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Raghuraman Kannan (right) and a team of researchers at the University of Missouri recently received a $2.
35 million grant from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to generate preclinical data based on their existing research — a necessary step
before starting human clinical trials.
Image credit: University of Missouri
When a person is diagnosed with non-small cell lung cancer (one of the two main forms of lung cancer), after 14 months, there is a 70-80% chance that the cancer will develop resistance to the drug originally used for treatment
.
If this happens, there are not many treatment options
at the moment.
That's why Michael J.
and Raghuraman Kannan, chair of cancer research at Sharon R.
Bukstein at the University of Missouri School of Medicine, are determined to find a solution
.
"We wanted to find out why patients are developing resistance to therapeutic drugs and determine how we can help them overcome this challenge
," he said.
Kannan and his research team recently received a $2.
35 million grant from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) to generate preclinical data based on their existing research — a necessary step
before starting human clinical trials.
Previously, the team identified two genes
involved in the development of this resistance.
Now, with the help of this grant, researchers will be able to test the methods they have developed to
prevent drug resistance.
Kannan says their method combines a biological process called RNA interference (RNAi) with protein nanoparticles
.
Nanoparticles will help transport RNA safely to cancerous tumors and stop
drug resistance.
This, in turn, will make the cancer more responsive
to the original drug treatment.
"With RNAi, we have something called silencing RNA (siRNA)," he said
.
"As the name suggests, it suppresses the gene of interest, in this case two genes
that cause drug resistance.
But siRNA is inherently unstable in the blood
.
So we have to develop a technique to deliver this siRNA to [cancer] tumors
.
That's where nanoparticles come in
.
”
Kannan has created similar nanoparticle-based drug delivery methods to develop treatments
for ovarian, breast, pancreatic and liver cancers.
He has authored more than 55 papers and holds 7 patents
.
His ultimate goal, he says, is to make his job more accessible so doctors can use it to help more patients
.
