Abstract
The cellular delivery of bioactive nucleic acidbased drugs such as small interfering RNA (siRNA) represents a major technical hurdle for their pharmaceutical application. Prodrug-like approaches provide an attractive concept to address the delivery problem. With the aimto prepare RNA-based prodrugs bearing biolabile protections which facilitate cellular uptake and are prone to be removed enzymatically inside cells in order to release functional RNA, we synthesized pro-RNA totally or partially masked in 20 -OH position with pivaloyloxymethyl (PivOM) groups. A suitable strategy has been developed to synthesize and to purify base-sensitive mixed 20 -OH/20 -O-PivOM oligoribonucleotides, and to include them in siRNA. In this strategy, the fluoride labile [(triisopropylsilyl)oxy]-benzyloxycarbonyl group (tboc) as nucleobase protection (for A and C), the TBS group as 20 -OH protection and the Q-linker to solid-support were compatible with the PivOM groups masking some 20 -OH. We have taken advantage of the specific stability of the PivOM group to apply selected acidic, basic, and fluoride ions treatment for the deprotection and release of pro-RNA. This kind of pro-siRNA was studied in a human cell culture-based RNAi assay and preliminary promising data are discussed.