Want to know more about the different lipid morphologies?

Liposomes

  • "Liposome" is a general term for vesicles that are formed by a lipid bilayer and that contain an aqueous core.
  • Materials can be loaded either into the aqueous core of the liposome (hydrophilic) or into the lipid bilayer (hydrophobic).
  • All liposomes are composed of lamella, or layers.
  • Liposomes are usually around 80nm in size.

Micelles

  • Micelles have hydrophilic head region in contact with the polar solvent and the hydrophobic tail region sequestered away from the solvent.
  • Micelles have a solid lipid core,which can be used to sequester hydrophobic APIs.
  • Micelles are usually formed by single-chain lipids or lipids with large headgroups due to lipid geometry and the high curvature of micelles.

LNPs

  • LNPs, short for lipid nanoparticles, is the term currently used to describe solid-core lipid vesicles encapsulating negatively charged nucleic acid cargo.
  • LNPs can be composed of many different lipid classes and structures, but always utilize a cationic lipid to allow for condensation of anionic nucleic acids, thereby forming the solid core particles.
  • LNPs are typically made using solvent injection.
  • LNPs are usually around 80nm in size.

Multilamellar

  • Multilamellar vesicles have many lamellae (or bilayers). Think of an onion!
  • These are generally in the 1-5um size range.
  • The benefit to MLVs is that you can typically have a higher drug concentration because you can pack drug into the aqueous layer between each bilayer.

GUVs

  • GUVs or Giant Unilamellar Vesicles are microns-scale vesicles that have a single bilayer.
  • Primarily used to observe lipid phase behavior and membrane events (fusion, fission) in synthetic biology with fluorescence microscopy.
  • Methods of preparation: swelling, electroformation
  • Generally, 1-30µm

    MVLs

    • MVLs, or Multivesicular liposomes, are large spherical vesicles with smaller polygon-shaped compartments, each containing API.
    • These vesicles offer benefits such as increased drug loading, sustained release, and prolonged efficacy.