How scorpion venom could yield new cancer treatment
Date: 7.1.2015
In the development of new drugs, taking something from nature and modifying it has been a successful tactic employed by medicinal chemists for years. Now, with the help of nanotechnology, researchers are turning once-discarded drug candidates into usable drugs.
Scorpion venom has been gaining interest as a source of new drugs. It contains a mixture of biological chemicals called peptides, some of which are known to trigger cell death by forming pores in biological membranes. Cell death can be useful if we are able to target, say, tumour cells to auto-destruct.
These toxins can have very potent effects. For instance, one particular small peptide, known as TsAP-1, isolated from the Brazilian yellow scorpion (Tityus serrulatus), has both anti-microbial and anti-cancer properties.
However, harnessing this kind of power for clinical good has so far been challenging because these toxins kill both tumours and healthy cells. One method to control such toxicity is through using nanotechnology to build specially made drug-delivery vehicles. If successful, the toxic drug is released to kill only unwanted tissues in a body.
One such attempt has been made by Dipanjan Pan at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champagne. In a study published in the journal Chemical Communications, scientists claim to have created spherical capsules to trap scorpion venom toxin TsAP-1. This encapsulated toxin, named NanoVenin, increases the drugs effectiveness at killing breast cancer cells by ten times.
