The continually increasing wealth of knowledge about the role of genes involved in acquired or hereditary diseases renders the delivery of regulatory genes or nucleic acids into affected cells a potentially promising strategy. Apart from viral vectors, non‐viral gene delivery systems have recently received increasing interest, due to safety concerns associated with insertional mutagenesis of retro‐viral vectors. Especially cationic polymers may be particularly attractive for the delivery of nucleic acids, since they allow a vast synthetic modification of their structure enabling the investigation of structure‐function relationships. Successful clinical application of synthetic polycations for gene delivery will depend primarily on three factors, namely (1) an enhancement of the transfection efficiency, (2) a reduction in toxicity and (3) an ability of the vectors to overcome numerous biological barriers after systemic or local administration. Among the polycations presently used for gene delivery, poly(ethylene imine), PEI, takes a prominent position, due to its potential for endosomal escape. PEI as well as derivatives of PEI currently under investigation for DNA and RNA delivery will be discussed.

This review focuses on structure‐function relationships and the physicochemical aspects of polyplexes which influence basic characteristics, such as complex formation, stability or in vitro cytotoxicity, to provide a basis for their application under in vivo conditions. Rational design of optimized polycations is an objective for further research and may provide the basis for a successful cationic polymer‐based gene delivery system in the future. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.