Proof-of-Concept of Electrical Activation of Liposome Nanocarriers: From Dry to Wet Experiments

Laura Caramazza; Martina Nardoni; Annalisa De Angelis; Patrizia Paolicelli; Micaela Liberti; Francesca Apollonio; Stefania Petralito

doi:10.3389/fbioe.2020.00819

Proof-of-Concept of Electrical Activation of Liposome Nanocarriers: From Dry to Wet Experiments

Front Bioeng Biotechnol. 2020 Jul 23:8:819. doi: 10.3389/fbioe.2020.00819. eCollection 2020.

Authors

Laura Caramazza^{1

2}, Martina Nardoni³, Annalisa De Angelis², Patrizia Paolicelli³, Micaela Liberti^{1

2}, Francesca Apollonio^{1

2}, Stefania Petralito³

Affiliations

¹ ICEmB at DIET, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy.
² Center for Life Nano Science@Sapienza, Istituto Italiano di Tecnologia, Rome, Italy.
³ Department of Drug Chemistry and Technologies, Sapienza University of Rome, Rome, Italy.

Abstract

The increasing interest toward biocompatible nanotechnologies in medicine, combined with electric fields stimulation, is leading to the development of electro-sensitive smart systems for drug delivery applications. To this regard, recently the use of pulsed electric fields to trigger release across phospholipid membranes of liposomes has been numerically studied, for a deeper understanding of the phenomena at the molecular scale. Aim of this work is to give an experimental validation of the feasibility to control the release from liposome vesicles, using nanosecond pulsed electric fields characterized by a 10 ns duration and intensity in the order of MV/m. The results are supported by multiphysics simulations which consider the coupling of three physics (electromagnetics, thermal and pore kinetics) in order to explain the occurring physical interactions at the microscopic level and provide useful information on the characteristics of the train of pulses needed to obtain quantitative results in terms of liposome electropermeabilization. Finally, a complete characterization of the exposure system is also provided to support the reliability and validity of the study.

Keywords: controlled release; electropermeabilization; electroporation; exposure systems; liposome vesicles; multiphysics modeling; nanosecond pulsed electric fields.