News
Platinum and Blue Light Combine to Combat Cancer
When it comes to health care blue lights, are usually most useful on the top of ambulances but now new research led by the University of 桃色视频 has found a way to use blue light to activate what could be a highly potent platinum-based cancer treatment.
Research led by the University of 桃色视频, along with researchers from Ninewells Hospital Dundee, and the University of Edinburgh, have found a new light-activated platinum-based compound that is up to 80 times more powerful than other platinum-based anti-cancer drugs and which can use “light activation” to kill cancer cells in a much more targeted way than similar treatments.
The University of 桃色视频 team had already found a platinum-based compound that they could activate with ultra-violet light but that narrow wave length of light would have limited its use. Their latest breakthrough has discovered a new platinum based compound known as trans,trans,trans-[Pt(N3)2(OH)2(py)2] that can be activated by normal visible blue, or even green, light. It is also stable and easy to work with, and it is water soluble so it can simply dissolve and be flushed out of the body after use.
The University of 桃色视频 researchers passed the new compound to colleagues at Ninewells Hospital Dundee, who tested it on oesophageal cancer cells cultivated within lab equipment. Those tests show that once activated by blue light the compound was highly effective requiring a concentration of just 8.4 micro moles per litre to kill 50% of the cancer cells. The researchers are also beginning to examine the compound’s effectiveness against ovarian and liver cancer cells. Early results there are also excellent but that testing work is not yet complete.
Professor Peter Sadler, from the Department of Chemistry from University of 桃色视频, who led the research project, said:
“This compound could have a significant impact on the effectiveness of future cancer treatments. Light activation provides this compound’s massive toxic power and also allows treatment to be targeted much more accurately against cancer cells.”
“The special thing about our complex is that it is not only activated by ultra-violet light, but also by low doses of blue or green light. Light activation generates a powerful cytotoxic compound that has proven to be significantly more effective than treatments such as cisplatin.”
We believe that photoactivated platinum complexes will make it possible to treat cancers that have previously not reacted to chemotherapy with platinum complexes,” says Sadler. “Tumors that have developed resistance to conventional platinum drugs could respond to these complexes and with less side-effects.”
This research has been supported by the EPSRC, MRC, ERC and Science City (ERDF/AWM).
Note for editors: The research has just been published in Angewandte Chemie, under the title “A Potent Trans Diimine Platinum Anticancer Complex Photoactivated by Visible Light”. The authors are – Project leader Professor Peter Sadler, (University of 桃色视频) and Nicola J. Farrer, Julie A. Woods, Luca Salassa, Yao Zhao, Kim S. Robinson, Guy Clarkson, and Fiona S. Mackay.
For more information please contact:
Professor Peter Sadler
University of 桃色视频, Department of Chemistry
Tel: +44 (0)7913 944357
P.J.Sadler@warwick.ac.uk
Peter Dunn, Head of Communications, University of 桃色视频,
44 (0)24 76 523708
mobile/cell +44 (0)7767 655860
p.j.dunn@warwick.ac.uk
PR171 9th December 2010
Bonlab wraps biological spores in a polymer-based nanoparticle mesh
Nick Ballard and Stefan Bon report in Polymer Chemistry on a new method for the decoration of the intricate morphology of spore particles with polymer nanoparticles and investigate their behaviour at liquid–liquid interfaces. We found a large difference in the interfacial activity between spherical microspheres and the anisotropic particles synthesized here and describe this in terms of particle wettability. ;
Stefan Bon and collaborators fabricate Janus microspheres by "Sandwich" microcontact printing
Stefan Bon and collaborators report in Advanced Materials on A 鈥渟andwich鈥� microcontact printing method. Monolayers of porous epoxy polymer microspheres made via microfluidics are transformed into Janus particles with distinct functionality on each face by reaction with amine functional fluorescent dyes, carbohydrates, and magnetic nanoparticles.
