Advanced peptide nanoparticles enable robust and efficient delivery of gene editors across cell types

Abstract

Efficient delivery of the CRISPR/Cas9 system and its larger derivatives, base editors, and prime editors remain a major challenge, particularly in tissue-specific stem cells and induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSCs). This study optimized a novel family of cell-penetrating peptides, hPep, to deliver gene-editing ribonucleoproteins. The hPep-based nanoparticles enable highly efficient and biocompatible delivery of Cre recombinase, Cas9, base-, and prime editors. Using base editors, robust and nearly complete genome editing was achieved in the human cells: HEK293T (96%), iPSCs (74%), and muscle stem cells (80%). This strategy opens promising avenues for ex vivo and, potentially, in vivo applications. Incorporating silica particles enhanced the system's versatility, facilitating cargo-agnostic delivery. Notably, the nanoparticles can be synthesized quickly on a benchtop and stored as lyophilized powder without compromising functionality. This represents an important advancement in the feasibility and scalability of gene-editing delivery technologies.

Keywords: Base and primer editor; Cell-penetrating peptide (CPP); Diverse cells, including MuSC and iPSC; Gene editing; Protein delivery; Synthetic gene editor delivery.