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剑桥科学家开发新型金纳米颗粒治疗脑癌

  1. 剑桥
  2. 纳米载药系统
  3. 脑癌
  4. 金纳米颗粒

来源:生物谷 2014-08-14 13:29

剑桥科学家开发新型金纳米颗粒治疗脑癌

2014年8月14日讯 /生物谷BIOON/ --最近来自英国剑桥大学的科学家在著名期刊Nanoscale上发表研究报告称微量金纳米颗粒能够帮助改善恶性脑瘤患者。研究人员利用这种材料输送化疗药物,结果发现当这种纳米级颗粒整合进入癌症细胞时,许多癌细胞停止分裂甚至死亡。研究人员希望通过这一发现开发出治疗恶性肿瘤更有效的方法。

据了解,在英国每年有超过4000名患者患上这种不治之症,目前的疗法都有各种各样的不足,这也使得患有这一疾病的患者生存期基本都不足五年。这项研究中采用的纳米颗粒是人头发直径的400万分之一,金颗粒外部包裹了一层化疗药物cisplatin。在研究中,这种金属颗粒载药系统能够有效放大化疗和放疗效应,最大限度杀死肿瘤细胞。处理20天后,肿瘤样本中肿瘤病毒基本全部死亡。

剑桥大学的Prof Sir Mark Welland参与这一研究,他表示下一步研究人员将尝试将种纳米金颗粒与一些能够靶向输送药物的材料结合使用,以考察其是否能够对其他种类的肿瘤起到类似的治疗作用。(生物谷Bioon.com)

详细英文报道:

Extremely small pieces of gold can be smuggled into cancer cells

Minuscule pieces of gold may help improve treatment for aggressive brain cancers, according to research published in the journal Nanoscale.

Scientists engineered extremely small golden spheres, coating them with a chemotherapy drug.

When the tiny particles were infused into the centre of tumour cells, the cancer stopped replicating and many diseased cells died.

Researchers hope it may provide a way to target difficult-to-treat cancers.

'Golden core'

Glioblastoma multiforme is a common form of brain cancer that affects more than 4,000 adults in the UK each year.

Though treatments exist, they have limited effectiveness. Most people with these tumours die within five years of diagnosis.

Researchers created nanospheres - particles that were four million times smaller than a cross-section of a single human hair.

At their core were tiny pieces of gold, surrounded by layers of cisplatin - a commonly used chemotherapy drug.

In trials on samples from human cancers, the spheres appeared to boost the effectiveness of conventional radiotherapy and chemotherapy, improving the chances that all the tumour cells were killed.

Scientists tested the nanospheres on brain-tumour samples extracted during surgery.

The cancer cells were then given a dose of radiotherapy, mirroring currently available treatment.

The radiotherapy not only attacked the tumour cells, it also excited electrons within the golden core. The excited electrons triggered the breakdown of genetic material (DNA) within the cancer.

This process also led to the release of the surrounding chemotherapy, allowing the cisplatin to work on the now weakened tumour.

'Challenging tumours'

Twenty days later, there appeared to be no viable cancer cells left in treated samples.

Prof Sir Mark Welland, of St John's College, Cambridge, who worked on the techniques said: "This is a double-whammy effect.

"And by combining this strategy with cancer cell-targeting materials, we should be able to develop therapy for glioblastoma and other challenging cancers in the future."

Dr Colin Watts, a neurosurgeon involved in the study said: "We need to be able to hit cancer cells directly with more than one treatment at the same time.

"This is important because some cancers are more resistant to one type of treatment than another."

They said this was promising but early research that required many more tests before it could be considered a part of standard treatment.

Researchers hope to start trials in humans in 2016 and are working on early experiments involving other types of tumour.

 

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