Unimolecular dendritic micelles designed as solubility enhancers were obtained by coupling polyethylene glycol (PEG) to Starburst(TM) polyamidoamine (PAMAM) dendrimers. Micelles-750, -2000, and -5000 have a generation 3.0 dendrimer core (32 primary amine end groups) and PEG arms with molecular weights of 750, 2000, and 5000, respectively. The conjugate of dendrimer core and PEG was characterized by MALDI-TOF MS and H-1 NMR. H-1 NMR was also used to estimate the average number of PEG arms on each dendrimer molecule. A typical hydrophobic compound, pyrene, was sonicated in an excess amount together with micelles at 50 degreesC for 6 h to produce its saturated water solution. The change of the solubility of pyrene was monitored at 334 nm, its maximum adsorption wavelength, by UV-VIS spectra. Concentrated micelles tended to dissolve more pyrene. However, there is no obvious linear relationship between micelle type and the amount of pyrene entrapped within micelles. Micelle-2000 could solubilize more pyrene than micelle-750. It is hypothesized that micelle-5000 did not solubilize more pyrene than micelle-2000 because of the PEG shell disruption by adjacent interpenetration of individual micelles when PEG arm length increased. (C) 2004 Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.