Lentiviral Vector Development Service
The development of safe and efficient gene delivery systems helps to develop effective clinical protocols. Lentiviruses, which belong to a subgroup of retrovirus family, have the ability to infect proliferating and quiescent cells. Vector systems based on the human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) or other lentiviruses have the potential to be important tools for clinical gene therapy. Creative Biolabs provides comprehensive lentiviral vectors with multiple cutting-edge modifications used for transgene delivery studies and application.
Lentiviral Vectors Construction
The insert capacity of lentiviral vector is 8 kb of sequence. HIV-1 vectors have been the most studied lentivirus that can propagate without the expression of any accessory genes. Lentiviral vectors generally contain only three HIV-1 genes: gag, pol and rev. In addition to the necessary cis-acting sequences, including LTR and packaging signals, the cloning vectors are devoid of all viral sequences. The rev response element (RRE) is included to ensure efficient nuclear export of the full-length viral RNA genome. Using vesicular stomatitis virus G-protein (VSV-G) to substitute the HIV envelope not only broadens the types of cells that can be infected by the vector, but also yields higher vector titer and results in greater stability of the vector virus particles. Creative Biolabs offers multiple optimization methods of lentiviral vector targeting, including direct targeting, selective targeting of tissues, control of transgene expression with tissue-specific promoters or through miRNA-mediated silencing.
In addition to the HIV-1 vector system, other lentivirus vectors also have been developed. Human immunodeficiency virus type 2 (HIV-2) is less pathogenic in humans and thus can be studied in a primate animal model. HIV-2 can offer some advantages in clinical gene therapy applications due to the ability of delivering therapeutic genes that target HIV-1. Furthermore, HIV-1 can compose with HIV-2 or SIV component to form chimeric vector systems. Lentivirus vectors pseudotyped with the VSV-G envelope glycoprotein based on the feline immunodeficiency virus (FIV) were capable of infecting a broad range of nondividing and terminally differentiated human cells.
Fig.1 Lentiviral vectors construction for gene therapy
Delivery Potential of Lentiviral Vectors
Because lentiviruses have strong neural stem cell tropism, they are widely used for ex vivo gene transfer in the central nervous system, with neither obvious immune response nor unnecessary side effects. Effective treatment has been shown in animal models of neurological diseases such as Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, motor neuron disease, Huntington's disease and spinal cord injury. Moreover, lentiviral vectors have been shown to infect retinal, hepatic, and muscle cells efficiently.
SERVICES
Based on years of efforts and exploration in gene therapy, Creative Biolabs presently provides a large collection of lentiviral vector services for the treatment of various diseases. Our customized solutions nearly cover every step of your project, including but not limited to:
Features
- Broad host range: high-efficiency infection of dividing and nondividing cells
- Long-term stable expression of a transgene
- Low immunogenicity
- Low cytotoxicity
We also provide recombinant lentivirus vector products containing various promoters and shRNA-encoded genes.
Creative Biolabs has been devoted to improving lentivirus vector systems, resulting in safer and higher titer vectors to meet your research requirements. Please feel free to contact us for more details and our scientists will have further in-depth discussion on your project.
Reference
- Buchschacher, G. L.; et al. (2000). Development of lentiviral vectors for gene therapy for human diseases. Blood, 95(8), 2499-2504.
