Develop a system for detecting and eliminating tumors based on nanoparticles

2013/03/12 Lakar Iraizoz, Oihane - Elhuyar Zientzia Iturria: Elhuyar aldizkaria

• Biokimika
• Ikerketa-zentroak
• Medikuntza
• Bioteknologia

Gaiker-IK4 has developed an innovative cancer system in a project led by Gaiker-IK4. The project sought the location and death of tumors by using nanoparticles as a tool.

Twenty European organizations have worked for four years to achieve this double goal and one of the results obtained has been the development of a tumor detection system. “The goal was not to be as invasive as the current systems (biopsy). Thanks to specific characteristics of nanoparticles and the use of a software created, images of the tumor region are obtained and the dimension of the tumor can be seen with great precision,” explains Pedro Heredia, researcher and project manager of Gaiker-IK4. And by releasing drugs stored in nanoparticles, researchers have also achieved the death of tumor cells in in vitro experiments.

However, “as it happens in all projects, the result has been bittersweet, because we have achieved very important things, on the one hand, but we have not met all the objectives we had,” says Heredia. The problems arise in conducting experiments in vivo: “The results have not been so satisfactory, since we have not managed to be more efficient than the previous treatment. In fact, animal systems are much more complex and contain processes that do not appear in cells grown in the laboratory, such as the immune system.”

The researcher foresees a long way ahead, “because in vivo trials have been very limited. Among other things, we must improve the nanoparticles themselves, since in the experiments we have seen that the result obtained varied a lot from one lot to another. That is, we should get the results to be repeated in all lots.”