Developing and validating imaging methods for lipid nanoparticle-based gene delivery

Introduction: The usage and optimization of lipid nanoparticles to deliver oligonucleotide-based drug is still being research, and one of the bottlenecks of the intracellular drug delivery is the highly inefficient endosomal escape[1]. To address this issue and make novel bio-therapeutic drug delivery more efficient, we need better understanding of endosomal escape [2,3,4]. This project focuses on release of the payload at endosome breakage, re-localization of the LNP lipids, and the re-stabilization of the microenvironment in the endosome after escape by validating and developing novel imaging tools.