The conjugation of diphtheria toxin T domain to poly(ethylenimine) based vectors for enhanced endosomal escape during gene transfection

The endosomal escape is a well-known serious obstacle for non-viral gene delivery. This is because of an acidic and enzymatic degradation of the contents of the endosome/lysosome. Therefore, the internalized gene needs to be efficient released into the cytosol to obtain the efficiently transfection efficiency. On the other hand, the diphtheria toxin T domain fuses with endosome membrane by pH decrease, then enhances the endosomal escape of the diphtheria toxin C fragment. In this study, we constructed diphtheria toxin T domain-conjugated poly(ethylenimine)s (PEI) polyplex for enhancing the endosomal escape of exogenous gene. The conjugation of diphtheria toxin T domain with PEI/pDNA polyplex leads to the significant enhancement of transfection efficiency when compared with plain PEI/pDNA polyplex. The pH-responsive increase in hydrophobicity of the diphtheria toxin T domain might not only trigger the perturbation of the endocytic vesicle membrane but might also increase the membrane permeability.