Today, the fight against cancer, the second most common cause of death after cardio-vascular diseases, remains one of the greatest global challenges.
The most widely used advanced pharmacological treatments are based on antibodies that target specific biomolecular elements. Recently, drugs have gone onto the market based on nanodimensional systems, more commonly referred to as nanomedicines. Use of these treatments has seen significant limitations, due to resistance to transport in the tumour micro-environment that reduces the spread of the drug and limits its distribution within the stroma and tumour cells. In the case of antibodies, this limitation is partly mitigated by a lower resistance to transport in the tissues and increase in therapeutic doses, with a consequent increase in cost of the treatment, already very high, and exposing the patient to numerous adverse reactions or events.

OBJECTIVES
To study and develop new combined therapeutic strategies aimed at increasing the volume of distribution and quantity of anti-tumour drugs selectively in the tumour tissue, appropriately modifying the pathophysiological state of the latter prior to administration of the therapeutic agent.
The intention is to verify, at the pre-clinical level, the possibility of using two different strategies aimed at maximising selective accumulation in the areas affected by oncological disease:

1. a pharmacological pre-treatment that increases permeability of the vessels
2. a pre-treatment based on application of radiation focused on the target lesion

RESULTS

Using appropriate in vivo and in vitro diagnostic methods to understand and exploit the relationship between therapeutic efficacy and bioavailability of this category of drugs, the expected results of the project are:

1. a new treatment that includes a pre-treatment with drugs already available on the market or the use of targeted radiation, possibly with the use of an imaging procedure for customisation of the therapy
2. set-up for advanced nanoscopy on histological sections dedicated to analysis of morphological and/or optical variations before and after pharmacological treatment

CONTACTS

Sara Zanchiello
Innovation and Complex Systems Structure – Area Science Park
sara.zanchiello@areasciencepark.it