Research Spotlight: Cancer fighting drugs disguised as platelets show promise in combating the disease
Researchers at North Carolina State University and the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill have developed a technique that coats anticancer drugs in membranes made from a patient's own platelets, allowing the drugs to last longer in the body and attack both primary cancer tumors and the circulating tumor cells that can cause a cancer to metastasize, according to an NC State article.
The work was tested successfully in an animal model, according to the article.
"There are two key advantages to using platelet membranes to coat anticancer drugs," said Zhen Gu, corresponding author of a paper on the work and an assistant professor in the joint biomedical engineering program at North Carolina State
"First, the surface of cancer cells has an affinity for platelets - they stick to each other. Second, because the platelets come from the patient's own body, the drug carriers aren't identified as foreign objects, so last longer in the bloodstream," said Gu who is a BMES member.
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