We are pleased to present a student who is close to the end of their PhD here at AIBN, to share their research with you.
Date: Thursday, 2 September
Time: 12 - 1pm
Venue: Online Via Zoom
Click here to access the free seminar.
Abstract
As the most malignant of brain cancers, the median survival time of glioblastoma (GBM) patients is less than 15 months. Medical intervention includes surgery combined with chemo- (Temozolomide, TMZ) and radiotherapy. However, drug resistance to TMZ was observed clinically because of the high expression of DNA repair protein O6-alkylguanine DNA alkyltransferase (AGT), which partly restores the gene adducts triggered by TMZ and induces tumour recurrence. As an AGT inhibitor, O6-Benzyl Guanine (O6-BG) has shown an improved therapeutic effect of alkylation drugs in resistant glioma cell lines and animal models. Nonetheless, the therapeutic effect of this drug combination is less pronounced in clinical trials, mainly because of dosage down-regulation of the alkylation agent. This down-regulation was caused by severe side effects due to off-target toxicity.
Here, we generated an effective theranostic platform by linking TMZ and O6-BG to a hyper-branched polymeric (HBP) backbone together with bispecific antibodies (αPEG-αEPHA2) that increase specific tumour accumulation through targeting the tumour-associated antigen EPHA2. This hybrid platform facilitates targeted drug delivery, leading to increased therapeutic efficacy to TMZ resistant GBM. In addition, the system includes a dye for convenient monitoring of the drug delivery system both in vitro and in vivo respectively, forming a theranostic platform for GBM treatment.
Presenter: Ms Weijing Chu, Thurecht Group, Australian Institute for Bioengineering and Nanotechnology, UQ.
Weijing joined the Thurecht Group as a fully funded Ph.D. student in 2019. She graduated from Sun Yat-sen University, China in 2015 with the Master of Science in Pharmaceutical Science. Her working was focused on building nano drug delivery system for the treatment of cancer bone metastasis. After that, she worked in college as an assistant lecturer teaching Pharmaceutical Science for 3 years. Now her research interest is finding a proper nano-drug delivery system to improve the prognosis of glioma patients.
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The AIBN Seminar series showcases a range of seminars across different topics and disciplines