Osteotropic therapy via Layer-by-Layer Nanoparticles

Stephen W. Morton, Nisarg J. Shah, Mohiddin A. Quadir, Zhou J. Deng, Zhiyong Poon, Paula T.

Hammond

Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA 02139

Current treatment options for debilitating bone diseases such as osteosarcoma, osteoporosis, and bone metastatic cancer are suboptimal and have low efficacy. New treatment options for these pathologies require targeted therapy that maximizes exposure to the diseased tissue and minimizes off-target side effects. This work investigates an approach for generating functional and targeted drug carriers specifically for treating primary osteosarcoma, a disease in which recurrence is common and the cure rate has remained around 20%. This approach utilizes the modularity of Layer-by-Layer (LbL) assembly to generate tissue-specific drug carriers for systemic administration. This is accomplished via surface modification of drug-loaded nanoparticles with an aqueous polyelectrolyte, poly(acrylic acid) (PAA), side-chain functionalized with alendronate, a potent clinically used bisphosphonate. This work represents a tunable approach towards the synthesis of drug carriers, in which LbL enables surface modification of nanoparticles for tissue-specific targeting and treatment.
References: S.W. Morton et al. Advanced Healthcare Materials, early view: published online Oct. 9,
2013; doi: 10.1002/adhm.201300465.