Molecular assembly of an aptamer-drug conjugate for targeted drug delivery to tumor cells.

ABSTRACT: The conjugation of antitumor drugs to targeting reagents such as antibodies is a promising method that can increase the efficacy of chemotherapy and reduce the overall toxicity of the drugs. In this study, we covalently link the antitumor agent doxorubicin (Dox) to the DNA aptamer sgc8c, which was selected by the cell-SELEX method. In doing so, we expected that this sgc8c-Dox conjugate would specifically kill the target CCRF-CEM (T-cell acute lymphoblastic leukemia, T-cell ALL) cells, but with minimal toxicity towards nontarget cells. The results demonstrated that the sgc8c-Dox conjugate possesses many of the properties of the sgc8c aptamer, including high binding affinity (K(d)=2.0+/-0.2 nM) and the capability to be efficiently internalized by target cells. Moreover, due to the specific c

SUBMITTER: Huang YF 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC2992821 | biostudies-literature | 2009 Mar

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature