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The approach is versatile. Baker has laden the dendrimers with molecules that glow under MRI scans, which can reveal the location of a cancer. And he can hook different targeting molecules and drugs to the dendrimers to treat a variety of tumors. He plans to begin human trials later this year, potentially on ovarian or head and neck cancer.
Mauro Ferrari, a professor of internal medicine, engineering, and materials science at Ohio State University, is hopeful about what Baker's work could mean for cancer patients. "What Jim is doing is very important," he says. "It is part of the second wave of approaches to targeted therapeutics, which I think will have tremendous acceleration of progress in the years to come."
To hasten development of nano-based therapies, the NCI alliance has committed $144.3 million to nanotech-related projects, funding seven centers of excellence for cancer nanotechnology and 12 projects to develop diagnostics and treatments, including Baker's.
Baker has already begun work on a modular system in which dendrimers adorned with different drugs, imaging agents, or cancer-targeting molecules could be "zipped together." Ultimately, doctors might be able to create personalized combinations of nanomedicines by simply mixing the contents of vials of dendrimers.
Such a system is at least 10 years away from routine use, but Baker's basic design could be approved for use in patients in as little as five years. That kind of rapid progress is a huge part of what excites doctors and researchers about nanotechnology's medical potential. "It will completely revolutionize large branches of medicine," says Ferrari.
OTHER PLAYERS
Nanomedicine
Raoul Kopelman -- Nanoparticles for cancer imaging and therapy
University of Michigan
Robert Langer -- Nanoparticle drug delivery for prostate cancer
MIT
Charles Lieber -- Nanowire devices for virus detection and cancer screening
Harvard University
Ralph Weissleder -- Magnetic nano-particles for cancer imaging
Harvard University
Home page image courtesy of Bryan Christie Design.
Particles the size and shape of bacteria could more effectively deliver medicine to cells.
Guest (Rodney E Bigler, Ph.D.)
The idea that a dendrimer with some killing substance will be absorbed by cells that use folic acid is interesting. Unfortunately all body cells to my knowledge use folic acid. Eliminating a cancer depends upon surgical excision of the primary and killing the micrometastatic cells. These specific cells can be targeted but not by their desire to ingest folic acid.
I have to agree with Dr. Bigler. While reading the article I couldn’t help thinking about Las Vegas. However, when one considers the GI Cocktail traits of Chemotherapy there really isn’t much difference in risks. I believe in this situation we may not want to use this targeting system in conjunction with “killer” drugs but maybe direct delivery of beneficial drugs such as aspirin.
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Guest (elem@msn)
Nanomedicine
This is the best ray of light for so many HUMANS. Go to it!!!!!!
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