Grafting chitosan with folic acid and poly(ethylene glycol)

Chitosan is one of best non-viral gene carriers. Folic acid can specifically interact with folate receptor located on the plasma cell membrane.Poly(ethylene glycol) can improve the solubility of chitosan and prolong plasma circulation time of chitosan/DNA complexes.In this study,folic acid and methoxy-polyethylene glycol acetic acid were grafted onto chitosan with different molecular weigh through their primary amino groups for target gene delivery.The successful grafting were proved by FTIR,~1H NMR,UV-Vis and TEM.