Descripción del proyecto
Combinar la ingeniería microfluídica con la investigación oncológica
La quimioterapia es un tratamiento antineoplásico que se receta para tratar de eliminar las células cancerosas. Con todo, los protocolos de quimioterapia son genéricos, por lo que no permiten tener en cuenta las diferencias entre pacientes con respecto a la farmacocinética de los antineoplásicos. En el proyecto POC-TDM, financiado por las Acciones Marie Skłodowska-Curie, se estudiará la posibilidad de mejorar y personalizar la quimioterapia antineoplásica. Por ejemplo, si no se alcanza la concentración sanguínea objetivo, se producirá una resistencia al fármaco o efectos secundarios no deseados. Por ello, la supervisión de fármacos antineoplásicos podría ser fundamental para mejorar y personalizar la quimioterapia. De hecho, el proyecto propone un nuevo método basado en un chip microfluídico para determinar de forma rápida las concentraciones plasmáticas de fármacos antineoplásicos comunes. Este novedoso sistema podría mejorar las tasas de supervivencia de los pacientes oncológicos a través de una terapia personalizada.
Objetivo
Cancer claims almost 10 million lives annually, making it one of the major causes of death around the world. Despite the development of novel drugs and treatment options, the 5-years survival of the most common cancers are still strikingly low. Chemotherapy (CT) is a widely used option to treat malignancies, however CT protocols are established on a “one size fits all” basis and ignore inter-patient differences in drug pharmacokinetics which influence the blood levels of anticancer drugs, therefore leading to improper dosing in 50% of patients. Missing target blood concentration will lead to drug resistance and/or unwanted side effects. Therapeutic Drug Monitoring (TDM) could be the key to improve and personalize CT, however the lack of an affordable point-of-care (POC) method is preventing its introduction to oncology. Mass spectrometry (MS) is the golden standard analytical approach to determine blood drug levels, but the instrument and specialized expertise to operate it are rarely available in the clinical environment. The high volume of blood required for MS analysis is also a challenge, because cancer patients are regularly weakened. Exploiting the strong and specific fluorescence of anthracyclines, the most used CT agents, we propose a radically new microfluidic chip-based approach to rapidly determine plasma concentrations of several widely applied anticancer drugs. Microvolume plasma separation and collection from a drop of blood (>50 ul) will be done with a specifically designed chip, then plasma anthracycline concentration will be measured using a compatible spectrophotometer. The approach will be validated using clinically relevant mouse tumour models and with samples from veterinary cancer patients. This interdisciplinary project, combining microfluidic engineering with cancer research, will introduce a novel POC-TDM system which could change CT treatments and improve survival through patient-tailored therapy.
Ámbito científico
- natural sciencesphysical sciencesclassical mechanicsfluid mechanicsmicrofluidics
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinepharmacology and pharmacydrug resistance
- medical and health sciencesclinical medicineoncology
- medical and health sciencesbasic medicinepharmacology and pharmacypharmacokinetics
- natural scienceschemical sciencesanalytical chemistrymass spectrometry
Palabras clave
Programa(s)
- HORIZON.1.2 - Marie Skłodowska-Curie Actions (MSCA) Main Programme
Régimen de financiación
HORIZON-TMA-MSCA-PF-EF - HORIZON TMA MSCA Postdoctoral Fellowships - European FellowshipsCoordinador
1121 Budapest
Hungría