Nanomedicine | Membraneless Organelle | Immunongineering | Ocular Delivery


POLYMERIC NANOCARRIERS &
​INTRACELLULAR TRAFFICKING 

​Intracellular delivery of therapeutics into living cells is related to the efficiency of nanomedicine. Therefore, we aim to design the next generation of nanocarriers by understanding intracellular trafficking and identifying strategies to target specific organelles. To this purpose, our lab has focused on:
  1. Identifying the internalization pathways of nanoparticles with different sizes and surface modifications;
  2. Tracking the intracellular localization of nanoparticles by chemically conjugating fluorophore to nanoparticles;
  3. Achieving subcellular targeting by modifying nanoparticles with short peptide ligands.

With these strategies, we showed that the intracellular delivery pathway is correlated with the surface ligands. For example, non-modified PEG-PCL nanoparticles utilize mainly clathrin-mediated endocytosis for cell entry, folate-labeled PEG-PCL nanoparticles of certain size range prefer caveolea-dependent pathways, and octaarginine-modified PEG-PCL nanoparticles enter the cell via macropinocytosis. ​

Related publications

  • Feng T.,Huang X., Ni, R., Suen WL, Chau Y. ,  Nanoparticles for drug delivery targeting neurodegeneration in brain and eye, Chapter 6, Nanomaterials for Drug Delivery and Therapy, Andrew William publishers, 2019,149-183
  • Kim M. , Feng T., Zhang Q., Chan H  and  Chau Y. ,Co-Encapsulation and Co-Delivery of Peptide Drugs via Polymeric Nanoparticles, Polymers 2019, 11, 288  DOI:10.3390/polym11020288
  • Zhou J, Ni R and Chau Y. "​Polymeric vesicle formation via temperature-assisted nanoprecipitation".RSC Adv. , 2017, 7 ,17997-18000 doi : 10.1039/C7RA01959A
  • Zhou J and Chau Y. "Different oligoarginine modifications alter endocytic pathways and subcellular trafficking of polymeric nanoparticles". Biomaterials Science. 2016. 4, 1462-1472
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