A next-generation anticancer drug developed by Academia Sinica researchers could greatly boost the life expectancy of people suffering from colorectal cancer and increase the chances of curing the disease, a scientist said yesterday.
Academia Sinica research fellow Wu Han-chung (吳漢忠) said that his research team has developed an anti-cancer drug that is significantly more efficient than existing ones by conjugating peptides — protein segments — with liposomes.
He said that traditional chemotherapeutic drugs consist of fine particles and spread to other parts to the body, impeding the functions of normal cells and causing serious side effects.
Due to the high pressure in tumor sites, caused by ruptures innate to the blood vessels in tumors, it is very difficult for anti-cancer drugs to penetrate tumors, Wu added.
He said that by embedding the right peptides in the surface of liposomes, which measure 100 nanometers and are small enough to seep into openings in the tumor blood vessels, the researchers found that two anti-cancer drugs, Doxorubicin and Vinorelbine, which they encapsulated in the liposomes, were effectively delivered to tumor cells.
Since peptides are highly tumor-specific and have an outstanding binding affinity with cancer cells, they help the liposomal drug to locate tumors, Wu said.
The lipid membrane is then dissolved by the acidic environment in tumor sites, releasing Doxorubicin and Vinorelbin, he said.
The team used a contrast medium to highlight the areas showing Doxorubicin accumulation in tumors implanted in mice, and found that drug accumulation increased by 10 to 15 times over existing therapies using only liposome, while the accumulation of chemotherapeutic drugs was so low that no highlighted areas were shown.
Test results from six mice indicated that after administering the liposomal drug for 30 days, tumors implanted in three test subjects shrank significantly, while those in the other three were completely eliminated.
On average, the tumors implanted in the mice shrank by 98 percent.
All test mice survived a 120-day duration — about equivalent to 10 years in a human’s lifespan — suggesting that the newly created drug could mean a 100 percent survival rate in humans, the researchers said.
Wu said that most chemotherapeutic drugs extend a patient’s life expectancy by only about six months at best.
Furthermore, he said that a test using the peptides identified by his team, conducted among 78 colorectal cancer patients, found that the peptides successfully targeted tumor cells in 80 percent of the patients.
Furthermore, the results showed that the peptides can target even stage-one colorectal cancer cells, which could greatly help doctors diagnose cancer at an early stage, boosting survival rates, he said.
He said that the project targeted colorectal cancer because it has been the most common cancer in Taiwan over the past seven years, but the therapy is showing good prospects of treating other types of cancer.
“The liposomal drug is like a guided missile for tumors,” said Wu Chien-hsun (吳建勳) the research’s first author.
The team’s research was published in the Science Translational Medicine journal on Wednesday.
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