The invention relates to VLP derived from human polyoma virus loaded with a drug (cargo) as a drug delivery system for transporting said drug into the CNS, in particular of living humans.

The disclosure relates to a fusion protein comprising at least a first and a second peptide, wherein the second peptide comprises a targeting region and a first and a second interaction region, the second peptide is located on the surface of the fusion protein; the second peptide comprises at least two interaction pairs, wherein an interaction pair is formed by an amino acid of the first interaction region and an amino acid of the second interaction region, the interaction between the amino acids of an interaction pair is covalent or non-covalent; and at least one interaction pair is a covalent interaction pair in which the amino acids are covalently bound, and to virus like particles (VLP) comprising the fusion protein for use as drug delivery system. Also provided are polynucleotides encoding the fusion protein, suitable expression vectors, host cells, production methods for the fusion protein and the VLP comprising the fusion protein.

A method of using a virus-like particle from a polyomavirus having a first nucleic acid as a cargo to detect a second nucleic acid. The method includes providing the virus-like particle from the polyomavirus having the first nucleic acid as the cargo, and detecting, via the virus-like particle from the polyomavirus, the second nucleic acid.

The invention relates to VLP derived from human polyoma virus loaded with a drug (cargo) as a drug delivery system for transporting said drug into the CNS, in particular of living humans.

The present invention relates to compositions of virus-like particles for the introduction of RNA-interference (RNAi-) inducing molecules into eukaryotic cells and methods for the cell type-specific transduction of a plurality of eukaryotic cells with RNAi-inducing molecules. The present invention furthermore relates to methods for a diagnosis, prevention and/or treatment of diseases or disease states associated with an increased expression rate of at least one endogenous gene, and/or with the undesired expression of at least one endogenous gene and/or foreign nucleic acids, in particular viral nucleic acids.

Provided are particles of nucleic acid origami structure encapsulated by at least twelve capsid units, compositions comprising the same and uses thereof for delivery of nucleic acids to target cells.