Study of protein cage nanoparticles for biomedical application

Abstract

Biomedical science has been greatly advanced and recognized as an important area to improve human healthcare. Recent advances in nanotechnology have been appreciated for developing biomedical sciences with its potential of generating unique materials, devices and systems utilizing phenomena and properties of nanoscale substances. The terminology, nanobiotechnology, is the combination of biotechnology and nanotechnology, and has been recognized as future promising technology. Nanobiotechnology usually represents a range of material size from 1 nm to 100 nm. Nanoscale materials have been widely utilized to observe physical, chemical and biological properties of substances. There are diverse nanomaterials including quantum dots (QDs), liposomes, dendrimers, virus-like particles (VLPs), and protein cages, utilized for biomedical applications. Biomedical applications can be generally classified into cell targeting, drug delivery, bioimaging, and vaccine development. In order to utilize nanoscale substances for such biomedical applications, their surface can be easily modifiable and they should contain optimal solubility and stability in aqueous media, without any side effects on biological properties and functionalities. Among the number of nanomaterials, protein cages such as ferritin, heat shock protein and Lumazine synthase have been highlighted with their advantages of biocompatibility, non-toxic, low cost for production and biodegradability, and applied for various biomedical sciences. Protein cages contain a hollow internal space which can encapsulate small molecules like fluorescence dyes or probes as a detector, and have an external surface which can be modifiable by using bioconjugation and azide-alkyne click chemistry. In this study, we focus on developing diverse protein cages for biomedical applications, particularly for cell targeting system.