Covalent attachment of an influenza hemagglutinin-derived peptide to urethane-based cationic polymers affects their transfection efficiency in DNA delivery and their course in cell entry

Moreover, the results of the present study demonstrated that the effectiveness of PU-PA-1-HAP in DNA delivery is due to the HAP conjugation, which not only helps the formed complexes to escape from endolysosomes, but also opens an alternative pathway (via clathrin as opposed to via caveolae) in transfection. Therefore, the increased capability of the complexes to gain cellular entry causes their increased transfection efficiency. In contrast, PU without HAP (i.e. PU-PA-1) can only deliver DNA into cells through the caveolae-mediated pathway.