Key Laboratory of Biomedical Polymers of Ministry of Education, Department of Chemistry, Wuhan University, Wuhan 430072, China
Abstract:
A phenylboronic‐acid‐modified amphiphilic block polyether is prepared via reaction of polyglycidol‐block‐poly(ethylene oxide)‐block‐poly(propylene oxide)‐block‐poly(ethylene oxide)‐block‐polyglycidol (Pluronic‐PG) with 2‐(N,N‐dimethylaminomethyl)‐5‐aminomethyl phenylboronic acid using phosgene as a coupling reagent. The boronic‐acid‐modified non‐cationic polymer binds plasmid pGL3 effectively, forms sub‐µm polymer/DNA complex particles, and greatly facilitates the cell uptake of the plasmid. The efficiency of the polymer as a gene vector is evaluated in vitro by transfection of pGL3 to HeLa, COS‐7 and HepG2 cells. Pluronic‐PG‐BA enhances the transfection efficiency by 100 to 1000 times compared with Pluronic‐PG. The presence of serum does not significantly affect the transfection efficiency.
