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Attoliter protein nanogels from droplet nanofluidics for intracellular delivery.

Accepted version
Peer-reviewed

Type

Article

Change log

Abstract

Microscale hydrogels consisting of macromolecular networks in aqueous continuous phases have received increasing attention because of their potential use in tissue engineering, cell encapsulation and for the storage and release of cargo molecules. However, for applications targeting intracellular delivery, their micrometer-scale size is unsuitable for effective cellular uptake. Nanoscale analogs of such materials are thus required for this key area. Here, we describe a microfluidics/nanofluidics-based strategy for generating monodisperse nanosized water-in-oil emulsions with controllable sizes ranging from 2500 ± 110 nm down to 51 ± 6 nm. We demonstrate that these nanoemulsions can act as templates to form protein nanogels stabilized by supramolecular fibrils from three different proteins. We further show that these nanoparticles have the ability to penetrate mammalian cell membranes and deliver intracellular cargo. Due to their biocompatibility and lack of toxicity, natural protein-based nanoparticles present advantageous characteristics as vehicles for cargo molecules in the context of pharmaceutical and biomedical applications.

Description

Keywords

Animals, Equipment Design, Humans, Microfluidics, Nanogels, Nanoparticles, Nanotechnology, Proteins

Journal Title

Sci Adv

Conference Name

Journal ISSN

2375-2548
2375-2548

Volume Title

6

Publisher

American Association for the Advancement of Science (AAAS)

Rights

All rights reserved
Sponsorship
Biotechnology and Biological Sciences Research Council (BB/J002119/1)
European Research Council (337969)
European Commission Horizon 2020 (H2020) Future and Emerging Technologies (FET) (766972)