Scientists discover new compound that could help treat ovarian cancer

A new research now finds scientists  discover a compound that could be more effective in treating a few types of cancers than standard chemotherapy.

While chemotherapy is still the first line of defense for most cancer tumours and is often highly effective, many cancers are naturally resistant, or develop resistance, to commonly used first-line chemotherapy drugs like cisplatin.

Researchers identified new drug-candidates that would work against these types of treatment resistant cancers.

In the study, scientists screened new compounds made in the lab against a “panel” of cancers that were sensitive and resistant to standard cancer therapy. They further tested the compounds with non-malignant cells to see how toxic they were to normal cells.

They found two lead compounds that had low toxicity to non-malignant cells but were highly active against cancer cells sensitive or resistant to standard treatment.

Speaking about it, a Prof. said, “Many cancer cells – about 20 per cent – become resistant to common treatments by learning to ignore the internal signals that tell them to undergo programmed cell death, known as apoptosis.

He further added, “We have identified a compound that kills cancer cells that avoids the need for apoptosis, and so the usual resistance mechanism doesn’t work against our compound.”

According to the Prof., the compound is as potent as common current chemotherapeutics, but crucially retains its potency against treatment-resistant cancers.

By looking at the cellular response from the cancers the researchers found the new drug lead works by two different mechanisms simultaneously, making it much more difficult for cancers to develop resistance toward them during treatment.

“We think this compound could be particularly effective against ovarian cancer,” he added.
The team used a technique called “proteomics” to determine how thousands of proteins in the cells responded to exposure to the drug lead.

Professor said, “Proteomics is a remarkably powerful approach we have  to identify how living things respond to new drug candidates. The multiple mechanisms of action of the new molecules was an unexpected and exciting result.”

Researchers now want to carry out further studies to find out if the compound can be used in combination with current treatments to improve their performance.

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Novel gold nanocomplex for cancer drug delivery

Anti-tumour drugs could target the diseased cell

Using gold nanoparticles coated with a simple organic molecule (porphyrin), researchers have designed an efficient drug nanocarrier. The nanocarrier was found to effectively deliver doxorubicin (anti-tumour drug) to the nucleus of the diseased cell and bring about programmed cell death.
Porphyrin was armoured on the gold nanosurface via continuous stirring method. “Porphyrin is a simple organic compound and it gives the necessary protection and stability to the nanosurface. Porphyrins are essential co-factors in many human proteins such as hemoglobin and so it can escape from the macrophages in our body,” explains the Senior Scientist  and one of the corresponding authors of the paper published recently.

The porphyrin molecule was found to be uniformly distributed on gold nanoparticles and the porphyrin–gold complex was stable.

The anti-tumour drug doxorubicin was then successfully loaded on the porphyrin–gold nanosurface. “Doxorubicin is selectively released when it reaches the low-pH environment seen in cancerous cells,” explains a research scholar at the institute and one of the first authors of the paper.

Activity of the complex

Its activity was then tested on brain and lung cancer cells and normal healthy cells. The porphyrin–gold complex without the drug showed no toxicity to healthy and cancerous cells. The nanoparticles coated with the drug showed very low toxicity to normal cells and caused programmed cell death both in brain and lung cancer cells.

Multidrug resistance is one of the major barriers in cancer cells, where the drug is quickly ejected out, reducing the effective drug concentrations within the cells and thus decreases its sensitivity. 

“We found that the drug-coated nanoparticles were retained well inside the cells thus showing higher activity,” says another research scholar at the institute and one of the first authors of this paper.

“There are several pathways by which the drug can damage the DNA. Currently we are studying the pathways, and trying to design a system that can release the drug more efficiently. We are also studying how the system works in real scenario of tumour model,” says one of the corresponding authors of the paper.

THIS IS ONLY FOR INFORMATION, ALWAYS CONSULT YOU PHYSICIAN BEFORE HAVING ANY PARTICULAR FOOD/ MEDICATION/EXERCISE/OTHER REMEDIES.                                                                                                                                                                                                        PS- THOSE INTERESTED IN RECIPES ARE FREE TO  VIEW MY BLOG-                                                                                           https://gseasyrecipes.blogspot.com/  

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