Cathepsin B-sensitive polymers for compartment-specific degradation and nucleic acid release

Degradable cationic polymers are desirable for in vivo nucleic acid delivery because they offer significantly decreased toxicity over non-degradable counterparts. Peptide linkers provide chemical stability and high specificity for particular endopeptidases but have not been extensively studied for nucleic acid delivery applications. In this work, enzymatically degradable peptide-HPMA copolymers were synthesized by RAFT polymerization of HPMA with methacrylamido-terminated peptide macromonomers, resulting in polymers with low polydispersity and near quantitative incorporation of peptides. Three peptide-HPMA copolymers were evaluated: (i) pHCathK(10), containing peptides composed of the linker phe-lys-phe-leu (FKFL), a substrate of the endosomal/lysosomal endopeptidase cathepsin B, connected to oligo-(L)-lysine for nucleic acid binding, (ii) pHCath(D)K(10), containing the FKFL linker with oligo-(D)-lysine, and (iii) pH(D)Cath(D)K(10), containing all (D) amino acids. Cathepsin B degraded copolymers pHCathK(10) and pHCath(D)K(10) within 1 h while no degradation of pH(D)Cath(D)K(10) was observed. Polyplexes formed with pHCathK(10) copolymers show DNA release by 4 h of treatment with cathepsin B; comparatively, polyplexes formed with pHCath(D)K(10) and pH(D)Cath(D)K(10) show no DNA release within 8 h. Transfection efficiency in HeLa and NIH/3T3 cells were comparable between the copolymers but pHCathK(10) was less toxic. This work demonstrates the successful application of peptide linkers for degradable cationic polymers and DNA release.