(Press-News.org) A comprehensive review in "Biofunct. Mater." meticulously details the most recent advancements and clinical translation of intelligent nanodrugs for breast cancer treatment. This paper presents an exhaustive overview of subtype-specific nanostrategies, the clinical benefits of FDA-approved nanodrugs, and innovative approaches to address tumor heterogeneity and treatment resistance. This serves as a foundational framework and pragmatic guide for enhancing precision-based breast cancer therapies.
Breast cancer, the most common cancer among women worldwide, is a major therapeutic challenge because of its profound heterogeneity. Breast cancer can be classified into several molecular subtypes, such as Luminal A, HER2-positive, and triple-negative breast cancer (TNBC), and a treatment that is effective for one patient may not work for another. In addition to this intrinsic heterogeneity, drug resistance and serious side effects have prompted the pursuit of more accurate and precise therapeutic strategies.
Nanomedicine, utilizing engineered nanoparticles for targeted drug delivery to tumors, presents a promising avenue for future treatment strategies. However, the design of an appropriate nanocarrier for individual patients has historically been a complex and often inefficient process of trial and error. The multitude of potential design parameters, including size, surface charge, and targeting ligand density, leads to a combinatorial explosion that is not feasible to test experimentally.
In this review, researchers from Shanghai Jiao Tong University School of Medicine and Guangdong Medical University have proposed a novel, data-driven solution to address the aforementioned challenge. They introduce an "AI-multi-omics intelligent delivery paradigm," in which a machine learning model is utilized to predict the optimal design of nanocarriers. This prediction is based on the unique biological signatures specific to a patient's tumor.
"We have transitioned from a universal, one-size-fits-all methodology to a subtype-specific, intelligent drug delivery system," states corresponding author Meng-Yao Li. "Many studies demonstrate that the incorporation of multi-omics data with artificial intelligence can effectively simplify complex processes. For example, in the case of aggressive Luminal B tumors, our model significantly enhanced the synchronization between drug release and peak tumor proliferation rates, increasing it by a factor of 2.8 compared to traditional static nanocarriers."
The review methodically delineates the manner in which this paradigm capitalizes on subtype-specific vulnerabilities. In the case of HER2-positive breast cancer, the utilization of trastuzumab-conjugated dendrimers resulted in a reduction of off-target toxicity by 47%. For the treatment of TNBC, a notoriously difficult-to-treat subtype, the employment of EGFR-antibody liposomes amplified tumor accumulation by a factor of 3.2.
The study also presents a comprehensive review of the current state of clinical nanomedicine, ranging from FDA-approved drugs such as Doxil®—which significantly decreases the cardiotoxicity of doxorubicin from 18% to 3%—to promising therapies currently under clinical trials. Notably, preliminary results for ²²⁵Ac-liposomes indicate that 77.8% of patients with metastatic TNBC achieved stable disease status for a duration of six months or longer, without any observed bone marrow toxicity.
"The potential is profound," elucidates Yimao Wu, a co-first author of the review. "This transcends mere incremental advancements. It offers a viable roadmap to engineer health, morphing breast cancer from a perilous disease into a manageable condition via personalized nanotherapeutic intervention."
The authors recognize that issues related to large-scale manufacturing and long-term safety continue to impede clinical adoption. Nevertheless, with the incorporation of AI, multi-omics data, and biomimetic nanocarriers such as exosomes, the trajectory of breast cancer treatment is on course to be notably more accurate and efficacious in the future.
This paper ‘Intelligent delivery and clinical transformation of nanomedicine in breast cancer: from basic research to individualized therapy’ was published in Biofunctional Materials (ISSN: 2959-0582), an online multidisciplinary open access journal aiming to provide a peer-reviewed forum for innovation, research and development related to bioactive materials, biomedical materials, bio-inspired materials, bio-fabrications and other bio-functional materials.
Citation: Wu Y, Chen Z, Chen X, Li M. Intelligent delivery and clinical transformation of nanomedicine in breast cancer: from basic research to individualized therapy. Biofunct. Mater. 2025(3):0014.https://doi.org/10.55092/bm20250014
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Fight or Flight—and Grow a New Limb
Study reveals how salamanders rely on sympathetic nervous system to regenerate body parts
By Kermit Pattison / Harvard Staff Writer
Biologists have long been fascinated by the ability of salamanders to regrow entire limbs. Now Harvard researchers have solved part of the mystery of how they accomplish this feat—by activating stem cells throughout the body, not just at the injury site.
In a paper [LINK WILL ACTIVATE WHEN EMBARGO LIFTS 11am ...
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The competition is fierce. Olympic gymnast Simone Biles is pushing herself to perform stronger and more consistently. Then, her coach calls her “fat.” It’s meant as a motivation, but this time, it has the opposite effect.
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Findings from Mass General Brigham investigators highlight the intricate interplay of diverse physiological processes as the brain shifts from wakefulness to sleep
A new study by investigators from Mass General Brigham used next-generation imaging technology to discover that when the brain is falling asleep, it shows a coordinated shift in activity. They found that during NREM (non-rapid eye movement) sleep, parts of the brain that handle movement and sensory input stay active and keep using energy, while ...
In the battle against mosquito-borne diseases that kill hundreds of thousands of people each year, scientists turned to an unlikely ally: a fungus that smells like flowers.
Taking advantage of the mosquito’s natural attraction to flowers, an international team of researchers engineered a new strain of Metarhizium fungus that imitates a flower’s sweet scent and lures the bloodsucking bugs to their deaths.
Inspired by certain fungi that the team found emit a sweet-smelling chemical called longifolene to draw ...
Researchers have achieved a breakthrough in solar physics by providing the first direct evidence of small-scale torsional Alfvén waves in the Sun's corona – elusive magnetic waves that scientists have been searching for since the 1940s.
The discovery, published today in Nature Astronomy, was made using unprecedented observations from the world's most powerful solar telescope, the U.S. National Science Foundation (NSF) Daniel K. Inouye Solar Telescope in Hawaii.
The findings could finally explain one of the Sun's greatest mysteries ...
Winter vomiting disease is caused by the Norovirus, which is most virulent during the colder half of the year. The infection clears up after a couple of days, but the protection it provides is short-lived, meaning that the same person can fall repeatedly sick in a short space of time. But some people cannot succumb to the virus, thanks to a particular gene variant.
“We wanted to trace the historical spread of the gene variant,” says Hugo Zeberg, senior lecturer in genetics at the Department of Physiology and Pharmacology, Karolinska Institutet, and researcher at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology in Leipzig.
Defective gene protects against ...
