A novel method of obtaining biodegradable polypeptide nanoparticles
Biodegradable nanoparticles play a key role as viable carries in many pharmaceutical and personal care products.
Polymeric nanoparticles based on synthetic aliphatic polyesters are currently the most widely used nanoparticles in the pharmaceutical industry; however, these are often hydrophobic and lack functional groups necessary for attachment of active biomolecules. Polypeptides obtained from ring-opening polymerization (ROP) of N-carboxyanhydrides (NCA) have been promoted as an alternative material for therapeutic delivery with many advantages over traditional nanoparticles.
In the study available here, Prof. Andreas Heise from the Polymer Chemistry and Biopolymer Labs at RCSI, alongside his team, detail how they developed a new technology to prepare biodegradable polypeptide nanoparticles containing only natural amino acids and carbohydrates via an emulsion polymerization approach.
The new method developed is similar to that used in industry for the production of polymer latexes.
Until now, there has been no suitable and scalable processing methodology for the production of solid polypeptide nanoparticles available. This is due to various challenges that the authors addressed throughout their research; overcoming the instability of NCAs in the presence of moisture was achieved by process optimization of the emulsification conditions, particle stabilization was achieved using in situ UV-cross linking.
The paper gives a clear description of polypeptide nanoparticle production by mini-emulsion polymerization of an NCA monomer. It also describes the appropriate reaction conditions, the necessary order of component addition, and a suitable initiator.
This new family of nanoparticles consists of only natural building blocks such as amino acids and carbohydrates. It has potential in the future to become a novel and more environmentally conscious delivery platform for therapeutics.
Journal Article Information:
Polypeptide Nanoparticles Obtained from Emulsion Polymerization of Amino Acid N-Carboxyanhydrides
J Am Chem Soc. 2019 Aug 14;141(32):12522–12526
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1021/jacs.9b06750
