Matching Items (4)
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- All Subjects: Cancer
- All Subjects: Chemotherapy
Description
The purpose of this project is to explore the benefit of using prodrugs in chemotherapy, as well as to explain the concept of angiogenesis and the importance of this process to tumor development. Angiogenesis is the formation of new blood capillaries that are necessary for the survival of a tumor, as a tumor cannot grow larger than 1-2 mm3 without developing its own blood supply. Vascular disrupting agents, such as iodocombstatin, a derivative of combretastatin, can be used to effectively cut off the blood supply to a growing neoplasm, effectively inhibiting the supply of oxygen and nutrients needed for cell division Thus, VDAs have a very important implication in terms of the future of chemotherapy. A prodrug, defined as an agent that is inactive in the body until metabolized to yield the drug itself, was synthesized by combining iodocombstatin with a β-glucuronide linker. The prodrug is theoretically hydrolyzed in the body to afford the active drug by β-glucuronidase, an enzyme that is produced five times as much by cancer cells as by normal cells. This effectively creates a “magic-bullet” form of chemotherapy, known as Direct Enzyme Prodrug Therapy (DEPT).
ContributorsClark, Caroline Marie (Author) / Pettit, George Robert (Thesis director) / Melody, Noeleen (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / Department of Chemistry and Biochemistry (Contributor)
Created2015-05
Description
PD-L1 blockade has shown recent success in cancer therapy and cancer vaccine regimens. One approach for anti-PD-L1 antibodies has been their application as adjuvants for cancer vaccines. Given the disadvantages of such antibodies, including long half-life and adverse events related to their use, a novel strategy using synbodies in place of antibodies can be tested. Synbodies offer a variety of advantages, including shorter half-life, smaller size, and cheaper cost. Peptides that could bind PD-L1 were identified via peptide arrays and used to construct synbodies. These synbodies were tested with inhibition ELISA assays, SPR, and pull down assays. Additional flow cytometry analysis was done to determine the binding specificity of the synbodies to PD-L1 and the ability of those synbodies to inhibit the PD-L1/PD-1 interaction. Although analysis of permeabilized cells expressing PD-L1 indicated that the synbodies could successfully bind PD-L1, those results were not replicated in non-permeabilized cells. Further assays suggested that the binding of the synbodies was non-specific. Other tests were done to see if the synbodies could inhibit the PD-1/PD-L1 interaction. This assay did not yield any conclusive results and further experimentation is needed to determine the efficacy of the synbodies in inhibiting this interaction.
ContributorsMujahed, Tala (Author) / Johnston, Stephen (Thesis director) / Blattman, Joseph (Committee member) / Diehnelt, Chris (Committee member) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-12
Description
Glioblastoma multiforme is associated with a very low survival rate and is recognized as the most vicious form of intracranial cancer. The Akt gene pathway has three different isoforms, each of which has a different role in the tumors of GBM. Preliminary data suggests that Akt3 may work to decrease tumorigenicity. A produced image that visualizes the subcellular localization of Akt3 led the author to believe that Akt3 may reduce tumorigenicity by decreasing genomic instability caused by the cancer. To explore this, flow cytometry was performed on GBM cell lines with Akt3v1 over-expression, Akt3v2 over-expression, and a control glioma cell line.
ContributorsGhorayeb, Antoine (Author) / Neisewander, Janet (Thesis director) / Diehnelt, Chris (Committee member) / Moussallem, Suzan (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / College of Liberal Arts and Sciences (Contributor)
Created2012-12
Description
Currently, treatment for multiple myeloma (MM), a hematological cancer, is limited to post-symptomatic chemotherapy combined with other pharmaceuticals and steroids. Even so, the immuno-depressing cancer can continue to proliferate, leading to a median survival period of two to five years. B cells in the bone marrow are responsible for generating antigen-specific antibodies, but in MM the B cells express mutated, non-specific monoclonal antibodies. Therefore, it is hypothesized that antibody-based assay and therapy may be feasible for detecting and treating the disease. In this project, 330k peptide microarrays were used to ascertain the binding affinity of sera antibodies for MM patients with random sequence peptides; these results were then contrasted with normal donor assays to determine the "immunosignatures" for MM. From this data, high-binding peptides with target-specificity (high fluorescent intensity for one patient, low in all other patients and normal donors) were selected for two MM patients. These peptides were narrowed down to two lists of five (10 total peptides) to analyze in a synthetic antibody study. The rationale behind this originates from the idea that antibodies present specific binding sites on either of their branches, thus relating high binding peptides from the arrays to potential binding targets of the monoclonal antibodies. Furthermore, these peptides may be synthesized on a synthetic antibody scaffold with the potential to induce targeted delivery of radioactive or chemotherapeutic molecular tags to only myelomic B cells. If successful, this would provide a novel alternative to current treatments that is less invasive, has fewer side effects, more specifically targets the cause of MM, and reliably diagnoses the cancer in the presymptomatic stage.
ContributorsBerry, Jameson (Co-author) / Buelt, Allison (Co-author) / Johnston, Stephen (Thesis director) / Diehnelt, Chris (Committee member) / School of Molecular Sciences (Contributor) / School of International Letters and Cultures (Contributor) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2016-05