Recently, Professor Chang Shi’s team from the General Surgery Department (Thyroid Surgery Subspecialty) at Xiangya Hospital of Central South University (CSU), has made progress in the treatment of anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC). The research findings have been published in Nano Letters (IF=10.8), an academic journal under the American Chemical Society (ACS), titled “Nanoclaim Drug-Delivery System Loading Potassium Iodide Promotes Endometriosis and Targeted Therapy in Anaplastic Thyroid Cancer”, which provide innovative solutions for the treatment of ATC in clinical practice and have significant clinical translation prospects. Associate Researcher Huang Peng from the General Surgery Department at Xiangya Hospital of CSU is the first author. Professor Chang Shi is the corresponding author. Xiangya Hospital of CSU is the affiliation of the first author and the corresponding author.

Original research findings of Professor Chang Shi’s team on targeted therapy strategy for ATC primary lesion published in Nano Letters

Anaplastic thyroid cancer (ATC) is a special pathological type of thyroid cancer, which is highly invasive and lethal. So far there is no effective treatment and the median survival time of patients is only 4.8 months with a mortality rate of 100%, making it the main cause of thyroid cancer-related deaths. Airway obstruction, asphyxia and distant metastasis caused by rapid proliferation of primary ATC cells remain the main causes of patient death.

To develop targeted therapy in ATC primary lesions, Professor Chang Shi’s team has been collaborating with outstanding expert teams from CSU School of Minerals Processing and Bioengineering, School of Materials Science and Engineering, and College of Chemistry and Chemical Engineering for a long time to explore the use of targeted nanoclaim drug-delivery system for targeted therapy in ATC primary lesions. During the researches, Professor Chang Shi’s team developed a nanoclaim drug-delivery system loading potassium iodide (KI@DOX-KaolinMeOH). The nanoparticles have good biocompatibility and can be enriched in ATC primary lesions but not taken up by normal thyroid cells. Further researches have shown that inhibiting the PI3K/AKT/mTOR signaling pathway can enhance the autophagy ability of ATC cells and the endocytosis effect of nanoparticles, thereby achieving specific killing effects on ATC cells. This is expected to provide a new strategy for the treatment of ATC primary lesions.

(First Review: Yan Mengjing, Second Review: Wang Xuan, Third Review: Wang Jianxiang)

Source: Xiangya Hospital  Author: Huang Peng

Original article link: https://news.csu.edu.cn/info/1003/156717.htm