A new drug carrier system has been developed, which ensures the effective delivery of drugs to the cancer cell nucleus by manufacturing matrices using SiO2 and a concoction and by micro-grinding them.
Most cancer drugs eliminate cancerous cells by destroying DNA in the cancer cell nucleus. Therefore, cancer drugs must be capable of penetrating the nuclei of cancer cells.
Previous researches have reported that less than 1% of drug molecules managed to affect DNA in the cancer cell nucleus after entering the cytoplasm owing to the nuclear membrane’s strong shielding effects.
Thus, developing a drug carrier system that enables the direct delivery of drugs to the nuclear membrane would be useful in that drugs can be more effectively used at lower doses, the tumor microenvironment can be improved and targeted drug delivery is possible.
Researchers at the Saemam Medical Foundation has announced that they successfully developed a nano drug delivery system that directly targets the cancer cell nucleus in contrast to preexisting nano drug delivery systems that failed to get through the nuclear pores (20~70nm).
The researchers’ nano drug delivery system is capable of identifying the nuclear pores precisely inside the cytoplasm and penetrating the cell nucleus to discharge various medications. Hence diverse drug therapies that aim to attack DNA in the cancer cell nucleus would benefit from this nano drug delivery system, researchers say.