Effect of surface decoration on properties and drug release ability of nanogels

Nanogels are a central class of biomaterials widely used in the field of drug delivery for the treatment of different pathologies such as tumors, cardiovascular diseases or central nervous system disorders. The great peculiarity of these systems is that, if properly surface functionalized, they are able to target specific body tissues and exploit precise targeted drug delivery. Anyway, the presence of a surface layer on the nanoparticle core can affect not only the biological behavior of the whole system but also its physical and drug delivery properties. In this work we investigated how the presence of different surface functionalization strategies on the same PEG-PEI nanogel framework influences the aforementioned peculiarities. The nanogels were functionalized with amine and pyridinic groups, while the properties analyzed and compared were the hydrodynamic diameter, the zeta-potential and the drug release ability. Moreover, we performed the evaluation of the cytocompatibility of the final nano-carrier and a molecular analysis of the surface features of these systems at microscopic level.