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The research, led by the University of Zaragoza, manages to introduce catalysts into tumor cells to kill them, without affecting healthy tissue.
Aragón has led the creation of a new tool to fight tumor cells from within. This research, still in the initial stages, could attack the tumor without damaging the rest of the healthy tissues and be able to reduce the current side effects of some treatments such as chemotherapy.
Researchers from the Aragon Nanoscience Institute (INA) of the University of Zaragoza, Araid and the universities of Granada and Edinburgh have been working on this important and novel study for more than two and a half years, which was published this Monday afternoon in the prestigious magazine 'Nature Catalysis'.
The novelty lies in 'manufacturing' the toxic molecule within the tumor cell. For this, the professor at the University of Zaragoza Jesús Santamaría explains that a catalyst has been used, like those used in many other daily aspects of life. "For example, the gases that come out of our car pass through a catalyst to convert them into others that are less harmful to the environment and health," says Santamaría. On this occasion, Palladium (metal) has been used as a catalyst that transforms a passive molecule into a powerful anti-cancer agent. Specifically, in panobinostat, a chemotherapy approved in 2015.
But how do you get this catalyst to the tumor? "Using a biological mechanism that the cells themselves have," says Santamaría. All cells generate vesicles called exosomes. These can circulate throughout the body and are an important part of the communication mechanism between cells.
What has been done – the researcher highlights – is to "hijack" this "intercellular traffic" so that the exosomes themselves carry the "load" to the tumor. "We have found a mechanism to synthesize the catalyst within an exosome, without damaging the properties of its membrane, which is where it has the characteristics and recognition elements of the initial cell," emphasizes Santamaría.
In this way, the catalysts inside the exosomes will go to the original cell and, there, they will carry out a reaction that generates a toxic molecule in situ. "We have collected exosomes from the same type of cancer cell that we intend to treat, we have loaded them with the Palladium catalyst and we have returned them to the culture medium. There, thanks to their selective tropism, the exosomes are responsible for carrying the catalyst to the original cell," he explains. Once inside, the catalyst converts the inactive panobinostat into its active, toxic form to cause cell death. "Just where we want it: inside the tumor cell," he adds.
