This article has been reviewed according to Science X's editorial process and policies. Editors have highlighted the following attributes while ensuring the content's credibility: RNA vaccines and other nucleic acid therapeutics are typically packaged within fatty molecules known as lipid nanoparticles (LNPs). MIT researchers have now developed a way to produce these particles much more quickly and with more precise control over their size and shape.
The new process, which can run automatically without human intervention, could greatly speed up the development of new RNA and DNA therapeutics, the researchers say. "This method can help you determine what are the parameters that will generate specific size and shape attributes, before you take those particles and see which one will perform best," says Cedric Devos, an MIT postdoc and one of the lead authors of the study. "It could be quite a powerful development tool." Current methods for designing new lipid nanoparticles often require time-consuming trial-and-error experiments, with limited investigation of desired particle size and shape.
Tuning the size and shape of LNPs could make it possible to target different organs and tissues. "The size and shape of LNPs could not be reliably controlled by any previous production method. The problem may appear simple at first glance, but in reality it requires a deep understanding of lipid nanoparticle assembly," says Allan Myerson, a professor of the practice in MIT's Department of Chemical Engineering and the senior author of the new study.
MIT postdocs Aniket Udepurkar and Peter Sagmeister are also lead authors of the paper, which appears in ACS Nano. Vaccines based on mRNA work by delivering instructions to cells to produce a harmless version of a viral protein, which prompts the immune system to generate a response. However, if mRNA is injected on its own, it will be quickly broken down in the body.
"These are really a revolutionary type of therapeutics, but they need some kind of delivery vehicle to bring them to the right cells in the body," Devos says. Scientists have used lipid nanoparticles to package the mRNA in COVID-19 vaccines and other mRNA therapeutics. LNPs usually consist of four components—an ionizable lipid, a phospholipid, cholesterol and a lipid attached to a molecule of polyethylene glycol (PEG), which helps stabilize the LNP.
To make the particles, two streams of fluid are mixed together at high speed. One consists of lipid molecules suspended in ethanol, and the other contains mRNA dissolved in an acidic buffer. Those solutions aren't mixed at equal flow rates, however.
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