Creating more potent cancer therapy using ‘theranostics’

A City of Hope scientist and his colleagues have developed a user-friendly approach to creating “theranostics” – therapy combined with diagnostics – that target specific tumours and diseases.
Key to the process are molecules called metallocorroles, which serve as versatile platforms for the development of drugs and imaging agents. City of Hope’s John Termini, Ph.D., and his colleagues at the California Institute of Technology and the Israel Institute of Technology developed a novel method to prepare cell-penetrating nanoparticles called “metallocorrole/protein nanoparticles.” The theranostics could both survive longer in the body and better snipe disease targets.
The study details a unique way the researchers prepared the theranostics that may be generalizable to many similar molecules.
“Through collaborative brainpower, we were able to create something that has huge chemotherapeutic potential,” Termini said. “Down the road, theranostics such as this could shorten treatment duration and diminish the dreaded side effects so many cancer patients fear.”
City of Hope https://tinyurl.com/y67c26em