Telset.id, Jakarta – Nanoparticles by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) research team are said to be able to deliver chemotherapy drugs to the brain and kill cancer cells.
The research team created a human tissue model to demonstrate the function of the nanoparticles. Chemotherapy drugs will enter the tumor, then kill the glioblastoma cells.
As reported Gadgets360, types of cancer such as glioblastoma have a high mortality rate. Treatment is difficult because of the blood-brain barrier.
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The barrier will not allow most chemotherapy drugs to penetrate the blood vessels around the brain and thus hinder cancer treatment efforts.
The MIT research team is trying to develop particles that can carry drugs and enter tumors. The drug then works to kill the glioblastoma cells.
To test efficiency, the research team devised the method and created a replicative model of the blood-brain barrier, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
“By testing the particles in a much more realistic model, we hope to reduce wasted time and energy,” said the MIT research team.
To replicate the complex structure of the brain, the research team used patient-derived glioblastoma cells by growing them in a microfluidic device.
Then, human endothelial cells are used to grow blood vessels in tiny tubes that surround the tumor cells. They also included two types of cells.
The two types are pericytes and astrocytes, which are involved in the transport of molecules across the blood-brain barrier. To make nanoparticles, layer by layer assembly technique is used.
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The particles used in the study were coated with a peptide called AP2, which was shown to be effective in helping the particles cross the blood-brain barrier.
The research team tested the nanoparticles in models of healthy brain tissue and glioblastoma. The AP2 peptide-coated particles efficiently pass through the blood vessels around the tumor.
Next, the particles were filled with the chemotherapy drug cisplatin and coated with a targeting peptide. The research team noted that the coated particles were able to kill glioblastoma tumor cells.
“We saw an increase in tumor cell death treated with peptide-coated nanoparticles compared to naked particles or over-the-counter drugs,” said lead author Cynthia Hajal.
Furthermore, he said, the coated article showed a higher specificity for killing tumors than killing all of them by non-specific means.
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