An effective drug against prostate cancer based on tea and gold has been created
Last reviewed: 23.04.2024
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American biologists have created a special drug based on tea extract and radioactive nanoparticles made of gold, which quickly and safely destroys prostate cancer, and successfully tested it on tumors implanted in the body of mice, according to an article published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
"In the course of the study, we discovered that one of the tea components was attached to the cancer cells inside the prostate, then we" glued "these molecules with radioactive gold nanoparticles - tea helped them to penetrate into the cancer cells, which allowed them to quickly destroy the tumor," said the head a group of scientists Kattesh Katti (Kattesh Katti) from the University of Missouri in Columbia (USA).
A group of biologists led by Cutty conducted experiments with gold nanoparticles capable of destroying cancer cells with the help of ionizing radiation. At the first stage of their work, the authors selected the sizes of nanoparticles to fight adenocarcinoma - prostate cancer.
As scientists explain, the diameter of a nanoparticle directly affects its damaging ability - the more a fragment of gold, the more cells it will destroy. In the case of prostate cancer, such nanoparticles can damage not only cancer cells, but also healthy tissues, which can adversely affect the future of male offspring.
Cutty and his colleagues conducted a series of experiments on cell cultures of adenocarcinoma and concluded that particles from the radioactive isotope gold-198 a few nanometers in diameter would destroy even the most aggressive tumors.
Then the biologists began to search for an effective means of delivering particles to the tumor. To their surprise, one of the components of tea - the antioxidant gallate of epigallocatechin (EGCg) - was able not only to deliver gold particles to the tumor, but also to keep them near cancer cells. As scientists explain, this substance is connected by a strong chemical bond with special outgrowths that are present only on the surface of adenocarcinoma cells.
The authors of the article produced a lot of gold nanoparticles and attached a lot of EGCg molecules to them. Such particles successfully penetrated into the cultures of cancer cells and destroyed them.
Convinced of the effectiveness of his invention, Cutty and his colleagues checked it in the case, trying to destroy the tumors from adenocarcinoma cells implanted in the body of ordinary mice. According to scientists, a month after treatment, the cancers either disappeared, or greatly diminished in size.
"Our next step is to collaborate with the College of Veterinary Medicine (at the University of Missouri) for experiments on larger animals in the very near future and the subsequent transition to clinical trials involving volunteers," concludes Cutty.
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