Localized Functionalization of Individual Colloidal Carriers for Cell Targeting and Imaging

Abstract

Fabricating drug particles for therapeutic delivery and imaging presents important challenges in the design of the particle surfaces. Drug nanoparticle surfaces are currently functionalized with site-specific targeting ligands, biocompatible polymers, or fluorophore-polymer conjugates for specific imaging. However, if these functionalizations were to be synthesized on the drug carrier in localized, nanoscale regions on the particle surface, new schemes of drug delivery could be realized. Here we describe the use of our particle lithography technique that enables the synthesis of individual colloidal carrier assemblies that can be imaged and targeted to integrin-expressing cells. We show localized adhesion specificity for cells expressing the target integrin followed by receptor-mediated endocytosis. With the addition of localized delivery by adding drug nanoparticles to a specific region on the particle surface, our colloidal carrier assemblies have the potential to target, deliver therapeutic agents to, sense, and image diseased endothelium.

The Shape of Things to Come: Importance of Design in Nanotechnology for Drug Delivery

“…They demonstrate many key attributes of RBCs including size, shape, elastic modulus, ability to deform under flow and oxygen-carrying capacity [30]. Drug carriers having multifunctional targeting and imaging capabilities have been fabricated using particle lithography techniques, allowing a nanoscale precision for site-specific chemical modifications on the surface of colloidal NPs [31]. …”

Biocompatible, Luminescent Silver@Phenol Formaldehyde Resin Core/Shell Nanospheres: Large‐Scale Synthesis and Application for In Vivo Bioimaging

“…[35] Polymer fluorescent microspheres have been applied in biomedicine, and scintillation proximity assay (SPA) is one of the techniques that utilizes fluorescent microspheres as a vital support agent. [54] Here, the surface of the polymer spheres has many hydroxyl groups according to the polymerization mechanism and the FTIR results.…”

“…[19,[31][32][33][34] Currently, particles with a size in the micro-or nanometer scale have been widely applied in cell delivery, cell targeting, and bioimaging. [35] From the viewpoint of applications in biotechnology, the particles must meet several requirements: i) precise control of particle composition and sizes across the endocytic/phagocytic size ranges, ii) prevention of particle-to-particle aggregation and fusion, iii) control of the surface chemistry for functionalization and dispersion, and iv) biocompatibility and low toxicity. [36] Although semiconductor quantum dots [37][38][39][40] or nanorods [41] have been developed to address the gap, their disadvantages, such as toxity (they could not be biocompatible until conjugated with polymers [42] or coated with silica [43] ), inefficient delivery, short circulation half life for in vivo imaging, [42] limit their widespread application.…”

Facile Fabrication of Anisotropic Colloidal Particles with Controlled Shapes and Shape Dependence of Their Elastic Properties

“…Therefore, preparation of colloidal particles with shape anisotropy has attracted considerable attention from scientists. In the past few decades, colloidal particles with anisotropic shapes such as ellipsoids, dumbbells, discs, and other complex geometries have been prepared by several research groups through various techniques such as mechanical stretching and the seeded polymerization . However, there is still a great challenge for scientists to obtain anisotropic colloidal particles with various shapes in an effective and controllable way.…”

“…complex geometries have been prepared by several research groups through various techniques such as mechanical stretching and the seeded polymerization. [12][13][14][15][16][17][18][19][20][21][22] However, there is still a great challenge for scientists to obtain anisotropic colloidal particles with various shapes in an effective and controllable way. Many synthetic methods reported in previous works need much heat, complex processing parameters, and long-time treatment.…”