Triggering antitumoural drug release and gene expression by magnetic hyperthermia

Abstract

Magnetic nanoparticles (MNPs) are promising tools for a wide array of biomedical applications. One of their most outstanding properties is the ability to generate heat when exposed to alternating magnetic fields, usually exploited in magnetic hyperthermia therapy of cancer. In this contribution, we provide a critical review of the use of MNPs and magnetic hyperthermia as drug release and gene expression triggers for cancer therapy. Several strategies for the release of chemotherapeutic drugs from thermo-responsive matrices are discussed, providing representative examples of their application at different levels (from proof of concept to in vivo applications). The potential of magnetic hyperthermia to promote in situ expression of therapeutic genes using vectors that contain heat-responsive promoters is also reviewed in the context of cancer gene therapy.

Use of magnetic fields and nanoparticles to trigger drug release and improve tumor targeting

“…When the SPIONs are exposed to a magnetic field that changes rapidly the SPIONs release sufficient heat to change their local temperature (Corot, Robert, Idée, & Port, 2006;Laurent et al, 2011). The heat can be harnessed for various applications, including induction of tumor cell death, either via hyperthermia (Hedayatnasab et al, 2017;Périgo et al, 2015) or ablation (Altanerova et al, 2017;Bobo, Robinson, Islam, Thurecht, & Corrie, 2016), as well as inducing release of tumor-targeting drugs from temperature-sensitive nanocarriers (Guisasola, Vallet-Regí, & Baeza, 2018;Moros et al, 2019). F I G U R E 4 Novel magnetic targeting device designs.…”

“…Many different approaches have been taken to prepare thermally responsive magnetic nanoparticles. Perhaps the most straightforward approaches involve directly attaching drugs to magnetic nanoparticles via either covalent or noncovalent bonds that can be broken or destabilized when the temperature is increased (Moros et al, 2019). An advantage of noncovalent bonds is that the drug may not need to be modified (Mertz, Sandre, & Bégin-Colin, 2017;Moros et al, 2019).…”

“…Perhaps the most straightforward approaches involve directly attaching drugs to magnetic nanoparticles via either covalent or noncovalent bonds that can be broken or destabilized when the temperature is increased (Moros et al, 2019). An advantage of noncovalent bonds is that the drug may not need to be modified (Mertz, Sandre, & Bégin-Colin, 2017;Moros et al, 2019). Noncovalent interactions can simply involve hydrogen bonding between the drug and SPION surface or polymer (Griffete et al, 2015; T.-J.…”

“…As a result, magnetic fields and magnetically responsive particles can be harnessed for therapy and drug delivery, particularly in cancer (C. Sun, Lee, & Zhang, 2008). Two approaches are most common: (a) the use of magnetic particles to improve the accumulation of drugs in a desired region via magnetic targeting (Alexiou et al, 2000;Shapiro et al, 2015) and (b) the use of magnetic fields to heat magnetic particles to directly induce hyperthermia in or ablation of diseased tissues (Hedayatnasab, Abnisa, & Daud, 2017) and/or to trigger the release of drugs from thermally sensitive carriers (Moros et al, 2019;Yoo, Jeong, Noh, Lee, & Cheon, 2013; Figure 1). As there are already a number of very comprehensive reviews on hyperthermia and thermal tissue ablation (Chang et al, 2018;Dewhirst, Lee, & Ashcraft, 2016;Périgo et al, 2015), these topics will not be discussed extensively here.…”

Iron nanoparticle bio-interactions evaluated in Xenopus laevis embryos, a model for studying the safety of ingested nanoparticles

“…Among nanoscale iron, superparamagnetic iron oxide NPs are widely studied for magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), for cancer treatment (Song et al 2019) and for targeting antibiotics (Armenia et al 2018), enzymes (Balzaretti et al 2017) and other drugs (Moros et al 2018). In addition, iron NPs functionalized with thermophilic enzymes might find their place also in industrial biotechnology (Armenia et al 2019).…”