DESIGN OF HYBRID NANOPLATFORMS FOR MULTIMODAL IMAGING AND THERAPY
Most of the systems for chemical/radiological detection and treatment of cancer used nowadays, even those based on nanoparticles, do not take advantage of the physiological anomalies of cancerous cells and cause toxic side effects which limit their efficacy. Moreover, a shared characteristic of all commercialized nanoplatforms is that they are designed for only one specific application (either diagnosis or therapy), and a vast majority of them are only developed to look for an improvement in the drug dosage process or pharmaceutical efficacy of previously approved drug compounds for clinical use. In addition, most of the studies are also still only focused on the obtention of monofunctional nanoparticle systems which improve the properties of the commercialized products for their intended applications in therapeutics and diagnosis, or which allow the incorporation of additional
functionalities as the molecular recognition of the target tissue and/or the controlled release of drugs. However, there is no a response to other of the most important challenges in clinical practice: the independent performance of diagnosis and therapeutical phases in the treatment of diseases like cancer, which involves a time delay which may lead to a worsening of the disease and the subsequent risk for the patient´s health. Thus, Nanomedicine is called to solve the lack of a system based on nanoparticles which would be able to simultaneously possess the capability of acting as a diagnosis element and of exhibiting a therapeutical action. This is the subject of theranosis (Theranosis = therapeutics + diagnosis). The suitable combinations of different nanostructured materials should give rise to the development of these multifunctional nanomedical platforms (theranostic platforms) and their commercialization. To achieve this goal, it is necessary to assemble the different components of the nanoplatform, to analyze their properties and to check if they fulfil all necessary requirements about biostability and biocompatibility. Hence, in an attempt to provide new solutions to these actual problems, in this research we propose the development of different excitable and controllable hybrid theranostic nanoplatforms prone to be simultaneously used in the treatment of cancerous cells and tissues by means of the diagnosis and tracking of the disease through combined imaging techniques (magnetic resonance luminiscence, photoacoustic, tomography… that is, multimodal imaging) of the affected area, and the therapeutic activity provided by the combination of chemotherapy, gene silencing, photodynamic and/or thermal therapies (the so-called multimodal or combinatorial therapy). In particular, we pay special attention to light and magnetic activable platforms for optoacoustic imaging remotely controlled heating and cargo release, and thermal biosensing through applied near-infrared light (NIR) or AMF. In addition, the nanoplatforms should be constructed with biocompatible and biodegradable elements through a methodology composed of easy and scalable steps ensuring long circulating times. To ensure the specific recognition and localised action of the nanosystems in the tumour areas, these ensembles will be guided by molecules which easily bind to over-expressed membrane receptors in cancerous cells.