Raman Profiling of Lipid Nanoparticles and Live Tumor Cells (Conference Abstract)

Lipid nanoparticles (LNPs) hold great promise for improved mRNA delivery. Their therapeutic efficacy depends on cellular uptake, internalization pathways, intracellular trafficking, and successful endosomal escape. Thus, optimizing LNP formulations, as well as designing novel ones for new applications, requires advanced methods to monitor and characterize LNPs intracellular behavior in live cells. In this study, we used the LabRAM HR Evolution Raman confocal microscope (Horiba, Fukuoka, Japan), which combines the spectral specificity of Raman spectroscopy with the spatial precision of confocal microscopy, to characterize mRNA-loaded LNPs and live tumor cells. A 532 nm laser at ~4 mW was used for excitation, with 10 s integration time and 10 accumulations.