DNA Nanotechnology-Enabled Drug Delivery Systems

Abstract

Over the past decade, we have seen rapid advances in applying nanotechnology in biomedical areas including bioimaging, biodetection, and drug delivery. As an emerging field, DNA nanotechnology offers simple yet powerful design techniques for self-assembly of nanostructures with unique advantages and high potential in enhancing drug targeting and reducing drug toxicity. Various sequence programming and optimization approaches have been developed to design DNA nanostructures with precisely engineered, controllable size, shape, surface chemistry, and function. Potent anticancer drug molecules, including Doxorubicin and CpG oligonucleotides, have been successfully loaded on DNA nanostructures to increase their cell uptake efficiency. These advances have implicated the bright future of DNA nanotechnology-enabled nanomedicine. In this review, we begin with the origin of DNA nanotechnology, followed by summarizing state-of-the-art strategies for the construction of DNA nanostructures and drug payloads delivered by DNA nanovehicles. Further, we discuss the cellular fates of DNA nanostructures as well as challenges and opportunities for DNA nanostructure-based drug delivery.

Keywords

Affiliated Institutions

• Fudan University CN
• The First Affiliated Hospital, Sun Yat-sen University CN
• Shanghai Institute of Applied Physics CN
• Buchang Pharma (China) CN
• Chinese Academy of Sciences CN
• Zhongshan Hospital CN
• Sun Yat-sen University CN
• ShanghaiTech University CN
• Fudan University Shanghai Cancer Center CN

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