Marine Drugs (Jun 2019)

Recent Advances in Chitosan-Based Carriers for Gene Delivery

  • Ye Cao,
  • Yang Fei Tan,
  • Yee Shan Wong,
  • Melvin Wen Jie Liew,
  • Subbu Venkatraman

DOI
https://doi.org/10.3390/md17060381
Journal volume & issue
Vol. 17, no. 6
p. 381

Abstract

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Approximately 4000 diseases are associated with malfunctioning genes in a particular cell type. Gene-based therapy provides a platform to modify the disease-causing genes expression at the cellular level to treat pathological conditions. However, gene delivery is challenging as these therapeutic genes need to overcome several physiological and intracellular barriers in order, to reach the target cells. Over the years, efforts have been dedicated to develop efficient gene delivery vectors to overcome these systemic barriers. Chitosan, a versatile polysaccharide, is an attractive non-viral vector material for gene delivery mainly due to its cationic nature, biodegradability and biocompatibility. The present review discusses the design factors that are critical for efficient gene delivery/transfection and highlights the recent progress of gene therapy using chitosan-based carriers.

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