Nanocages Production
CD Bioparticles is a leading manufacturer and supplier of various drug delivery products, including nanocages for R&D and commercialization in a variety of application areas. Nanocages have played a vital role in the development and implementation of many useful tools for researches involving biology, chemistry and material sciences as well as nanomedicine.
Introduction to Nanocages
Nanocages refer to hollow nanostructures with porous walls, they have attracted greater attention as a new class of drug-carriers, as a result of their possibilities in multi-modality medical treatments and theranostics. Their excellent intrinsic properties, including porous structure, high loading capacity, smart release, surface tailorability, multi-functionality and low likelihood of unfavorable immune responses, have make nanocages one of the most attractive strategies to improve the delivery of therapeutic molecules.
Figure 1. A simple illustration of the formation of nanocages.
Key Features:
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Small dimension is a basic advantage to make nanocages widely used in therapeutic diagnostics. For example, Au nanocages are up to 40 nm in diameter compared to Au shells and Au core–shells (>100 nm) used as contrast agents.
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The hollow body structure and spacious interior of nanocages endow them high surface/volume ratio and thus higher loading capacity to encapsulate hundreds or even thousands of cargo molecules inside. Nanocages have a higher loading capacity than other nanoparticles.
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High toxicity caused by anti-cancer chemotherapy won’t be a problem in nanocage carriers. Therefore, a lower dose of nanocages is required to deliver high loading-capacity, a therapeutically effective dose of the drug.
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Thanks to their safe outer cages, they can minimize premature drug degradation or interaction with its biological environment and transport cargos to specific tissues.
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They can deliver relevant drugs to specific organs, even brain, or tissues, overcoming the blood–brain barrier, and preferentially extravasating from leaky cancer vasculatures and accumulating in tumor tissue (enhanced permeability and retention [EPR] effect), thereby allowing effective anticancer therapy with minimal toxicity.
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Higher efficiency, lower costs and proper outcome in intracellular delivery. Viral delivery of siRNA attracts much attention as a matter of safety concern, and nonviral delivery systems are being designed with equal efficiency, protein-based nanocages are now being researched as a carrier for siRNA.
Generally, nanocages can be divided into two groups as follows:
Table 1. Groups of nanocages and their advantages in summary.
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Types
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Advantages
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Organic nanocages
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Supramolecular nanosystems
Protein nanocages
Virus-like particles (VLPs)
DNA nanocages
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They show mild interaction with living cells, especially protein nanocages constructed from endogenous proteins. Protein nanocages are often not recognized as foreign. And they can be biologically or chemically engineered or modified using different approaches.
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Inorganic nanocages
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Gold nanocages
Silica nanocages
Carbon-based nanocages
Hybrid metal-organic nanocages
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High drug-loading capacity.
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Controllable drug loading and release kinetics.
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Flexible surface chemical modification.
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In vivo safety.
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Possibility of using luminescent, radioactive or magnetic reporter molecules for tracing.
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Above all, it is worth noted that protein nanocages are commonly used because of their construction from endogenous proteins such as ferritin, heat shock proteins, encapsulins, vault proteins. They perform biological roles in living cells, such as iron homeostasis by storage of excess iron in its core, catalysis of products in glucose metabolism, protective roles for DNA from oxidative damage and more. Many advantages of nanocages suggest their potential applications in multimodal treatments, multi-responsive release systems and theranostic applications.
Figure 2. Schematic illustration of various nanocaged platforms, their ability to target cells and intracellular delivery via receptor-mediated uptake. (Zangabad, P. S., et al. Nanoscale, 2017, 9(4), 1356-1392.)
Our Nanocages Featured Services
CD Bioparticles is specialized in the development of drug delivery systems and customizing nanoparticles for drug delivery utilizing our core technologies. With our high-quality products and services, the efficacy of your drug delivery can be tremendously improved.
We offer well-designed drug-loaded nanocage products as virus-like particles (VLPs), protein nanocages, DNA nanocages, supramolecular nanosystems, hybrid metal–organic nanocages, gold nanocages, carbon-based nanocages and silica nanocages. Clients may select the material type, particle size, size distribution, and/or surface functional groups such as carboxyl or amine groups. And we also provide custom services for designing and synthesizing nanocages with special required drugs loading, together with its analysis and characterization before and after drug encapsulation.
Quotations and Ordering
References:
1. Zangabad, P. S., et al. Nanocaged platforms: modification, drug delivery and nanotoxicity. Opening synthetic cages to release the tiger. Nanoscale, 2017, 9(4), 1356-1392.
2. Schoonen, L., van Hest, J. C. Functionalization of protein-based nanocages for drug delivery applications. Nanoscale, 2014, 6(13), 7124-7141.
3. Lee, E. J., Lee, N. K., Kim, I. S. Bioengineered protein-based nanocage for drug delivery. Advanced drug delivery reviews, 2016, 106, 157-171.
4. Chen, J., Saeki, F., et al. Gold nanocages: bioconjugation and their potential use as optical imaging contrast agents. Nano letters, 2005, 5(3), 473-477.
