Nanocrystals Carrying Radioisotopes Offer New Hope for Cancer Treatment

The Science

Scientists have developed tiny nanocrystal particles made up of isotopes of the elements lanthanum, vanadium, and oxygen for use in treating cancer. These crystals are smaller than many microbes and can carry isotopes of elements such as actinium and radium. These isotopes undergo radioactive decay, emitting alpha particles (helium nuclei) that destroy cancer cells in the process. The individual isotopes that the nanocrystals carry are too small to see. So, the researchers used advanced computer simulations and data from experiments to understand how the isotopes are arranged inside the nanocrystals. This knowledge will help researchers design more effective radioactive nanocrystals that target and kill tumors.

The Impact

This research could revolutionize cancer therapy by enabling doctors to treat more types of cancers using an approach called targeted alpha therapy. This therapy delivers radioactive substances directly to diseased tissue, where they then decay and break DNA strands in the cancer cells. Targeted therapies have fewer side effects and cause only minimal damage to surrounding healthy cells. Previous studies have found that these therapies can be as much as 50% more effective than traditional chemotherapy, in which patients receive powerful drugs that kill cancer cells. However, alpha therapy only works for types of cancers for which researchers have found effective delivery methods. This study may lead to new imaging methods for cancer detection and diagnosis, as well as new, more effective cancer therapies.

Summary

Inorganic nanocrystals loaded with medical radioisotopes are promising tools for cancer therapy because they offer a new way to deliver cancer-killing radiation to tumors. This study focused on how two radioactive isotopes, actinium and radium, become part of these nanocrystals so they can be delivered to cancer cells. Using a combination of experimental synthesis and molecular dynamics simulations, the research team discovered that the actinium isotopes tend to form tightly packed clusters within the nanocrystals, while radium isotopes distribute more broadly across their surface.

The findings, validated in the laboratory by analyzing their chemical signatures at high resolution, help provide a blueprint for designing nanocrystals optimized for cancer therapy. These new therapies will benefit the treatment of localized tumors, such as breast, brain, and ovarian cancer, but will also have the advantage of being targetable to metastatic cancer anywhere in the body. This type of radiation treatment destroys the targeted cancer cells with minimal damage to healthy organs, resulting in fewer side effects. Understanding these therapies at the atomic level opens new pathways for tailoring them to image and treat more types of tumors.

Funding

This research was supported by the Oak Ridge National Laboratory Directed Research & Development (LDRD) program. The isotopes used in this research were supplied by the Department of Energy (DOE) Isotope Program, managed by the DOE Office of Isotope R&D and Production. The simulations used resources of the Oak Ridge Leadership Computing Facility at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the National Energy Research Scientific Computing Center, both of which are DOE Office of Science user facilities.