U of T Engineering professor Warren Chan has spent the last decade figuring out how to deliver chemotherapy drugs into tumours — and nowhere else. Now his lab has designed a set of nanoparticles attached to strands of DNA that can change shape to gain access to diseased tissue. Credit: NSERC
Modular nanoparticles attached to strands of DNA can change shape to gain access to diseased tissue. Many cancer drugs target fast-growing cells ie tumours, but unfortunately also hair follicles, GI lining, and skin. U of T Engineering Prof. Warren Chan has spent the last decade figuring out how to deliver chemotherapy drugs into tumours – and nowhere else.
One thing we know about cancer: no 2 tumours are identical. Eg Early-stage breast cancer may react differently to a given treatment than pancreatic cancer, or even breast cancer at a more advanced stage. Which particles can get inside which tumours depends on multiple factors such as the particle’s size, shape and surface chemistry. Chan’s group have now designed a targeted molecular delivery system that uses modular nanoparticles whose shape, size and chemistry can be altered by the presence of specific DNA sequences.
“We’re making shape-changing nanoparticles,” says Chan. “They’re a series of building blocks, kind of like a LEGO set.” The component pieces can be built into many shapes, with binding sites exposed or hidden. They are designed to respond to biological molecules by changing shape, like a key fitting into a lock. They are made of miniscule chunks of metal with strands of DNA attached to them. The nanoparticles will float around harmlessly in the blood stream, until a DNA strand binds to a sequence of DNA known to be a marker for cancer. When this happens, the particle changes shape, then targets the cancer cells, expose a drug molecule to the cancerous cell, tag the cancerous cells with a signal molecule etc.
The real problem is how to deliver enough of the nanoparticles directly to the cancer to produce an effective treatment. The group plans to apply the system toward personalized nanomedicine – further tailoring their particles to deliver drugs to your precise type of tumour, and nowhere else. http://news.engineering.utoronto.ca/shape-shifting-engineered-nanoparticles-for-delivering-cancer-drugs-to-tumours/
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