New polymer research benefits anti-cancer treatment

Researchers at the University of Huddersfield have developed a new lab technique that could potentially aid the development and success rate of an important anti-cancer treatment.

The treatment, used particularly in cases of liver cancer, injects polymer beads into arteries that feed a tumour, where they block the blood flow cutting off the supply of oxygen and nutrients. The beads are able to release an anti-cancer drug into the tumour, reducing systemic side effects.

However, developers need a safe way of predicting what will happen in a patient’s body if the beads and the drug they contain are modified. New research has provided a method with the findings being described in an article featured in the European Journal of Pharmaceutical Sciences.

Huddersfield pharmaceutical science lecturer, researcher and co-author of the article, Dr Laura Waters said: “There was no lab mimic that was able to adequately predict how the drug was released from these drug-eluting beads once they were in the body. The article describes a way of doing it in the lab.  We compared our results with in vivo data and proved that the method worked.”

Dr Waters is supervising the PhD researcher Tanya Swaine, a graduate of the University of Huddersfield whose doctoral project is sponsored by the company BTG International, which manufactures the embolisation beads that are used in the therapy.

‌Tanya and co-researchers were able to carry out lab experiments in which a buffer – a liquid that mimics blood – was pumped at different rates through the beads. They also modified the quantities of drug contained in the beads. By comparing their laboratory observations with in vivo data, the research team was able to establish the validity of their simulation technique.

Medical researchers working on a bead-based system will be able to make accurate predications without running any risks to patients.

Professor Andy Lewis, Director of R&D at BTG International and industrial supervisor in the collaboration commented: “We are continually innovating our drug-eluting bead technologies to introduce new features, such as X-ray visibility or biodegradability.  It’s important from a product development perspective that if we wanted to put other drugs into the beads, or change anything about their chemistry, we could use this system to predict product behaviour before it is given to people.”