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Multifunctional decoration of alpha-tocopheryl succinate-based NP for cancer treatment: effect of TPP and LTVSPWY peptide

  • Emerging Group Leaders: Research and Reflections on Career Goals
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An Author Correction to this article was published on 12 October 2017

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Abstract

Active targeting not only of a specific cell but also a specific organelle maximizes the therapeutic activity minimizing adverse side effects in healthy tissues. The present work describes the synthesis, characterization, and in vitro biological activity of active targeting nanoparticles (NP) for cancer therapy based on α-tocopheryl succinate (α-TOS), a well-known mitocan, that selectively induces apoptosis of cancer cells and proliferalting endothelial cells. Human epidermal growth factor receptor 2 (HER2) targeting peptide LTVSPWY (PEP) and triphenylphosphonium lipophilic cation (TPP) were conjugated to a previously optimized RAFT block copolymer that formed self-assembled NP of appropriate size for this application and low polydispersity by self-organized precipitation method. PEP and TPP were included in order to target not only HER2 positive cancer cells, but also the mitochondria of these cancer cells, respectively. The in vitro experiments demonstrated the faster incorporation of the active-targeting NP and the higher accumulation of TPP-bearing NP in the mitochondria of MDA-MB-453 HER2 positive cancer cells compared to non-decorated NP. Moreover, the encapsulation of additional α-TOS in the hydrophobic core of the NP was achieved with high efficiencies. The loaded NP presented higher cytotoxicity than unloaded NP but preserved their selectivity against cancer cells in a range of tested concentrations.

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  • 12 October 2017

    A correction to this article has been published.

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Acknowledgements

Authors acknowledge, David Gómez, and Rosa Ana Ramírez and Mar Fernández for their help in SEM, and cell culture experiments, respectively.

Funding sources

This work was funded by the Spanish Ministry of Economy and Competitiveness (MAT2014-51918-C2-1-R) and CIBER BBN-ECO Foundation project, CSIC (201660I028) and the National Institutes of Health Cell and Tissue Engineering Training Grant T32 GM008433.

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The manuscript was written through contributions of all authors. All authors have given approval to the final version of the manuscript.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. Group of Biomaterials, Department of Polymeric Nanomaterials and Biomaterials, Institute of Polymer Science and Technology, ICTP-CSIC, Juan de la Cierva, 3, 28006, Madrid, Spain

    Raquel Palao-Suay, María Rosa Aguilar, Francisco J. Parra-Ruiz, Sergio Martín-Saldaña & Julio San Román

  2. Networking Biomedical Research Centre in Bioengineering, Biomaterials and Nanomedicine, CIBER-BBN, Madrid, Spain

    Raquel Palao-Suay, María Rosa Aguilar, Francisco J. Parra-Ruiz & Julio San Román

  3. George W. Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and Parker H. Petit Institute of Bioengineering and Bioscience, Georgia Institute of Technology, 315 Ferst Dr NW, Atlanta, 30332, GA, USA

    Nathan A. Rohner & Susan N. Thomas

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  1. Raquel Palao-Suay
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  2. María Rosa Aguilar
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  3. Francisco J. Parra-Ruiz
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  4. Sergio Martín-Saldaña
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Correspondence to María Rosa Aguilar.

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The original version of this article was revised: The original version of this article unfortunately contained mistakes. The “Reflections on Career Goals” and the group photo were missing in the original version of this article. They are given below. The original article was corrected.

A correction to this article is available online at https://doi.org/10.1007/s10856-017-5995-3.

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Palao-Suay, R., Aguilar, M.R., Parra-Ruiz, F.J. et al. Multifunctional decoration of alpha-tocopheryl succinate-based NP for cancer treatment: effect of TPP and LTVSPWY peptide. J Mater Sci: Mater Med 28, 152 (2017). https://doi.org/10.1007/s10856-017-5963-y

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