Destroying Cancer: new drug delivery system containing RNA therapy can target cancer cells in bone marrow
Researchers from Tel Aviv University develop nanoparticles containg RNA molecules, similar to those used in the COVID-19 vaccine, that inhibit the ability of cancer cells to divide
Researchers at Tel Aviv University destroyed 90% of the multiple myeloma blood cancer cells under laboratory conditions, and 60% in human tissues taken from patients at Rabin Medical Center (Belinson Hospital), using an RNA-based drug delivered to the cells by targeted lipid nanoparticles.
The researchers developed lipid-based nanoparticles (similar to those used in the COVID-19 vaccine) containing RNA molecules that silence the gene CKAP5, encoding cytoskeleton-associated protein 5. With this protein inhibited the cancer cell is unable to divide, which essentially kills it. To avoid damaging noncancerous cells, the nanoparticles were coated with antibodies that guided them specifically to the cancer cells inside the bone marrow.
The breakthrough was achieved by a group of researchers from Tel Aviv University and the Rabin Medical Center, led by Prof. Dan Peer, a pioneer in the development of RNA therapeutics and Head of the Nanomedicine Laboratory at the Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research, also serving as TAU's VP R&D, and by PhD student Dana Tarab-Ravski. The results were published in the leading journal Advanced Science.
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