Chemical Communications Blog

Everyone knows that cancer as a disease is awful, but the side effects of currently utilized chemotherapies have their own horrors. Research into natural products as therapies have found some promising compounds, but they face barriers to practical use in patients. One particular molecule, artesunate (ART), recently showed high potential for anticancer activity when in the presence of iron. Unfortunately, ART has major problems that limit its current applicability, including low solubility in water and high instability in biologically relevant conditions.

One approach to get around these issues is to encapsulate the drug (pun intended) in a nanoparticle-based carrier. A carrier with a hydrophobic interior and hydrophilic exterior can bring higher concentrations of drugs with low solubility into a cell and protect them from deleterious conditions in the body. An additional benefit is the relative ease of incorporating targeting ligands into the particles during synthesis. This allows the drugs to only interact with specific cells or, in this specific case, the mitochondria within cells.

Figure 1. Schematic of the nanoparticle synthesis process complete with targeting ligand molecules. The anticancer agent is activated in the presence of iron.

Researchers in China have prepared approximately 200 nm nanoparticle carriers for ART (Figure 1) using triphenyl phosphonium (TPP) as a mitochondrial targeting ligand. These nanoparticles remained stable in biologically relevant conditions for a week, sufficient for in-vitro studies. The studies showed significant decreases in cancer cell growth when the nanoparticles were used compared to the ART alone. The nanoparticles with TPP on the surface showed the highest efficacy, particularly when coupled with iron treatment to activate the ART.

Figure 2. Images of cells exposed to nanoparticles with (bottom) and without (top) a targeting ligand filled with different fluorescent dyes. The increased brightness corresponds to higher uptake of the nanoparticles by the cells.

To further investigate the cell uptake pathway of the nanoparticles, the researchers added fluorescent dye molecules to the inside of the particles. Once the cells took up and ruptured the nanoparticles, the dyes were released and became visible to the researchers (Figure 2). The fluorescence was twice as great in cells exposed to the nanoparticles treated with the TPP targeting ligand, showing its value for cell uptake. The researchers also used fluorescent dyes that react with reactive oxygen species (ROSs), as their generation is how ART kills cancer cells. The in-vitro studies showed an over three-fold increase in fluorescence from reactions with ROSs which, combined with data showing higher rates of cell death, supports the increased activity of ART when combined with this nanoparticle architecture.

To find out more please read:

A mitochondria targeting artesunate prodrug-loaded nanoparticle exerting anticancer activity via iron-mediated generation of the reactive oxygen species

Zhigang Chen, Xiaoxu Kang, Yixin Wu, Haihua Xiao, Xuzi Cai, Shihou Seng, Xuefeng Wang and Shiguo Chen

Chem. Commun., 2019, 55, 4781 – 4784.

About the blogger:

Beth Mundy is a PhD candidate in chemistry in the Cossairt lab at the University of Washington in Seattle, Washington. Her research focuses on developing new and better ways to synthesize nanomaterials for energy applications. She is often spotted knitting in seminars or with her nose in a good book. You can find her on Twitter at @BethMundySci.

A team of researchers from Shandong Normal University in Jinan, China, have developed a highly sensitive and label-free assay for the detection of uracil-DNA glycosylase, a DNA repair enzyme that removes uracil from DNA molecules. Uracil is an RNA base, and when uracil appears in DNA through deamination of cytosine or misincorporation during DNA synthesis, the error can have mutagenic consequences.

Diminished activity of uracil-DNA glycosylase has been linked to a number of disease states including human immunodeficiency and Bloom syndrome, an inherited disorder associated with an increased risk of cancer (among other symptoms). Developing sensitive methods to quantify uracil-DNA glycosylase would enable early diagnosis of such conditions and improve understanding of the DNA-repair machinery. As a proof-of-concept, the researchers showed that this method could quantify the enzyme in the cell lysate of HeLa cancer cells.

Their method reminds me of Rube Goldberg machines, which achieve a task via a series of connected, mechanical steps. Completion of one step triggers the start of another: such as a line of falling dominos hitting a marble that, in turn, rolls down a track. In this work the action of one enzyme returns a product that is the preferred substrate of another enzyme. At the risk of deviating slightly, one of the more spectacular examples of a Rube Goldberg machine is seen in the music video for OK GO’s ‘this too shall pass’, a single-take shoot of a warehouse sized machine, featuring rolling cars, swinging pianos, flowing water and rolling billiard balls, all to perform the task of (spoiler alert) blasting the band members in the face with coloured paint.

