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Gene delivery to human adult and embryonic cell-derived stem cells using biodegradable nanoparticulate polymeric vectors

Gene Therapy volume 16, pages 533–546 (2009)Cite this article

Abstract

Gene delivery to stem cells holds great potential for tissue regeneration and delivery of therapeutic proteins. The major barrier is the lack of safe and efficient delivery methods. Here, we report enhanced gene delivery systems for human stem cells using biodegradable polymeric vectors. A library of poly (β-amino esters) end-modified derivatives was developed and optimized for high transfection efficiency and low cytotoxicity for three human stem cell lines including human mesenchymal stem cells (hMSCs), human adipose-derived stem cells (hADSCs) and human embryonic stem cell-derived cells (hESCds). In the presence of 10% serum, leading end-modified C32 polymeric vectors exhibited significantly high transfection efficiency in hMSCs (27±2%), hADSCs (24±3%) and hESCds (56±11%), with high cell viability (87–97%) achieved in all cell types. Our results show that poly(β-amino esters) as a class, and end-modified versions of C32 in particular, are efficient polymeric vectors for gene delivery to both adult and embryonic-derived stem cells.

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Acknowledgements

We thank the NIH (R01-EB000244-27 and R01-DE016516-03) for funding. FY gratefully acknowledge the National Institutes of Health for National Research Service Award postdoctoral fellowship (1F32 AR056567-01). We also thank the laboratory of Professor Johnny Huard at the University of Pittsburgh for kindly providing us the DNA plasmid-encoding human vascular endothelial growth factor 165 used in this study.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Department of Chemical Engineering, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    F Yang, J J Green, L Keung, S-W Cho & R Langer

  2. Department of Chemical Engineering, University of California, Berkeley, CA, USA

    T Dinio

  3. Department of Surgery, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA

    H Park

  4. Harvard-MIT Division of Health Science and Technology, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    R Langer

  5. David H Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA, USA

    R Langer & D G Anderson

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  1. F Yang
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Correspondence to D G Anderson.

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Supplementary Information accompanies the paper on Gene Therapy website (http://www.nature.com/gt)

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Yang, F., Green, J., Dinio, T. et al. Gene delivery to human adult and embryonic cell-derived stem cells using biodegradable nanoparticulate polymeric vectors. Gene Ther 16, 533–546 (2009). https://doi.org/10.1038/gt.2008.182

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