A novel type of therapeutic drugs which could be selectively activated by locally applied ultrasound is proposed to treat cancer and other disease. The technology is termed sonochemotherapy. The proposed sound excitable drugs (SED) are designed to have neither cytotoxicity nor phototoxicity in their native states, but having ultrasound inducible cytotoxicity. Ultrasound is a mature, safe and non-radiation technology, routinely used in various clinical imaging and treatments. Combining ultrasound with the proposed SED, the applied ultrasound wave could become a drug activator, converting non-toxic SED into cytotoxic agents to treat diseases at defined area. Different from conventional nonspecific chemotherapy, which has cytotoxic drugs circulating through out the body, sonochemotherapy provide site-specific chemotherapeutic effect. Ultrasound penetrates deep tissue emitting no radiation, thus the proposed sonochemotherapy is expected to become an alternative treatment approach of radiation therapy and photodynamic therapy with superior efficacy and safety.

Public Health Relevance

The goal of this research is to develop a new type of tunable chemotherapeutic agents which could only be activated by specific sound wave. The proposed sonochemotherapeutic technology is unique and could have great potential in cancer treatment. If successful, it could become a safe substitute to currently used radiation therapy.

Agency
National Institute of Health (NIH)
Institute
National Institute of General Medical Sciences (NIGMS)
Type
Research Project (R01)
Project #
5R01GM094880-02
Application #
8136231
Study Section
Special Emphasis Panel (ZGM1-GDB-7 (EU))
Program Officer
Okita, Richard T
Project Start
2010-09-01
Project End
2014-08-31
Budget Start
2011-09-01
Budget End
2012-08-31
Support Year
2
Fiscal Year
2011
Total Cost
$304,920
Indirect Cost
Name
Methodist Hospital Research Institute
Department
Type
DUNS #
185641052
City
Houston
State
TX
Country
United States
Zip Code
77030
Zhang, Weiqi; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2018) Real-Time Visualization of Lysosome Destruction Using a Photosensitive Toluidine Blue Nanogel. Chemistry 24:2089-2093
Lee, Tae Sup; Kim, Young; Zhang, Weiqi et al. (2018) Facile metabolic glycan labeling strategy for exosome tracking. Biochim Biophys Acta Gen Subj 1862:1091-1100
Zhang, Weiqi; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2018) Redox-responsive cisplatin nanogels for anticancer drug delivery. Chem Commun (Camb) 54:8367-8370
Zhang, Weiqi; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2017) Sequence-Independent DNA Nanogel as a Potential Drug Carrier. Macromol Rapid Commun 38:
Pes, Lara; Kim, Young; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2017) Bidentate iminodiacetate modified dendrimer for bone imaging. Bioorg Med Chem Lett 27:1252-1255
Tung, Ching-Hsuan; Han, Myung Shin; Kim, Young et al. (2017) Tumor ablation using low-intensity ultrasound and sound excitable drug. J Control Release 258:67-72
Zhang, Weiqi; Zhang, Zhe; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2017) Beyond chemotherapeutics: cisplatin as a temporary buckle to fabricate drug-loaded nanogels. Chem Commun (Camb) 53:779-782
Tung, Ching-Hsuan; Qi, Jianjun; Hu, Lingchuan et al. (2015) A Quick Responsive Fluorogenic pH Probe for Ovarian Tumor Imaging. Theranostics 5:1166-74
Han, Junyan; Han, Myung Shin; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2013) A non-toxic fluorogenic dye for mitochondria labeling. Biochim Biophys Acta 1830:5130-5
Han, Junyan; Han, Myung Shin; Tung, Ching-Hsuan (2013) A fluorogenic probe for ?-galactosidase activity imaging in living cells. Mol Biosyst 9:3001-8

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