Utility of vascular endothelial specific peptides for enhancement of adeno-associated virus-mediated gene transfer.

Vascular endothelial cells (EC) have been targeted for the treatment of pathological conditions such as atherosclerosis, hypercholesterolemia, post-angioplasty restenosis and hypertension. Non-pathogenic adeno-associated virus (AAV) has been shown as a good gene delivery tool in a variety of cell lines as well as in animal models. However, AAV has been reported to induce less endothelial cell transduction. AAV vector alone transduced HUVEC much lower than other cell lines including Hela, PAC1, and C2C12. Preincubation of AAV vector with EC membrane specific peptides markedly increased AAV transduction of HUVEC. On the contrary, those peptides did not affect AAV expression in other cell types. These EC-specific peptides may be a strategy for enhancement of AAV mediated-gene expression.