Multifunctional Hollow Gold Nanospheres for Concurrent Photothermal-Chemotherapy



 DESCRIPTION (provided by applicant): Treatment of patients with primary and metastatic liver tumors is a challenging unsolved problem. Only 5-20% of patients with tumors in the liver are surgical candidates, and systemic chemotherapy alone has been demonstrated to be of limited efficacy in treating hepatocellular carcinoma and liver metastases. Minimally invasive image-guided interventional techniques, including transarterial interventions and percutaneous interventions (e.g., radiofrequency ablation, laser ablation), have been introduced into the clinic for the treatment of patients with liver tumors. However, these techniques are limited by incomplete elimination of cancer cells, which can lead to local tumor recurrence. Therefore, there is an urgent need to develop innovative local treatment approaches for liver tumors. We believe that intraarterially delivered nanoparticles offers a unique opportunity for highly concentrated local delivery of heat and chemotherapeutic agents and thus may significantly improve the efficacy of treatment for liver tumors. We have developed an innovative proprietary technology that is capable of mediating simultaneous near-infrared laser-triggered photothermal ablation (PTA) and local release of doxorubicin (DOX). Our DOX-loaded, polyethylene glycol-coated hollow gold nanospheres (DOX@PEG-HAuNS) have demonstrated low systemic toxicity under normal body temperatures and significantly enhanced antitumor efficacy when combined with laser exposure under hyperthermia and ablative temperatures. In this SBIR program, we have assembled a multidisciplinary team to implement a coherent strategy to address developmental and translational challenges. Our specific aims are: 1) To synthesize and characterize high-quality DOX@PEG-HAuNS in large scale and under Good laboratory Practice (GLP) production conditions, 2) To determine the pharmacokinetics (PK) and biodistribution of DOX@PEG-HAuNS after IA injection in rats, and to demonstrate the feasibility of concurrent PTA and DOX chemotherapy in an orthotopic rat liver cancer model and a clinically relevant large animal liver cancer model (rabbit VX2 model). We believe that the proposed dual-modality treatment strategy will offer superior local tumor control while reducing the likelihood of adverse events. Success of the proposed work will pave the way for future clinical trials of DOX@PEG-HAuNS.