Biopolymers composed of a pH-responsive, hydrophilic poly(methacrylic acid-grafted-ethylene glycol) network polymerized in the presence of poly(methyl methacrylate) nanoparticles were designed for the oral delivery of chemotherapeutics for the treatment of colon cancer. An inulin-doxorubicin conjugate, designed to target the colon and improve doxorubicin efficacy, was loaded into these polymer ...

The limitation of specific delivery of photosensitizers to tumor sites, represents a significant shortcoming of photodynamic therapy (PDT) application at present. Prostate-specific membrane antigen (PSMA), a validated biomarker for prostate cancer, has attracted considerable attention as a target for imaging and therapeutic applications for prostate cancer. The present study focuses on the inve...

Light-activated antimicrobial agents (photosensitizers) are promising alternatives to antibiotics for the treatment of topical infections. To improve efficacy and avoid possible damage to host tissues, targeting of the photosensitizer to the infecting organism is desirable, and this has previously been achieved using antibodies and chemical modification of the agent. In this study we investigat...

Doxorubicin (DOX) was conjugated to a single-chain variable fragment (scFv) against human midkine (MK), and the conjugate (scFv-DOX) was used to target the chemotherapeutic agent to a mouse solid tumor model in which the tumor cells expressed high levels of human MK. The His-tagged recombinant scFv was expressed in bacteria, purified by metal affinity chromatography, and then conjugated to DOX ...

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a B-cell malignancy in need of new, effective, and safe therapies. The recently identified IgM receptor FcmR is overexpressed on malignant B cells in CLL and mediates the rapid internalization and lysosomal shuttling of IgM via its Fc fragment (Fcm). To exploit this internalization and trafficking pathway for targeted drug delivery, we engineered an IgM-der...

Synthetic glucocorticoids are potent anti-inflammatory drugs but serious side effects such as bone mobilization, muscle mass loss, immunosuppression, and metabolic alterations make glucocorticoid therapy a difficult balance. The therapeutic anti-inflammatory effect of glucocorticoids relies largely on the suppressed release of tumor-necrosis factor-α and other cytokines by macrophages at the si...

Gold nanorods used in therapy and diagnosis must be nontoxic and stable in biological media and should be specific for the target. The complete combination of these three factors has hindered the use of gold nanorods as carriers in biological and biomedical applications. In this study, we produced a conjugate of gold nanorods with the peptide CLPFFD that recognizes toxic β-amyloid aggregates pr...

Personalized anti-cancer medicine is boosted by the recent development of molecular diagnostics and molecularly targeted drugs requiring rapid and efficient ligation routes. Here, we present a novel approach to synthetize a conjugate able to act simultaneously as an imaging and as a chemotherapeutic agent by coupling functional peptides employing solid phase peptide synthesis technologies. Deve...

Breast cancer aberrantly expresses tissue factor (TF) in cancer tissues and cancer vascular endothelial cells (VECs). TF plays a central role in cancer angiogenesis, growth, and metastasis and, as such, is a target for therapy and drug delivery. TF is the cognate receptor of factor VIIa (fVIIa). We have coupled PTX (paclitaxel, also named Taxol) with a tripeptide, phenylalanine-phenylalanine-ar...

Chronic lymphocytic leukemia (CLL) is a B-cell malignancy in need of new, effective, and safe therapies. The recently identified IgM receptor FcμR is overexpressed on malignant B cells in CLL and mediates the rapid internalization and lysosomal shuttling of IgM via its Fc fragment (Fcμ). To exploit this internalization and trafficking pathway for targeted drug delivery, we engineered an IgM-der...