Issue 3, 2015

Hydrogen-bonding dramatically modulates the gene transfection efficacy of surface-engineered dendrimers

Abstract

Dendrimers have shown great promise in the design of efficient gene vectors. However, high transfection efficacy is usually associated with serious cytotoxicity for these cationic polymers. Here, we report a facile strategy to prepare surface-engineered dendrimers with a dramatic transfection efficacy and reduced cytotoxicity. Surface-engineered dendrimers with multiple hydrogen bonding ligands such as guanamine and nucleobase derivatives show superior efficacy and low cytotoxicity on commonly used cells as well as 3D tumor spheroids to representative transfection reagents such as Lipofectamine 2000. Complementary multiple hydrogen bonding interactions between the modified ligands and DNA nucleobases play essential roles in efficient gene transfection. The hydrogen-bond modulation strategy represents a promising tool in the design of highly efficient and less cytotoxic gene materials.

Graphical abstract: Hydrogen-bonding dramatically modulates the gene transfection efficacy of surface-engineered dendrimers

Supplementary files

Article information

Article type
Paper
Submitted
24 Sep 2014
Accepted
08 Dec 2014
First published
22 Dec 2014

Biomater. Sci., 2015,3, 500-508

Hydrogen-bonding dramatically modulates the gene transfection efficacy of surface-engineered dendrimers

N. Shao, H. Wang, B. He, Y. Wang, J. Xiao, Y. Wang, Q. Zhang, Y. Li and Y. Cheng, Biomater. Sci., 2015, 3, 500 DOI: 10.1039/C4BM00335G

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