Xinyue Huang
University of Oxford
Xinyue Huang is a Postdoctoral Research Assistant in from the Nuffield Department of Obstetrics and Gynaecology in University of Oxford since 2016. She is a biomaterials scientist focusing on the use of organic and inorganic nanoparticle in biomedical applications, especially for delivery system on a variety of biotherapeutics (such as chemotherapeutics and gene therapeutics) in preclinical stage.
Mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNPs) are promising biomaterials for advanced nano-carriers applicable to a large number of biomedical applications. Cargo can include dyes, peptides, nucleic acids and other therapeutics.... [ view full abstract ]
Mesoporous silica nanoparticles (MSNPs) are promising biomaterials for advanced nano-carriers applicable to a large number of biomedical applications. Cargo can include dyes, peptides, nucleic acids and other therapeutics. Compared to most commercially available options, MSNPs have very large surface areas, functionalisible surfaces, tuneable size and porosity, various architectures, low cytotoxicity and low cost.
In our study, we produced a number of MSNPs with different architecture. Figure 1 shows a selection of MSNPs synthesised in the laboratory. In order to demonstrate the physical and biological properties of the MSNPs in depth, a number of techniques have been used to characterise the particles to give parameters such as size, surface potential, porosity, surface area and cytotoxicity of the MSNPs.
After extensive characterisation, we demonstrated that MSNPs can be taken up by different cancer cells, and therefore can be used as intracellular anti-cancer agent carriers. The cellular uptake efficacy was largely dependent on the cell type and particle physical properties. MSNPs can be customised with controlled size and modified surface to provide an ideal candidate designed for maximum cellular uptake of a specific cell type.
Furthermore, we determined that MSNPs were able to load many small cargo molecules via adsorption and chemical conjugation, including molecules with different electric potential and/or different hydrophobicity. We found that the drug loading efficiency is dependent upon the porosity and surface area of the MSNP and the electric potential difference between the cargo and the surface of MSNPs. In in vitro study, we found that MSNPs can deliver drugs which have been shown to be difficult to deliver in conventional ways to cancer cells efficiently.
We also showed that MSNPs can be used as in vitro siRNA carrier. Several MSNPs candidates were shown to be more efficient than commercially available vectors and to lead to much higher transfection and knock-down efficiency.
