Research groups from two Autonomous Communities collaborate in the study of the pharmacological actions of nanoparticles.

The Associated Unit Neurodeath belonging to the University of Castilla-La Mancha and the BioFarma group of CIMUS from the University of Santiago de Compostela are collaborating on screening the pharmacological actions of certain nanoparticles, based on carbohydrates, on the activity of certain intracellular molecules.  The purpose of this study is to discard their toxicity and evaluate their progression towards in vivo studies to advance in the preclinical phase of development of a possible therapy against glioblastoma, a brain tumor for which there is currently no effective treatment.

The data obtained in this work indicate that the studied nanoparticles do not significantly affect the enzymatic activity of different kinases and neither the activity of various types of cytochrome P450, the enzyme responsible for detoxifying drugs. They also do not appear to affect the ionic currents of excitable cells, as they do not modify the membrane potential of various excitable cells. Taken together, the data suggest that these nanoparticles are not toxic and could be effective carriers of drugs and genetic material for the treatment of various diseases, including glioblastoma.

This collaboration is part of Line of Action 3: “Drug screening platform and drug-target interaction analysis” of the project on Biotechnology applied to Health of the Complementary Plans entitled:
“Development of tools for diagnosis, prognosis, and advanced or targeted therapies in personalized medicine”, funded by the Recovery, Transformation, and Resilience Plan of the European Union.