IJMS, Vol. 25, Pages 4327: A Multifunctionalized Potyvirus-Derived Nanoparticle That Targets and Internalizes into Cancer Cells

IJMS, Vol. 25, Pages 4327: A Multifunctionalized Potyvirus-Derived Nanoparticle That Targets and Internalizes into Cancer Cells

International Journal of Molecular Sciences doi: 10.3390/ijms25084327

Authors: Daniel A. Truchado María Juárez-Molina Sara Rincón Lucía Zurita Jaime Tomé-Amat Corina Lorz Fernando Ponz

Plant viral nanoparticles (VNPs) are attractive to nanomedicine researchers because of their safety, ease of production, resistance, and straightforward functionalization. In this paper, we developed and successfully purified a VNP derived from turnip mosaic virus (TuMV), a well-known plant pathogen, that exhibits a high affinity for immunoglobulins G (IgG) thanks to its functionalization with the Z domain of staphylococcal Protein A via gene fusion. We selected cetuximab as a model IgG to demonstrate the versatility of this novel TuMV VNP by developing a fluorescent nanoplatform to mark tumoral cells from the Cal33 line of a tongue squamous cell carcinoma. Using confocal microscopy, we observed that fluorescent VNP–cetuximab bound selectively to Cal33 and was internalized, revealing the potential of this nanotool in cancer research.