This is a new breakthrough in cancer research: CNRS chemists have just developed a molecule that attacks cancer cells under the effect of light.
A molecule derived from a textile dye could turn into a future cancer treatment. A Franco-Swedish team of researchers has developed a new molecule that attacks cancer cells under the effect of light. This specifically accumulates in cancer cells and then becomes toxic on contact with light.
>> France at the forefront of nanoparticles in the fight against cancer: “The objective is to increase the cure rate”
Similar molecules have already been used for twenty years in hospitals to treat certain cancers of the skin, neck or bladder. “These treatments are part of photodynamic therapies”explains Cyril Monnereau, teacher, CNRS researcher in Lyon, one of the authors of this work.
This new molecule is much more effective than existing molecules, which would reduce treatment doses by 10 or 100 compared to current treatments, and therefore minimize side effects. Laboratory tests on human cells, as well as in vivo tests on zebrafish embryos are very promising.
Researchers have modified the structure of this molecule
A photodynamic treatment is effective under the effect of light because it uses the properties of certain molecules which, when they receive a photon, in other words light, are destabilized by a surplus of energy which they do not don’t know what to do. By reflex, they transmit this excess energy to oxygen molecules around them, and these oxygen molecules then become toxic for cancer cells.
This new molecule is derived from a textile dye. Initially, it is an ingredient used to make yellow dyes. We produce several tons a year. Teams of chemists from the CNRS in Lyon and Angers, and from South Korea were interested in it, because like all dyes, it is sensitive to light. These chemists came up with the idea of slightly modifying the structure of this yellow dye molecule to see if it could be recycled into drugs that are activated by light.
>> Oncology: France and six other countries launch a “G7 for cancer”
They were pleasantly surprised to find that very small changes were enough for this molecule to become a potential photosensitive drug which could therefore prove to be more effective than the treatments of the same family that we know. We will now have to pass the phase of toxicity and efficacy tests and wait several more years for possible clinical trials in humans. This discovery is promising, because it brings renewal to a field of oncology that has not seen any recent development.