Available Technologies

Background

There are various intracellular targets for drug development, but for many of them, small molecules are said to be ineffective thus a drug delivery system for larger sized molecules such as peptides or antibodies has been desired. However, many of the conventional techniques still struggle with low delivery efficiency and high cytotoxicity.

Description and Advantages

Kyoto University researchers have successfully developed improved cytoplasmic delivery peptides that enable efficient protein delivery into cells. The peptides work simply by mixing with the target molecule or by forming a peptide fusion molecule.

• Efficient intracellular delivery without toxicity (Fig. 1)
  This delivery peptides achieves 22 times greater intracellular delivery compared to conventional peptide (E3MP), with no associated toxicity.

• Intracellular delivery of large molecules in the presence of serum (Fig. 2)
  Simply by co-adding the delivery target molecule with the peptides to the culture medium, antibodies can be delivered into cells.

• Successful delivery confirmed in-vivo (Fig. 3)
  Fusion proteins or co-administered proteins with the developed peptide reach the intracellular region of tumor cells in living mice.