Academia Sinica researchers yesterday introduced a new chemical switch that can secure the efficacy of drugs in target tumors and minimize unwanted toxicity.
The study was written by a research team led by Institute of Biomedical Sciences research fellow Steve Roffler, who last month was among the 78 recipients of the Ministry of Science and Technology’s Outstanding Research Award.
Hydrophobic drugs tend to leak out of biocompatible nanocarriers before they accumulate in tumors, which is a major bottleneck affecting the efficacy of nanomedicine, Roffler told a news conference in Taipei.
Photo: Chien Hui-ju, Taipei Times
To solve the problem, the researchers spent seven years developing a switch that can be linked to drugs and allow them to reach target tumors without leaking out of liposomes in blood, which could introduce unwanted toxicity in other parts of the body, he said.
The switch offers new opportunities for researchers to develop safe and effective nanomedicines for treating cancers and other diseases, he said, adding that it might be useful for loading multiple drugs into a single liposome.
They used mice bearing human breast cancer tumors for the study and plan to continue testing the switch to treat pancreatic and metastatic colorectal cancers in mice, he added.
The study, titled “Reversible glycosidic switch for secure delivery of molecular nanocargos,” was published in the journal Nature Communications on May 10.
It was coauthored by postdoctoral researchers at Roffler’s lab, Pierre-Alain Burnouf and Su Yu-cheng (蘇昱誠), as well as Chia Nan University of Pharmacy and Science professor Leu Yu-lin (呂玉玲), who is Roffler’s former student.
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