Lung Cancer Treatment Receives Help From Medical Nanoparticles

Nanoparticles may prove helpful in treating lung cancer, according to a recent study published in the journal ACSO Nano.

These extremely small particles can be modified for a variety of uses in the medical field, whether it comes to engineering to transporting medicines to a specific disease site while not interfering with healthy parts of the body.

Now, Munich scientists have developed nanocarriers that only release carried drugs in lung tumor areas. For the first time, the study shows nanoparticles' selective drug release to human lung tumor tissue.

"Using these nanocarriers we can very selectively release a drug such as a chemotherapeutic agent specifically at the lung tumour," reports research group leader Silke Meiners of the Comprehensive Pneumology Center (HMGU), in a news release. "We observed that the drug's effectiveness in the tumour tissue was 10 to 25 times greater compared to when the drugs were used on their own. At the same time, this approach also makes it possible to decrease the total dose of medicines and consequently to reduce undesirable effects."

Future studies will be needed to determine the safety of the nanocarriers in vivo and help better understand the clinical efficacy in an advanced lung tumor mouse model.