The strategy starts with the action of uracil-DNA glycosylase and ends with a bioluminescent signal via a cascade of enzymatic reactions

The authors’ strategy involves a series of sequential steps employing seven different enzymes and three nucleic acid probes. It begins with a double stranded DNA probe containing one rogue uracil base: the perfect bait for uracil-DNA glycosylase. The action of this enzyme and two others, in a process involving base excision, DNA backbone cleavage and the addition of thymine-rich sequences, produces a large quantity of single-stranded DNA molecules with long thymine-rich tails. These molecules hybridise with adenine-rich RNA probes to generate RNA-DNA duplexes. An enzyme digests the RNA portion, releasing adenosine monophosphate monomers, which are converted to adenosine triphosphate (ATP), a required energy input to activate firefly luciferase. Luciferase catalyses the oxidation of luciferin to form oxyluciferin, accompanied by a large bioluminescent signal. Thus, uracil-DNA glycosylase is detected with 1-2 orders of magnitude more sensitivity than state-of-the-art fluorescent and luminescent assays.

Unlike conventional Rube Goldberg machines, which are characterised by unnecessary complexity, in this ‘enzymatic Rube Goldberg machine’ each step has a specific purpose and serves to amplify the signal of the last. This is dubbed ‘tricyclic cascade signal amplification’ and it enables highly sensitive detection of the enzyme.

To find out more please read:

Label-free and high-throughput bioluminescence detection of uracil-DNA glycosylase in cancer cells through tricyclic cascade signal amplification

Yan Zhang, Qing-nan Li, Chen-chen Li, Chen-yang Zhang.
Chem. Commun., 2018, 54, 6991-6994
DOI: 10.1039/c8cc03769h

About the author

Zoë Hearne is a PhD candidate in chemistry at McGill University in Montréal, Canada, under the supervision of Professor Chao-Jun Li. She hails from Canberra, Australia, where she completed her undergraduate degree. Her current research focuses on transition metal catalysis to effect novel transformations, and out of the lab she is an enthusiastic chemistry tutor and science communicator.

Researchers at the University of Texas have developed an inventive method to deliver molecules into the cell’s nucleus. Advances in gene therapy and the development of drugs that target DNA, the transcription machinery and other regulatory systems all rely on effective transport of molecules into the nucleus. Furthermore, achieving selective delivery of drugs reduces toxicity to non-target organs while maintaining the therapeutic effect.

Towards this aim, the authors delivered liposomes coated with clusters of gold nanoparticles into the cytoplasm. Laser irradiation of the cells heats the nanoparticles to high temperatures resulting in vapourisation of the water-based cytosol, and the transient formation of nanobubbles. The effect of this is an increase in the porosity of the nuclear envelope, enabling the transfer of various macromolecules from the cytoplasm into the nucleus. The authors describe this technique as ‘nanomechanical transduction’ because it is hypothesised that the mechanical effects brought on by the rapid growth and collapse (20 – 50 ns lifetimes) of the bubbles is responsible for the observed increase in porosity.

Local heating of gold nanoparticles and the subsequent formation of nanobubbles occurs due to ‘plasmon resonance’, whereby an electromagnetic field interacts with gold on the surface of the liposome and drives free-electron oscillation in resonance with the incident laser.

A diagram showing nanomechanical transduction. A gold-coated liposome enters the cell and, upon activation by a laser pulse, creates nanobubbles and mechanical disruption within the cell, resulting in increased permeability of the nuclear membrane.

As a proof-of-concept the authors investigated whether nanomechanical transduction can improve the nuclear localisation of two different types of macromolecule: a dextran polymer labelled with a fluorescent dye, and a plasmid encoding the green fluorescent protein. In the first experiment, cells containing the dextran polymer were incubated with plasmonic liposomes and subjected to a near-infrared laser pulse. Up to 70% fluorescence intensity was observed in the nucleus compared to the cytoplasm, far exceeding the result from control experiments using electroporation to increase cell membrane permeability. In a similar way, nanomechanical transduction resulted in a 2.7 fold increase in the expression of the green-fluorescent protein compared to using electroporation, demonstrating efficient delivery of the plasmid into the nucleus.

The authors entitle their paper ‘rock the nucleus’ and, unintentional reference or not, I think a Casbah (one meaning is the central keep, or citadel, of a walled city) is a rather fitting analogy for the nucleus: the command post of the cell, and safeguard of genetic information. The authors of this work offer a sophisticated yet general method for molecules to breach the walls.

To find out more please read:

Rock the nucleus: significantly enhanced nuclear membrane permeability and gene transfection by plasmonic nanobubble induced nanomechanical transduction

Xiuying Li, Peiyuan Kang, Zhuo Chen, Sneha Lal, Li Zhang, Jeremiah J. Gassensmith and Zhenpeng Qin.
Chem. Commun., 2008, Advance Article
DOI: 10.1039/c7cc09613e

About the author:

Zoë Hearne is a PhD candidate in chemistry at McGill University in Montréal, Canada, under the supervision of Professor Chao-Jun Li. She hails from Canberra, Australia, where she completed her undergraduate degree. Her current research focuses on transition metal catalysis to effect novel transformations, and out of the lab she is an enthusiastic chemistry tutor and science communicator.