4.1. Reagents, Cells, and Cell Culture

Egg phospholipid (PC, Lipoid E80) for nanostructured lipid carriers (NLC) reconstitution were purchased from Lipoid GmbH (Ludwigshafen, Germany). Cholesterol for NLC reconstitution and streptavidin were from Solarbio Science & Technology Co. (Shanghai, China). Octadecylamine, cholesteryl oleate, and glycerol trioleate for NLC reconstitution, as well as Oil Red O and Nile Red for lipid staining, were purchased from Sigma (St. Louis, MO, USA). Human ApoA-I for reconstituted high-density lipoprotein (rHDL) synthesis and biotin-conjugated anti-ApoA-I antibody (anti-ApoA-I-biotin) for specifically recognizing ApoA-I were purchased from Cloud-clone (Katy, TX, USA). Ganglioside GM3 was from AdipoGen Life Sciences (Liestal, Switzerland). Human ox-LDL for foam cell induction of macrophages was from Yiyuan Biotechnologies (Guangzhou, China). Carboxyl silica microspheres were from Bangs Laboratories, Inc. (Fishers, IN, USA). Anti-GM3 IgM and AlexaFluor488-conjugated goat anti-mouse IgM antibodies were from Amsbio (Milton Park Abingdon, UK) and Invitrogen (Carlsbad, CA, USA), respectively. Other reagents were all of analytical/chromatographic grade.

Mouse RAW264.7 macrophages, purchased from the Cell Bank of the Chinese Academy of Sciences (Shanghai, China), were routinely cultured in RPMI 1640 Media (Gibco) and supplemented with 10% FBS, 100 Unit/mL penicillin and 100 μg/mL streptomycin. The cells at passage ~5 were used in the experiments.