PROJECT TITLE: Focused ultrasound and thermosensitive liposomes for paediatric brain tumour treatment
LEAD INVESTIGATOR: Dr Antonios Pouliopoulos
INSTITUTION: King’s College London (KCL)
AWARD APPROX: £850,000 (Funded by The Little Princess Trust in partnership with CCLG)
Diffuse midline glioma is a devastating brain tumour, affecting primarily young children. There’s currently no cure for this disease and treatment options are limited. This is mainly because this type of tumour is well-protected from drugs by the ‘blood-brain barrier’. This barrier physically blocks all medications from entering the brain. Our group has developed new methods of bypassing this barrier using focused ultrasound. Our aim is to effectively deliver medication into diseased areas in a patient-friendly manner, without affecting healthy tissues or inducing detrimental side effects.
The Little Princess Trust-funded project combines two main aspects: ultrasound therapy and new drug carriers, called liposomes. Liposomes are small liquid pockets that can be loaded with powerful drugs. We
collaborate with Prof Maya Thanou at KCL, whose group has developed liposomes that are sensitive to heat. In other words, they release their contents, such as chemotherapy drugs, only when heated.
We aim to deliver these liposomes in the brain tumour using focused ultrasound, and to release chemotherapy drugs specifically within the tumour by mildly heating the affected area. We also work with Prof Darren Hargrave and Dr Elwira Szychot from University College London/Great Ormond Street Hospital, who are clinical experts in diffuse midline glioma and provide invaluable insights from the patient’s perspective.
Our aim is to effectively deliver medication into diseased areas in a patientfriendly manner, without affecting healthy tissues or inducing detrimental side effects.
What results can you share from the project?
So far, we’ve designed and produced liposomes that carry drugs specifically to the brain tumour we’re trying to treat. We can see the delivery of these liposomes through scans like MRIs, and we know that we can deliver the liposomes into brain tissue due to our work on laboratory models. Now, we’re making sure we can deliver the drugs into the brain tissue. Our future work will be focused on evaluating the effect our new treatment has on survival in the lab.
What does this mean for young cancer patients?
If successful, this project will pave the way towards more effective and kinder treatments for young brain cancer patients. Currently, a limited amount of medication developed for this type of brain tumour reaches its target. Also, high systemic doses mean considerable side effects for young patients. We want to kill two birds with one stone, by reducing the total administered dose while increasing the delivered dose to the right location. This approach is completely non-invasive and painless, providing an excellent example for future personalised and comfortable treatments.
Will this influence any future research?
We hope that our project will lead to future clinical trials for diffuse midline glioma patients. Our team is aiming to be the first to treat a paediatric brain tumour patient with focused ultrasound in the UK in the near future. We believe that our project outcomes will open new avenues for device-drug combination approaches offering personalised treatments.
From Contact magazine issue 103 | Summer 2024
