Issue 24, 2024

Rational design of polymer-based mRNA delivery systems for cancer treatment

Abstract

Messenger RNA (mRNA)-based cancer therapeutics have shown great promise in cancer prevention and treatment, such as mRNA cancer vaccines and protein replacement therapeutics. The key to mRNA cancer therapeutics is to develop safe and effective delivery systems that can efficiently encapsulate mRNA, protect them from degradation, selectively target specific tissues, facilitate cellular uptake and endosomal escape, and ultimately release them into the cytoplasm for protein expression. Polymer-based mRNA delivery systems have received increasing attention for cancer therapy due to their virtues of customizable chemical structures, easy functionalization, and controllable stability, allowing the overcoming of tumor delivery barriers and enhancing therapeutic efficacy. This review introduces the characteristics and applications of mRNA therapeutics, the principles, and classification of polymer-based mRNA delivery systems, and summarizes several advanced mRNA delivery strategies to realize cancer-selective and intracellular delivery, organ-targeted delivery, and tissue-penetrating delivery. The review aims to provide guidance for the design of future polymer-based cancer mRNA delivery systems.

Graphical abstract: Rational design of polymer-based mRNA delivery systems for cancer treatment

Article information

Article type
Review Article
Submitted
23 Feb 2024
Accepted
13 Mai 2024
First published
21 Mai 2024

Polym. Chem., 2024,15, 2437-2456

Rational design of polymer-based mRNA delivery systems for cancer treatment

Q. Wan, Y. Sun, X. Sun and Z. Zhou, Polym. Chem., 2024, 15, 2437 DOI: 10.1039/D4PY00206G

To request permission to reproduce material from this article, please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

If you are an author contributing to an RSC publication, you do not need to request permission provided correct acknowledgement is given.

If you are the author of this article, you do not need to request permission to reproduce figures and diagrams provided correct acknowledgement is given. If you want to reproduce the whole article in a third-party publication (excluding your thesis/dissertation for which permission is not required) please go to the Copyright Clearance Center request page.

Read more about how to correctly acknowledge RSC content.

Social activity

Spotlight

Advertisements