ENGINEERING LIPID AND HYBRID NANOVECTORS FOR TARGETED GENE DELIVERY TO MACROPHAGE SUBPOPULATIONS

In this work, a structural taxonomy of these systems is proposed with the aim of clarifying the possible architectures that can arise when genetic materials are complexed with a polycation or a lipid, followed by the addition of a lipid or a polymer to ameliorate the cellular toxicity, modulate cellular uptake and/or improve the transfection efficiency of the resulting nanovectors (Chapter 1). The experimental part of this thesis is organized presenting first the technological data of the prepared lipopolyplexes (Chapter 2), PLA-PEG/lipid nanoparticles (Chapter 3) and LNP (Chapter 4) and then their in vitro performances on polarized macrophages isolated from human blood (Chapter 5).