Biodegradable Highly Branched Poly(β-Amino Ester)s for Targeted Cancer Cell Gene Transfection

Shuai Liu; Yongsheng Gao; Sigen A; Dezhong Zhou; Udo Greiser; Tianying Guo; Rui Guo; Wenxin Wang

doi:10.1021/acsbiomaterials.6b00503

Biodegradable Highly Branched Poly(β-Amino Ester)s for Targeted Cancer Cell Gene Transfection

ACS Biomater Sci Eng. 2017 Jul 10;3(7):1283-1286. doi: 10.1021/acsbiomaterials.6b00503. Epub 2016 Oct 26.

Authors

Shuai Liu^{1

2}, Yongsheng Gao¹, Sigen A¹, Dezhong Zhou¹, Udo Greiser¹, Tianying Guo², Rui Guo³, Wenxin Wang¹

Affiliations

¹ Charles Institute of Dermatology, School of Medicine, University College Dublin, Belfield, Dublin 4, Ireland.
² Key Laboratory of Functional Polymer Materials, Ministry of Education, Institute of Polymer Chemistry, College of Chemistry, Nankai University, 300071, Tianjin, China.
³ Department of Biomedical Engineering, Jinan University, 510632, Guangzhou, China.

PMID: 33440516
DOI: 10.1021/acsbiomaterials.6b00503

Abstract

To enhance the gene transfection efficiency to targeted cells while reducing the side effects to untargeted cells is of great significance for clinical gene therapy. Here, biodegradable highly branched poly(β-amino ester)s (HPAESS) are synthesized and functionalized with folate (HPAESS-FA) and lactobionic acid (HPAESS-Lac) for targeted cancer cell gene transfection. Results show that because of the triggered degradability of the vector and enhanced receptor-mediated cellular uptake of polyplexes, the HPAESS-FA and HPAESS-Lac exhibit superior gene transfection capability in specific cancer cells with negligible cytotoxicity, pointing to their promise as targeted vectors for efficient cancer gene therapy.

Keywords: biodegradable; cancer cells; gene transfection; highly branched poly(β-amino ester)s; targeting.