Cancer
is an unanswerable question for researchers around the world from many decades.
Exploring wide areas of biology, medicine and interdisciplinary fields like
nanotechnology is going on to find a suitable molecule to kill cancer. The
prescription of drugs (chemotherapy) to cancer patients by physicians across
the globe after tumor removal is the current treatment modality. So the drugs
play an important role in the treatment of cancer. The effectiveness of the
drugs is limited while the side effects are more. But patients, as there is no
other go, are ready to take these drugs.
From
the last decade, the advent of nanotechnology in the delivery of medicine has
paved the way for a new field called “Drug Delivery”. The main objective of
this field is to develop various nanoformulation (a drug loaded nanocarrier)
that is targeted to the specific diseased site, stay for a longer time in the
body and minimizing side effects. Not every nanoformulation will fulfill all
these three, but most of them will.
A
recent development from Mc Neil’s Lab, part of the federally funded research and development center operated by
SAIC-Frederick for the National Cancer Institute, worked with a drug company to
reformulate TNF-alpha by coupling it with gold nanoparticles. Using the
nanotechnology-enhanced protein, it appears possible to safely inject up to
three times the amount that had been lethal with previous versions. The
modified drug has been through a Phase 1 clinical trial and is entering Phase 2[1].
In future we can expect much more will come from many labs around the
world and hope for a cancer free society.
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