Lipid-Based Self-Assembled NPs: The Effects of Morphology and Targeting Molecules on the Cellular Uptake Using In Vitro Tumor Mode

While the usage of nanoscale materials for therapeutics and diagnostics is growing rapidly, there remain many challenges to understanding the expected controlling parameters (e.g., size, shape and chemical properties) that significantly affect the performance of the nanomaterials due to complicated in vivo environments. Therefore, a strong interest in the knowledge of the nano–biointeractions and how they contribute to tissue accumulation has been developed. To date, researchers have relied on monolayer cell cultures and animal models to study such nano–biointeractions. However, currently, there is a big gap between the result of the over-simplified in vitro cell response and the complex animal models, where many biological reactions and organs may interact with the nanomaterials. Novel non-expensive microfluidic systems have recently been designed to mimic the tumor environment (including extracellular (ECM) tissue and cancer cells). Moreover, well-defined and low-polydispersity lipid-based nanoparticles (NPs) have been synthesized into various morphologies such as nanodiscs, vesicles, ribbons, etc. in Prof. Mu-Ping Nieh’s research group, and we will test their potential application in cancer drug delivery.