| abstract |
A polymer crosslinked by means of disulphide bonds and which degrades at low redox potential sites in the body (e.g. colon, the ischaemic heart, post-stroke brain, rheumatoid joints, tumours etc.) is used to form a delivery device for selective delivery of an active agent to the site. Monomers useful for producing disulphide crosslinked polymers are trithiiols of formula (I), where A = straight or branched alkyl, substituted or unsubstituted aryl, or substituted or unsubstituted heteroaryl; B = NH, NHCO or CONH; K = straight or branched alkyl; D = a bond, CONH-alkylidene or NHCO-alkylidene; R1 = H or NR12; R2 = H or COR11; R1 = H, alkyl, or an amino acid or peptide residue; R11 = OH, or an amino or peptide residue and alkyl is C¿1?-C6 alkyl. |