MIT chemists from the laboratory of Jeremiah Johnson and researchers from the group of KI faculty member and David H. Koch Professor in Engineering Paula Hammond have come together to develop a new method for building nanoparticles that carry the drugs cisplatin, doxorubicin, and camptothecin—three drugs that are often used in a combination treatment for ovarian cancer. In a study published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, Johnson and colleagues demonstrated that the triple-threat nanoparticles could kill ovarian cancer cells more effectively than particles carrying only one or two drugs.
Instead of building a particle and then binding a drug, the new approach uses drug-loaded building blocks that can be attached to others in a very specific structure. The team is now working on four-drug particles with the goal of developing new treatment regimens that could better target cancer cells while avoiding the toxic side effects of traditional chemotherapy. “This is a new way to build the particles from the beginning,” Johnson said. “In principle, there’s no limitation on how many drugs you can add.”