lastname: Zhou
authors.forename: Zheng-Rong
authors.initials: ZR
authors.lastname: Lu
mesh_terms: D003713:Dendritic Cells / Q000737:chemistry*; D006801:Humans; D049329:Nanostructures; D012821:Silanes / Q000737:chemistry*
chemical_list: D012821:Silanes
keywords: MRI contrast agent; POSS dendrimer; cancer molecular imaging; dendritic nanoglobules; drug and gene delivery; gadolinium; manganese(II); peptide-targeted; tumor extracellular environment