Image-controlled Ultrasound-induced Drug Delivery

Objective

The demographic changes in Europe towards an aging society will coincide with increasing morbidity of the population. European citizens need improved access to state-of-the-art medical care especially in oncology and cardiology, while keeping expenditures on healthcare affordable. New therapeutic options such as externally triggered local drug release at the diseased area hold promise to solve urgent medical needs: improved treatment with reduced side effects, fewer burdens to the patient and faster recovery after intervention. Nanomedicine, the application of nanomaterials and nanotechnology to healthcare, will enable breakthroughs in clinical practice. SONODRUGS addresses clinical needs by developing novel drug delivery technologies for localised treatment of cardiovascular disease and cancer. SONODRUGS develops drug delivery concepts where drug release can be triggered by focused ultrasound induced pressure or temperature stimuli within the diseased tissue. New drug loaded nanocarriers will be designed for tailored drug delivery systems that respond to either of the two stimuli. Medical imaging, i.e. magnetic resonance imaging and ultrasound imaging, will be used to guide, follow and quantify the drug delivery process. Therapy efficacy using different drug delivery systems will be assessed in vitro and subsequently in preclinical studies. Starting form research on a broad range of materials and drugs, two nanocarriers will be finally selected, optimized and produced on a pilot scale in combination with image-guided delivery tools and methods. SONODRUGS binds expertise in materials research (Philips, TUE, GhentRGN, HBBG); material production (Nanobiotix, Lipoid); clinical knowledge in oncology (UTours, HBBG) and cardiology (UKB); in vitro and preclinical validation (UTours, ErasmusMC, UKB); research on imaging techniques (UCY, Philips, IMF); pharmacokinetics, toxicology and biodistribution (ULSOP, IPT).

Fields of science (EuroSciVoc)

CORDIS classifies projects with EuroSciVoc, a multilingual taxonomy of fields of science, through a semi-automatic process based on NLP techniques. See: The European Science Vocabulary.

• medical and health sciences medical biotechnology nanomedicine
• medical and health sciences clinical medicine cardiology cardiovascular diseases
• medical and health sciences clinical medicine oncology
• medical and health sciences basic medicine pharmacology and pharmacy pharmacokinetics
• engineering and technology medical engineering diagnostic imaging magnetic resonance imaging

Keywords

Project’s keywords as indicated by the project coordinator. Not to be confused with the EuroSciVoc taxonomy (Fields of science)

• Local
• delivery nanomedicine nanocarriers oncology cardiology
• drug

Programme(s)

Multi-annual funding programmes that define the EU’s priorities for research and innovation.

• FP7-NMP - Specific Programme "Cooperation": Nanosciences, Nanotechnologies, Materials and new Production Technologies

Topic(s)

Calls for proposals are divided into topics. A topic defines a specific subject or area for which applicants can submit proposals. The description of a topic comprises its specific scope and the expected impact of the funded project.

• NMP-2007-4.0-4 - Substantial innovation in the European medical industry: development of nanotechnology-based systems for in-vivo diagnosis and therapy (in coordination with topic HEALTH-2007-2.4.1-7 and HEALTH-2007-1.2-3 in Theme 1 "Health")

Call for proposal

Procedure for inviting applicants to submit project proposals, with the aim of receiving EU funding.

FP7-NMP-2007-LARGE-1
See other projects for this call

Funding Scheme

Funding scheme (or “Type of Action”) inside a programme with common features. It specifies: the scope of what is funded; the reimbursement rate; specific evaluation criteria to qualify for funding; and the use of simplified forms of costs like lump sums.

CP-IP - Large-scale integrating project

Coordinator

Participants (17)