Europe PMC

This website requires cookies, and the limited processing of your personal data in order to function. By using the site you are agreeing to this as outlined in our privacy notice and cookie policy.

A Novel Cell-Penetrating Lipopeptide for DNA Binding, Self-Assembly, and Delivery Into HeLa and Pluripotent Stem Cells.

Author information

Affiliations

  • 1. School of Chemistry, Food Biosciences and Pharmacy, University of Reading, Reading, UK.
      Authors
    • de Mello LR 1, 3
    • Castelletto V 1
    • Hamley IW 1
    (3 authors)
  • 2. Department of Immunology, Institute of Biomedical Science, University of São Paulo, São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
      Authors
    • Honda TSB 2
    (1 author)
  • 3. Departamento de Biophysics, Federal University of São Paulo- Vila Clementino, São Paulo, São Paulo, Brazil.
      Authors
    • de Mello LR 1, 3
    • Alves PT 3
    • Han SW 3
    • da Silva ER 3
    (4 authors)

Journal of Peptide Science : an Official Publication of the European Peptide Society, 01 Mar 2026, 32(3):e70085
https://doi.org/10.1002/psc.70085 PMID: 41554528 PMCID: PMC12815588

This article is in the Europe PMC Open access subset. Refer to the copyright information in the article for licensing details.
Free full text in Europe PMC

Abstract 

A lipopeptide is designed that contains an epitope from simian virus T-antigen (SV40T, PKKKRKV) conjugated to an N-terminal palmitoyl (C16-) moiety, with the aim to act as an effective cell-penetrating lipopeptide, with additional aggregation propensity conferred by the lipid chain. A combination of cryo-TEM and small-angle X-ray scattering (SAXS) is used to show that the lipopeptide forms micelles, but mixtures with DNA lead to formation of fractal cluster-like co-assemblies due to intercalation of the DNA and peptide. Spectroscopic studies using fluorescence and circular dichroism (along with fiber X-ray diffraction) show that the peptide interacts with DNA and inserts into the groove. Confocal microscopy along with flow cytometry confirms delivery of DNA into both HeLa and mouse embryonic stem cells (mESCs) in pluripotent state, and the system shows excellent cytocompatibility as confirmed by MTT assays. Our data indicate that the lipopeptide may outperform the DNA transfection agent lipofectamine in DNA delivery into these stem cells and it enables DNA delivery into the cytoplasm and nucleus.

Free full text 

loading

Full text links 

Read article at publisher's site: https://doi.org/10.1002/psc.70085

Similar Articles 

To arrive at the top five similar articles we use a word-weighted algorithm to compare words from the Title and Abstract of each citation.

    Funding 

    Funders who supported this work.

    Engineering and Physical Sciences Research Council (1)

    • Grant ID: EP/V053396/1

      Loading publications

    Fundação de Amparo à Pesquisa do Estado de São Paulo (3)

    • Grant ID: 19/20907-7

      Loading publications

    • Grant ID: 2021/10092-6

      Loading publications

    • Grant ID: 2019/19719-1

      Loading publications

    • Save
    • Open PDF
    • Claim to ORCID