Department of Neurological, Neuropsychological, Morphological and Movement Sciences, University of Verona, Italy.
Eur J Histochem. 2012 Apr 16;56(2):e20. doi: 10.4081/ejh.2012.20.
Chitosan-based nanoparticles (NPs) deserve particular attention as suitable drug carriers in the field of pharmaceutics, since they are able to protect the encapsulated drugs and/or improve their efficacy by making them able to cross biological barriers (such as the blood-brain barrier) and reach their intracellular target sites. Understanding the intracellular location of NPs is crucial for designing drug delivery strategies. In this study, fluorescently-labelled chitosan NPs were administered in vitro to a neuronal cell line, and diaminobenzidine (DAB) photoconversion was applied to correlate fluorescence and transmission electron microscopy to precisely describe the NPs intracellular fate. This technique allowed to demonstrate that chitosan NPs easily enter neuronal cells, predominantly by endocytosis; they were found both inside membrane-bounded vesicles and free in the cytosol, and were observed to accumulate around the cell nucleus.
壳聚糖基纳米粒子（NPs）作为药剂学领域中合适的药物载体备受关注，因为它们能够保护包裹的药物，并且/或者通过使药物能够穿过生物屏障（如血脑屏障）并到达其细胞内靶位来提高其功效。了解 NPs 的细胞内位置对于设计药物输送策略至关重要。在这项研究中，将荧光标记的壳聚糖 NPs 体外给予神经元细胞系，并用二氨基联苯胺（DAB）光转化将荧光和透射电子显微镜相关联，以精确描述 NPs 的细胞内命运。该技术证明壳聚糖 NPs 很容易通过内吞作用进入神经元细胞；它们既存在于膜结合的囊泡内，也存在于细胞质中游离的状态，并被观察到在细胞核周围聚集。
