About the Authors

Aman P. Mann

Contributed equally to this work with: Aman P. Mann, Anoma Somasunderam

Affiliation Department of Nanomedicine and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Anoma Somasunderam

Contributed equally to this work with: Aman P. Mann, Anoma Somasunderam

Affiliation Department of Nanomedicine and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

René Nieves-Alicea

Affiliation Department of Nanomedicine and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Xin Li

Affiliation Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Austin Hu

Affiliation Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America

Anil K. Sood

Affiliations Department of Gynecologic Oncology, University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America, Department of Cancer Biology, University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Mauro Ferrari

Affiliations Department of Nanomedicine and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America, Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America, Department of Experimental Therapeutics, University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center, Houston, Texas, United States of America, Department of Bioengineering, Rice University, Houston, Texas, United States of America

David G. Gorenstein

Affiliation Institute of Molecular Medicine, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America

Takemi Tanaka

Takemi.Tanaka@jefferson.edu

Affiliations Department of Nanomedicine and Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston, Houston, Texas, United States of America, Department of Biomedical Engineering, University of Texas Austin, Austin, Texas, United States of America, Department of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Thomas Jefferson University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, United States of America

Competing Interests

D.G. has financial interest in AM Biotechnologies and AptaMed Inc. A.M, A.S., D.G, and T.T are inventors on a patent on ESTA-1 in preparation. This does not alter the authors' adherence to all the PLoS ONE policies on sharing data and materials.

Author Contributions

Conceived and designed the experiments: APM AS DG TT. Performed the experiments: APM AS XL AH TT. Analyzed the data: APM AS RNA TT. Contributed reagents/materials/analysis tools: AS MF. Wrote the paper: APM AS RNA TT.