A research team at Yonsei University College of Medicine (YUCM) has discovered a method to increase the drug delivery rate and increase the effectiveness of glioblastoma treatment.
Glioblastoma, which accounts for 15 percent of all brain tumors, is a disease in which tumors occur in glial cells in the brain. Its treatment is so difficult that the World Health Organization (WHO) has classified the illness at the top of its index for tumor malignancy.
Depending on the location of the brain, glioblastoma can cause various symptoms such as convulsions, speech, and visual field disturbances occur. While treatment includes surgery, radiation, and drugs, glioblastoma rapidly develops drug resistance. As the tumor undergoes cell division, there is a lack of oxygen inside, and the hypoxic state leads to the expression of genes that make them resistant to anticancer drugs.
To resolve the problem, Professors Sung Hak-joon, Shin Young-min, Yu Seung-eun, and researcher Baek Se-woom devised a way to supply oxygen to glioblastoma and made a spheroid with glioblastoma to test its efficacy.
Since the hypoxic state caused by tumor cell division lowers the drug response, the team developed a plan to increase oxygen supply using oxygen-releasing microparticles, microscopic particles ranging from 0.1 to 100 micrometers.
When researchers administered a small amount of hydrogen peroxide and microparticles to the tumor's surface, a chemical reaction occurred and continuously generated sufficient oxygen. To confirm the effect, the team created a spheroid with glioblastoma. A spheroid is an aggregate of dozens or more single cells forming a three-dimensional sphere.
As a result of treating the spheroids with oxygen-releasing microparticles, the invasiveness indicating the extent of tumor spread was 58 percent lower than that of the untreated spheroids. In addition, drug reactivity also increased by 32 percent.
The team conducted a model that inserted glioblastoma spheroids with sufficient oxygen and glioblastoma spheroids without oxygen with a 3D chip and implanted them into mice. The tumor growth rate was 57 percent lower in the oxygen-sufficient model, and drug reactivity was 19 percent higher in the glioblastoma spheroids with sufficient oxygen than in the control group.
"Hospitals can use the spheroid in animal experiments, and we expect that the spheroid will have various use in conquering glioblastoma, such as testing drug response," Professor Sung said. "In addition to glioblastoma, we will continue to develop a platform that reproduces the tumor environment, taking the lead in overcoming intractable diseases."