Sci Adv: Scientists have created a drug delivery nanosysm system that penetrates the blood-brain barrier

Over the past few decades, researchers have identified biological pathways that lead to neurodegenerative diseases and developed promising molecularly targeted drugs.
, however, progress in translating these findings into clinical treatments has been much slower, in part because transporting drugs through the blood-brain barrier (BBB) is a huge challenge.
To successfully deliver the drug to the brain, a team of bioengineers, doctors and collaborators at Brigham and Women's Hospital and Boston Children's Hospital created a nanoparticle platform that promotes the effective delivery of the drug into the broken or intact blood-brain barrier in mice.
Source: In a mouse model of traumatic brain injury (TBI), Pixabay observed that the transport system tripled the amount of the drug accumulated in the brain compared to traditional transport methods and was also effective in treatment, making it possible to treat many neurological disorders.
the findings were published in the journal Science Advances.
DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abd6889 Traditional methods of delivering therapeutic drugs to the brain after brain trauma depend on the time window when the blood-brain barrier is damaged after a physical head injury, but effective drug delivery tools are lacking after vascular barrier repair.
S. Nitin Joshi, associate bioengineer at the Nanomedical Center in Brigham's Department of Anesthesiology, Peri surgery and Pain Medicine, said: "It's hard to get small and large molecule therapy drugs through the blood-brain barrier.
Our solution is to encapsulate the therapeutic agent into biocompaturable nanoparticles with specific surface proteins, enabling them to be effectively transported to the brain during treatment without being affected by the state of the blood-brain barrier.
" technology could be used to treat secondary injuries associated with brain trauma that can lead to Alzheimer's, Parkinson's and other neurodegenerative diseases that can develop in the months or years that follow after the brain haemorrhage heals.
drug used in this study is a small interfering RNA (siRNA) molecule designed to inhibit the expression of tau protein, which is thought to play a key role in neurodegenerative changes.
polylactic acid-hydroxyacetic acid (PLGA) is a biodegradable biocompasitive polymer that is used as a base material for nanoparticles.
researchers systematically designed and studied the surface proteins of nanoparticles to maximize penetration of the intact, undetected blood-brain barrier in healthy mice.
found a 50 percent reduction in tau protein expression in TBI mice that received anti-tau protein siRNA through a new transportation system.
, tau protein expression was not affected in mice receiving siRNA through conventional transport systems. Dr Wen Li,
's first author, said: "In addition to demonstrating the usefulness of this new drug transport platform, this report is the first to demonstrate the ability of nanoparticles to pass through tightly connected biological barriers by regulating surface chemical properties and coating densities.
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