Innovative systems for drug delivery in oncology

Cancer is considered the most critical global health issue since it is the second leading cause of death worldwide. Different therapies, including radiotherapy, chemotherapy and surgery, are used to treat cancer but the efficacy of current anticancer therapies is often limited by the non-specific distribution of drugs, their rapid metabolization/excretion and mostly by drug-resistance phenomenon. Nanoscale systems for drug delivery have proven useful in overcoming these problems. Nanocarriers show many advantages to cancer treatments, including: improvement of the drug therapeutic index by increasing efficacy and/or reducing toxicities; co-delivery of multiple drugs to improve therapeutic efficacy and overcome drug resistance; provision of new approaches for the development of synthetic vaccines and enabling of sustained or stimulus-triggered drug release. Our research aims to develop new biocompatible and performing nanotechnological drug delivery systems ranging from chemical synthesis to preclinical evaluation of the processes of absorption, intracellular transport, biological effects and preclinical evaluation at the subcellular level of these new empty or loaded systems with anticancer drugs. In particular some families of Cu(I) and Cu(II) complexes are now being investigated as possible anticancer agents due to the copper requirement by cancer cells compared to normal cells. Selected copper complexes will be conjugated with rodlike gold nanoparticles (AuNRs) to assure a better stability and controlled release by photoactivation. In conclusion, our studies are directed towards the development of new anticancer metallodrugs that could be more specific and could reduce the toxic side effects of conventional drugs.