A pH-responsive cleavage route based on a metal-organic coordination bond.

The physical or chemical event that generally causes stimuli responses is limited to the formation or destruction of secondary forces, such as hydrogen bonding, hydrophobic effects, electrostatic interactions, and simple reactions. Here, pH-responsive behavior of metal-organic coordination bonding, which is intrinsic to natural systems (e.g., transferrin recycling in cells), is becoming a strong candidate for a new stimulus-responsive route. We have designed a simple pH-responsive release system by integrating a metal ion and ligand or self-assembling these species with biodegradable host molecules to form nanoparticles with "metal-ligand" or "host-metal-ligand" architectures. The cleavage of either or both the "metal-ligand" or the "host-metal" coordination bond in response to pH variations causes significant damage to the nanoparticles and the subsequent release of ligand molecules under designated pH conditions.