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Updated: Feb 22, 2026

Targeted Plasma Membrane Delivery of a Hydrophobic Cargo Encapsulated in a Liquid Crystal Nanoparticle Carrier
Published on: February 8, 2017
Targeted anion transporter delivery by coiled-coil driven membrane fusion
Nestor Lopez Mora1, Azadeh Bahreman1, Hennie Valkenier2
1Leiden Institute of Chemistry , Leiden University , 2300 RA Leiden , The Netherlands .
None:
Synthetic anion transporters (anionophores) have potential as biomedical research tools and therapeutics. However, the efficient and specific delivery of these highly lipophilic molecules to a target cell membrane is non-trivial. Here, we investigate the delivery of a powerful anionophore to artificial and cell membranes using a coiled-coil-based delivery system inspired by SNARE membrane fusion proteins. Incorporation of complementary lipopeptides into the lipid membranes of liposomes and cell-sized giant unilamellar vesicles (GUVs) facilitated the delivery of a powerful anionophore into GUVs, where its anion transport activity was monitored in real time by fluorescence microscopy. Similar results were achieved using live cells engineered to express a halide-sensitive fluorophore. We conclude that coiled-coil driven membrane fusion is a highly efficient system to deliver anionophores to target cell membranes.
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