First Contact Imaging of nanoparticular siRNA

Okan Osmanoglou

The central question of this work is the intracellular release of potential therapeutic nucleic acids, with siRNA as model payload from nanoparticular formulations and the ”First Contact” of a prodye-siRNA. Our approach uses chemically modified leukodyes, which are colorless, non-fluorescent and sensitive to lytic enzymes. Upon ”First Contact” of leukodye-conjugated siRNA with lytic enzymes in the cell, they develop fluorescence inside eukaryotic cells and can thus be visualized by fluorescence or confocal microscopy.