By Wejdan Al Shakarchi (PhD student in the Keele Nanopharmaceutics Research Group, Institute for Science & Technology in Medicine, Keele University)
Programming death in cancer cells
Novel technologies improving long-term prognosis
In our work at ISTM we produce tiny particles which can
perform multiple tasks, they can be used for the codelivery of anticancer drugs as well as proteins which can
trigger cell death. Here we attach a natural killing protein,
cytochrome C onto the nanoparticle surface. Cytochrome
C is useful in liver cancer treatment as it does not harm
normal cells but possess the ability to control and initiate
cell death in cancerous cells via the normal cell death
mechanism. Administration of cytochrome C combined
with drug therapy has shown to significantly improve the
ability to programme cell death in liver cancer cells.
Through this novel technology it is hoped that patients will
benefit from a better long-term prognosis using conventional therapies with reduced side effects.
Sce
ne
Diagram showing hybrid nanoparticles decorated with protein molecules
on their surface for cancer therapy.
Cancer is categorised as abnormal cell division, which
can be localised to a specific area or can invade other
parts of the body resulting in tumour spread. Mortality due
to liver cancer increases year on year resulting from drug
resistance, poor solubility of drugs in water and poor absorption of the drug by the body, in addition to alteration
in the genes of the tumour cells. With increases in obesity
rates and alcohol consumption over the past decade,
4500 new cases of liver cancer are discovered every year
in the UK. However, only 20% of these cases will respond
to current treatment regimes. As such, it is of paramount
importance that new therapeutic strategies are discovered. These include the development of new delivery systems for treating disease with drugs as well as investigation into the use of specific proteins, which can be used to
program cell death (apoptosis). Programmed cell death is
frequently associated with cancer: Defects in this pathway
may contribute to the onset of cancer since tumour cell
growth is rapid with no mechanism for death. Therefore,
activation of programmed cell death could control and
reduce tumour volume.
TRANSLATE
3
“
4500 new cases of liver
cancer are discovered
every year in the UK.
However, only 20% of
these cases will respond to current treatment regimes.
Dr
Chadwick inspecting one of the new force sensors that will be used