Templated synthesis of spherical RNA nanoparticles with gene silencing activity

RNA has inherent therapeutic and structural properties that make it an important component of biologically-functional nanoparticles. Using DNA-amphiphiles as synthetic templates, we report the synthesis of two classes of RNA-amphiphiles that self-assemble into spherical nanoparticles in aqueous solution and show gene silencing activity. Bioactive RNA nanoparticles with gene silencing activity have been synthesized in high yield using a complementary spherical DNA nanoparticle.