TY - JOUR
T1 - Self-Healing pH- and Enzyme Stimuli-Responsive Hydrogels for Targeted Delivery of Gemcitabine to Treat Pancreatic Cancer
AU - Bilalis, Panayiotis
AU - Skoulas, Dimitrios
AU - Karatzas, Anastasios
AU - Marakis, John
AU - Stamogiannos, Athanasios
AU - Tsimblouli, Chrisida
AU - Sereti, Evangelia
AU - Stratikos, Efstratios
AU - Dimas, Konstantinos
AU - Vlassopoulos, Dimitris
AU - Iatrou, Hermis
N1 - Publisher Copyright:
© 2018 American Chemical Society.
PY - 2018/9/10
Y1 - 2018/9/10
N2 - A novel, multifunctional hydrogel that exhibits a unique set of properties for the effective treatment of pancreatic cancer (PC) is presented. The material is composed of a pentablock terpolypeptide of the type PLys-b-(PHIS-co-PBLG)-PLys-b-(PHIS-co-PBLG)-b-PLys, which is a noncytotoxic polypeptide. It can be implanted via the least invasive route and selectively delivers gemcitabine to efficiently treat PC. Simply mixing the novel terpolypeptide with an aqueous solution of gemcitabine within a syringe results in the facile formation of a hydrogel that has the ability to become liquid under the shear rate of the plunger. Upon injection in the vicinity of cancer tissue, it immediately reforms into a hydrogel due to the unique combination of its macromolecular architecture and secondary structure. Because of its pH responsiveness, the hydrogel only melts close to PC; thus, the drug can be delivered directionally toward the cancerous rather than healthy tissues in a targeted, controlled, and sustained manner. The efficacy of the hydrogel was tested in vivo on human to mouse xenografts using the drug gemcitabine. It was found that the efficacy of the hydrogel loaded with only 40% of the drug delivered in one dose was equal to or slightly better than the peritumoral injection of 100% of the free drug delivered in two doses, the typical chemotherapy used in clinics so far. This result suggests that the hydrogel can direct the delivery of the encapsulated drug effectively in the tumor tissue. Enzymes lead to its biodegradation, avoiding removal by resection of the polypeptidic carrier after cargo delivery. The unique properties of the hydrogel formed can be predetermined through its molecular characteristics, rendering it a promising modular material for many biological applications.
AB - A novel, multifunctional hydrogel that exhibits a unique set of properties for the effective treatment of pancreatic cancer (PC) is presented. The material is composed of a pentablock terpolypeptide of the type PLys-b-(PHIS-co-PBLG)-PLys-b-(PHIS-co-PBLG)-b-PLys, which is a noncytotoxic polypeptide. It can be implanted via the least invasive route and selectively delivers gemcitabine to efficiently treat PC. Simply mixing the novel terpolypeptide with an aqueous solution of gemcitabine within a syringe results in the facile formation of a hydrogel that has the ability to become liquid under the shear rate of the plunger. Upon injection in the vicinity of cancer tissue, it immediately reforms into a hydrogel due to the unique combination of its macromolecular architecture and secondary structure. Because of its pH responsiveness, the hydrogel only melts close to PC; thus, the drug can be delivered directionally toward the cancerous rather than healthy tissues in a targeted, controlled, and sustained manner. The efficacy of the hydrogel was tested in vivo on human to mouse xenografts using the drug gemcitabine. It was found that the efficacy of the hydrogel loaded with only 40% of the drug delivered in one dose was equal to or slightly better than the peritumoral injection of 100% of the free drug delivered in two doses, the typical chemotherapy used in clinics so far. This result suggests that the hydrogel can direct the delivery of the encapsulated drug effectively in the tumor tissue. Enzymes lead to its biodegradation, avoiding removal by resection of the polypeptidic carrier after cargo delivery. The unique properties of the hydrogel formed can be predetermined through its molecular characteristics, rendering it a promising modular material for many biological applications.
UR - http://www.scopus.com/inward/record.url?scp=85052381392&partnerID=8YFLogxK
U2 - 10.1021/acs.biomac.8b00959
DO - 10.1021/acs.biomac.8b00959
M3 - Article
C2 - 30095907
AN - SCOPUS:85052381392
SN - 1525-7797
VL - 19
SP - 3840
EP - 3852
JO - Biomacromolecules
JF - Biomacromolecules
IS - 9
ER -