Nano-Transducers Composed of Lipids Visualize Population Doubling Levels of Cells

We present a novel concept of the “nano-transducer (Nano-T)” for non-destructive visualization of population doubling levels (PDLs) of cells. Nano-T, based on lipid nanoparticles, is designed to visualize cellular uptake preferences for the physical characteristics: sizes and surface fluidities. By reflecting the changed cell surfaces due to increased PDLs, Nano-T effectively visualized PDLs based on their physical characteristics. Finally, we demonstrated selective delivery to aged-cells under co-culture conditions with young-cells and achieved unpreceded 71% selectivity. The presented Nano-T will open new paradigms of nanomedicines for anti-aging.