Water‐dispersible and soluble porous organic polymers for biomedical applications

Porous organic polymers (POPs) have become an emerging class of advanced porous organic materials owing to their structural diversity and tailored functions in solid state and organic media. Creating water-soluble and related water-dispersible POPs is still very challenging in the research area of porous organic materials. Their porosity-based functions with diverse topological architectures in aqueous media offer promising platforms in bio-related fields. This review highlights recent progress on water soluble or dispersible POPs for biomedical applications including bioimaging and biosensing, nanocarriers for drug delivery and tumor targeting, phototherapeutics, protein and gene delivery, biomacromolecule encapsulation and discrimination, and anti-microbial activity.