Patent ID: 8642787

Claim:
A method, comprising: independently covalently attaching by a ring opening reaction a first cyclic carbonyl monomer to three or more independent nucleophilic surface groups of a nanostructure selected from the group consisting of i) macromolecules selected from the group consisting of crosslinked polymers, latexes, hyperbranched polymers, dendrimers, dendrons, cyclodextrins, and combinations of the foregoing materials and ii) inorganic materials, thereby forming a first modified nanoparticle, the first modified nanoparticle comprising three or more initiator groups produced by the ring opening of the first cyclic carbonyl monomer; and initiating a ring opening polymerization of one or more cyclic carbonyl monomers by the three or more initiator groups, thereby forming a surface modified nanoparticle comprising three or more independent surface branches, wherein each of the three or more independent surface branches comprises a first polymer produced by the ring opening polymerization; wherein the first cyclic carbonyl monomer has formula (12): wherein each Y is independently selected from the group consisting of —O—, —NH—, and —S—, R 5 and R 6 are independent monovalent radicals selected from the group consisting of hydrogen, and monovalent hydrocarbon radicals comprising 1 to 30 carbons, and M 1 is a monovalent radical selected from the group consisting of —OR 1 , —NHR 1 , —NR 1 R 1 , and —SR 1 , wherein R 1 is a monovalent radical.