Natural or Synthetic RNA Delivery: A Stoichiometric Comparison of Extracellular Vesicles and Synthetic Nanoparticles

Overview

Journal Nano Lett

Publisher American Chemical Society

Specialty Biotechnology

Date 2021 Feb 11

PMID 33570966

Citations 52

Authors

Daniel E Murphy

Olivier G de Jong

Martijn J W Evers

Maratussholikhah Nurazizah

Raymond M Schiffelers

Pieter Vader

Affiliations

Soon will be listed here.

Abstract

RNA therapeutics have high potential that is yet to be fully realized, largely due to challenges involved in the appropriate delivery to target cells. Extracellular vesicles (EVs) are lipid bound nanoparticles released by cells of all types and possess numerous features that may help overcome this hurdle and have emerged as a promising RNA delivery vehicle candidate. Despite extensive research into the engineering of EVs for RNA delivery, it remains unclear how the intrinsic RNA delivery efficiency of EVs compares to currently used synthetic RNA delivery vehicles. Using a novel CRISPR/Cas9-based RNA transfer reporter system, we compared the delivery efficiency of EVs to clinically approved state-of-the-art DLin-MC3-DMA lipid nanoparticles and several transfection reagents. We found that EVs delivered RNA several orders of magnitude more efficiently than these synthetic systems. This finding supports the continued research into EVs as potential RNA delivery vehicles.

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