Polymer-based micelles for gene delivery

Acrylate and acrylamide based block copolymers with cationic, anionic, hydrophilic and hydrophobic functional groups were synthesized via RAFT polymerization and assembled into micelles. The combination of different functional groups in one block copolymer composition and by mixing different (block) polymers was investigated regarding their performance as non-viral gene delivery systems. Fixation of the micelle structure by core-crosslinking resulted in higher gene expression. This demonstrated the benefit of micelles as nanocarriers compared to polyplexes. The structure-property study revealed that covalent incorporation of anionic charges in the cationic block copolymer and incorporation by mixing has the potential to increase biocompatibility and transfection efficiency.