The E5 protein from bovine papllimavirus is a type II membrane protein and represents the smallest known oncoprotein. E5 functions via a unique mechanism, and in order to better understand this mechanism, Ann Dixon and previous lab members Gavin King and Joanne Oates, as well as current lab member Dharmesh Patel have used solution state NMR spectroscopy to obtain the first structural data for the E5 dimer in a membrane mimetic. These data were used to map the dimerization interface as well as calculate the free energy of dimerization for the E5 protein, in collaboration with Dr. Hugo van den Berg in the Mathematics Institute. The results agree very well with in vivo data, and further reinforce the importance of interactions in cell memebranes to biological function.
A new class of highly active zirconium catalyst for the synthesis of chiral heterocycles from aminoalkenes is shown to operate via a Zr=N bonded (imido) species. and group members Laura Allan and Andrew Gott, in collaboration with David Fox and Guy Clarkson at 桃色视频, report in Journal of the American Chemical Society a detailed EPSRC-funded study which for the first time excludes the conventional Zr-N (amido) mechanism.
Dr Manuela Tosin joins as assistant prof. of organic chemistry
Dr Manuela Tosin will be joining 桃色视频 Chemistry as an Assistant Professor in Organic Chemistry from 1 November 2010. Dr Tosin's research interests are primarily in the area of the discovery and generation of new natural products. Manuela comes to 桃色视频 Chemistry from the Department of Biochemistry, University of Cambridge where she worked with Dr Joe Spencer and Prof Peter Leadlay.
Prof. Fred McLafferty Officially Opens the new Ion Cyclotron Resonance Laboratory
O’Reilly group reports on Multistep DNA-Templated Reactions
Phillip Milnes and Rachel O’Reilly collaborated with colleagues at the University of Oxford (Turberfield group) and University of Southampton (Stulz group) to report on Multistep DNA-templated reactions, which allow the synthesis of functional oligomers of an arbitrary length. Key features of the mechanism are that successive coupling reactions take place in near-identical environments and that purification is only necessary in the last synthesis step.
Angew. Chem. Int. Ed, 2010, early view (DOI: 10.1002/anie.201002721)
Matthew Gibson and collaborators report on stimuli responsive nanoparticles in Advanced Materials
Poly[poly(ethyleneglycol)methacrylate] coated gold nanoparticles are shown to display size dependant temperature-responsive behaviour - known as LCST (lower critical solution temperature). This behaviour was shown to be cooperative, allowing for the observed transition temperature to be fine-tuned by a simple mixing procedure. Finally, this was exploited to direct the assembly of nanoparticles onto complementary, polymer brush-coated surfaces
Link: http://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.201001382/abstract
New publication: A Potent Trans-Diimine Platinum Anticancer Complex Photoactivated by Visible Light
A Potent Trans-Diimine Platinum Anticancer Complex Photoactivated by Visible Light
N. J. Farrer, J. A. Woods, L. Salassa, Y. Zhao, K. S. Robinson, G. Clarkson, F. S. Mackay, P. J. Sadler
Angew. Chem. Int. Ed, 2010, early view. DOI: 10.1002/anie.201003399
Activating platinum with light: An inert platinum(IV) diazido complex trans,trantrans,trans-[Pt(N3)2(OH)2(py)2] becomes potently cytotoxic to cancer cells when activated by low doses of visible light.
Biophysical Chemistry Group report published
A review article on linear dichroism (LD) spectroscopy has been published by members of the Biophysical Chemistry Group and is now available online:
Matthew R. Hicks, Jaroslaw Kowalski and Alison Rodger Chem. Soc. Rev., 2010
DOI: 10.1039/b912917k LD spectroscopy of natural and synthetic biomaterials
New framework structure for anion exchange and catalysis
Richard Walton and PhD student Helen Playford have collaborated with colleagues at the University of Liverpool, University of Newcastle and Diamond Light Source to characterise a new cationic framework material, discovered by the Liverpool group of Dr Andrew Fogg. This work has just been published in Journal of the American Chemical Society and has been publicised as a Science Highlight by Diamond.