Platform Capabilities

A scalable solution

Our platform combines three powerful technologies to unlock new abilities in engineering cells, so that new types of cell and gene therapies — ones that can only be dreamed of today — soon become a reality.

Viruses and electric shocks are relics of the past.

Compared to conventional delivery technologies like viral vectors and electroporation, Mekonos’ nanoneedle-based delivery platform enables unprecedented viability, efficiency, and consistency in molecular payload delivery.

 

An integrated delivery platform from R&D through manufacturing

Mekonos’ novel delivery platform seamlessly scales from R&D applications through manufacturing.

  • We deliver single cell precision at scale. Our unique chip architecture aligns single nanoneedles to individually trapped cells (“one needle, one cell”), ensuring that each cell receives the same amount of cargo and resulting in a highly homogenous population of modified cells.

  • We have the ability to deliver large DNA molecules — in excess of 100kb — via physical transport of payloads directly into target cells.

Mekonos’ nanoneedle-based delivery platform enables unique capabilities for advanced cell engineering and cell therapy development

  • A single “poke” by one of our nanoneedles is very well tolerated by cells, allowing us to routinely achieve over 90-95% viability in engineered cells, including in fragile cell types like primary immune cells and stem cells. This high viability (with no recovery period) also enables sequential delivery of payloads into engineered cells.

  • Our system can finely control the amount of cargo which gets into each cell, through both proprietary surface chemistry (controlling the loading and release of cargo from our needles) as well as temporal control during needle-based delivery. These capabilities enable unprecedented dose control when engineering cells and offer a critical degree of precision for cell therapy development not possible with conventional delivery.

  • Our nanoneedle delivery method directly transports cargo into target cells, enabling high efficiency delivery even in challenging cell types.

  • Through spatial and chemical controls, we are able to target cargo delivery specifically to the nucleus, resulting in higher efficiency genome editing and avoiding cytotoxicity issues triggered by DNA payloads in the cytoplasm.

  • Our platform enables multiple, distinct cargos to be loaded onto a single needle, allowing for simultaneous delivery of multiple components into recipient cells. This intraneedle multiplexing supports advanced gene editing and other multi-payload applications.

  • With the consistency of single cell precision at scale, and an event log tracking each delivery event, we enable better data packages for regulatory submission by having more control and tracking of what is delivered into each cell.

Building a track record of

Superior payload delivery in fragile cell types

 

Payload examples

Nucleic Acids 

Protein Complexes

Small Molecules

Cell type examples

Primary Cells 

Immune Cells

Stem Cells

 

Collaboration is in our DNA.

Learn how our novel delivery platform can accelerate your cell therapy development programs.