Hyaluronic Acid-Decorated Chitosan Nanoparticles for CD44-Targeted Delivery of Everolimus

Bronchiolitis obliterans syndrome (BOS), caused by lung allograft-derived mesenchymal cells’ abnormal proliferation and extracellular matrix deposition, is the main cause of lung allograft rejection. In this study, a mild one-step ionotropic gelation method was set up to nanoencapsulate the everolimus, a key molecule in allograft organ rejection prevention, into hyaluronic acid-decorated chitosan-based nanoparticles. Rationale was the selective delivery of everolimus into lung allograft-derived mesenchymal cells; these cells are characterized by the CD44-overexpressing feature, and hyaluronic acid has proven to be a natural selective CD44-targeting moiety. The optimal process conditions were established by a design of experiment approach (full factorial design) aiming at the control of the nanoparticle size (≤200 nm), minimizing the size polydispersity (PDI 0.171 ± 0.04), and at the negative ζ potential maximization (−30.9 mV). The everolimus was successfully loaded into hyaluronic acid-decorated chitosan-based nanoparticles (95.94 ± 13.68 μg/100 mg nanoparticles) and in vitro released in 24 h. The hyaluronic acid decoration on the nanoparticles provided targetability to CD44-overexpressing mesenchymal cells isolated from bronchoalveolar lavage of BOS-affected patients. The mesenchymal cells’ growth tests along with the nanoparticles uptake studies, at 37 °C and 4 °C, respectively, demonstrated a clear improvement of everolimus inhibitory activity when it is encapsulated in hyaluronic acid-decorated chitosan-based nanoparticles, ascribable to their active uptake mechanism.