Non-Viral Gene Therapy

The world is driving in to the era of transformation
of chemical therapeutic molecules to biological genetic material
therapeutics, and that is where the biological drugs
especially “genes” come into existence. These genes worked
as “magical bullets” to specifically silence faulty genes responsible
for progression of diseases. Viral gene delivery
research is far ahead of nonviral gene delivery technique.
However, with more advancement in polymer science, new
ways are opening for better and efficient nonviral gene
delivery. But efficient delivery method is always considered
as a bottleneck for gene delivery as success of which will
decide the fate of gene in cells. During the past decade, it
became evident that extracellular as well as intracellular barriers
compromise the transfection efficiency of nonviral vectors.
The challenge for gene therapy research is to pinpoint the
rate-limiting steps in this complex process and implement
strategies to overcome the biological physiochemical and
metabolic barriers encountered during targeting. The synergy
between studies that investigate the mechanism of breaking in
and breaking out of nonviral gene delivery carrier through
various extracellular and intracellular barriers with desired
characteristics will enable the rational design of vehicles and
revolutionize the treatment of various diseases

The research and development of non-viral gene therapy has been extensive over the past decade and has received a big push thanks to the recent successful approval of non-viral nucleic acid therapy products. Despite these developments, nucleic acid therapy applications in cancer have been limited. One of the main causes of this has been the imbalance in development of delivery vectors as compared with sophisticated nucleic acid payloads, such as siRNA, mRNA, etc. This paper reviews non-viral vectors that can be used to deliver nucleic acids for cancer treatment. It discusses various types of vectors and highlights their current applications. Additionally, it discusses a perspective on the current regulatory landscape to facilitate the commercial translation of gene therapy.