title: RNA as a stable polymer to build controllable and defined nanostructures for material and biomedical applications.
abstract: The value of polymers is manifested in their vital use as building blocks in material and life sciences. Ribonucleic acid (RNA) is a polynucleic acid, but its polymeric nature in materials and technological applications is often overlooked due to an impression that RNA is seemingly unstable. Recent findings that certain modifications can make RNA resistant to RNase degradation while retaining its authentic folding property and biological function, and the discovery of ultra-thermostable RNA motifs have adequately addressed the concerns of RNA unstability. RNA can serve as a unique polymeric material to build varieties of nanostructures including nanoparticles, polygons, arrays, bundles, membrane, and microsponges that have potential applications in biomedical and material sciences. Since 2005, more than a thousand publications on RNA nanostructures have been published in diverse fields, indicating a remarkable increase of interest in the emerging field of RNA nanotechnology. In this review, we aim to: delineate the physical and chemical properties of polymers that can be applied to RNA; introduce the unique properties of RNA as a polymer; review the current methods for the construction of RNA nanostructures; describe its applications in material, biomedical and computer sciences; and, discuss the challenges and future prospects in this field.
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA.
authors.forename: Hui
authors.initials: H
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA; Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering, Sogang University, Seoul, Republic of Korea.
authors.forename: Taek
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Lee
authors.affiliation: Department of Chemical and Materials Engineering, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA.
authors.forename: Thomas
authors.initials: T
authors.lastname: Dziubla
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA.
authors.forename: Fengmei
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Pi
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA; Department of Chemistry, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40506, USA.
authors.forename: Sijin
authors.initials: S
authors.lastname: Guo
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Nanomedicine and Nanosafety, CAS Key Laboratory for Biomedical Effects of Nanomaterials and Nanosafety, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology of China, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Jing
authors.initials: J
authors.lastname: Xu
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Nanomedicine and Nanosafety, CAS Key Laboratory for Biomedical Effects of Nanomaterials and Nanosafety, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology of China, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Chan
authors.initials: C
authors.lastname: Li
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA.
authors.forename: Farzin
authors.initials: F
authors.lastname: Haque
authors.affiliation: Laboratory of Nanomedicine and Nanosafety, CAS Key Laboratory for Biomedical Effects of Nanomaterials and Nanosafety, National Center for Nanoscience and Technology of China, Beijing 100190, China.
authors.forename: Xing-Jie
authors.initials: XJ
authors.lastname: Liang
authors.affiliation: Nanobiotechnology Center, Markey Cancer Center, and Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, University of Kentucky, Lexington, KY 40536, USA.
authors.forename: Peixuan
authors.initials: P
authors.lastname: Guo
keywords: Biopolymer; RNA nanostructure; RNA nanotechnology; RNA therapeutics; pRNA; phi29 DNA packaging motor