Using lasers to deliver drugs

As I mentioned in this previous article, lasers are being used in various ways to help medical patients.

One team in Switzerland has come closer to creating a method that is workable, depending on the safety and reproducability when using nanoparticles.

A team led by Jeffrey Hubbell of the École Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne (EPFL) has found a way to bind water-insoluble cancer drugs to nanoparticles by exposing the two to argon laser light for one hour.

The nanoparticles have internal spaces used to trap the drugs and channels through which they can be released.

The investigators created these nanoparticles from two different polymers that crosslink to each other when exposed to light from an argon laser for one hour. They then added the nanoparticles to a solution of doxorubicin and evaporated the solvent used to dissolve the anticancer drug. Nearly half of the drug in solution became encapsulated within the nanoparticles. The researchers note that the resulting nanoparticles contain a protein-repelling surface coating that should result in favorable pharmacokinetic behavior.

Experiments to test the drug-release characteristics of these nanoparticles showed that maximum release occurred at approximately eight hours and then remained close to that level for a week. The data imply that release occurs through a diffusion mechanism, that is, drug travels through channels in the nanoparticle to the nanoparticle surface, as opposed to a disintegration mechanism in which the nanoparticle falls apart and releases drug.

Their work has been published in the European Journal of Pharmecuetal Sciences.


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Published by

Michael Harrison

Husband, Programmer, Irish dancer, tinkerer, astronomer, layabout (as much as possible)

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