Nonviral DNA delivery from polymeric systems

Gene therapy holds great promise for the treatment of disease by delivering genes encoding for therapeutic proteins. Although it was originally devised for the treatment of inherited genetic disorders, such as cystic fibrosis, recent work has expanded the applications of gene therapy to develop strategies for HIV, cancer (1), and wound healing applications (2). The challenge of gene therapy is to develop safe and efficient gene delivery systems (1). Most studies have focused on the use of viral vectors because of their potentially high efficiencies; however, the safety and ease of manufacturing of nonviral vectors may make them the preferred choice in the future.