Cancer Fighting Nanoparticles...

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Mesoporous silica (mSiO₂) can be used to carry anti-cancer drugs to tumour sites in mice. So say researchers at the University of Wisconsin−Madison in the US who have succeeded in making TRC105-conjugated mSiO₂ labelled with radioactive copper for the first time. TRC105 is a chimeric monoclonal antibody that binds to both human and mouse endoglin, or CD105 (a type I membrane glycoprotein found on endothelial cell surfaces).

mSiO₂ nanoparticles are a promising new category of drug delivery vehicle because they are biocompatible and non-toxic. Their surfaces can also be easily modified and their mesopores (which are around 2–3 nm across) can hold a significant amount of therapeutic molecules.

Successful anti-cancer drug delivery

In vivo tumour targeting experiments by Cai and colleagues clearly show that the ⁶⁴Cu-NOTA-mSiO₂-PEG-TRC105 accumulates at mouse breast tumour sites (known as "4T1") thanks to TRC105-mediated binding to CD105 in tumour blood vessels. As a proof of concept, they also demonstrated that they could successfully deliver the anti-cancer drug doxorubicin (DOX) in mice with 4T1 tumours by injecting DOX-loaded ⁶⁴Cu-NOTA-mSiO₂-PEG-TRC105 into the animals.

Nanotech Web: Silica nanoparticles deliver anti-cancer drugs