Assembly of phi29 pRNA nanoparticles for siRNA delivery to prostate cancer cells

Nanotechniques involve the creation, characterization, and modification of organized nanomaterials to serve as building blocks for the construction of submicro or nanoscale devices and systems with applications in technology and medicine. Living systems contain a wide variety of ordered macromolecular structures and powerful bionanomachines. The ingenious, novel design of the bacteriophage phi29 DNA packaging motor and its constituents has inspired the artificial synthesis and assembly of phi29 biomimetic motor and its components. The 30-nm nanomotor was geared by six copies of ATP-binding packaging RNAs (pRNAs). The structural versatility of pRNA coupled with its ability to form dimers, trimers, hexamers and patterned superstructures via interlocking loop interactions make it a promising tool for nanomachine fabrication, pathogen detection and drug/gene delivery. The low-resolution global structures of the pRNA and its dimer, trimer and hexamer have been probed by photoaffinity cross linking, chemical modification interference, compensatory modification, Cryo-AFM and 3D computer modeling.