SsDNA Aptamer Specifically Targets and Selectively Delivers Cytotoxic Drug Doxorubicin to HepG2 Cells.

ABSTRACT: Hepatocellular carcinoma (HCC) is the third leading cause of death due to cancer worldwide with over 500,000 people affected annually. Although chemotherapy has been widely used to treat patients with HCC, alternate modalities to specifically deliver therapeutic cargos to cancer cells have been sought in recent years due to the severe side effects of chemotherapy. In this respect, aptamer-based tumor targeted drug delivery has emerged as a promising approach to increase the efficacy of chemotherapy and reduce or eliminate drug toxicity. In this study, we developed a new HepG2-specific aptamer (HCA#3) by a procedure known as systematic evolution of ligands by exponential enrichment (SELEX) and exploited its role as a targeting ligand to deliver doxorubicin (Dox) to HepG2 cells in vitro. The

SUBMITTER: Yu G 

PROVIDER: S-EPMC4726709 | biostudies-literature | 2016

REPOSITORIES: biostudies-literature