ABSTRACT
Background: Cancer stem cells (CSCs) are the most challenging issue in cancer treatment, because of their high resistance mechanisms, that can cause tumor recurrence after common cancer treatments such as drug and radiation based therapies, and the insufficient efficiency of common treatments in CSCs removal and the recurrence of tumors after these treatments, it is essential to consider other methods, including non-ionizing treatments likes light-based treatments and magnetic hyperthermia (MHT). Method and material: After synthesis, characterization and investigation, the toxicity of novel on A375 and MAD-MB-231 cell lines, magnetic hyperthermia and light-based treatments were applied. MTT assay and flow cytometry was employed to determine cell survival. the influence of combination therapy on CD44 + CD24-and CD133 + CD44+ cell population, Comparison and evaluation of combination treatments was done respectively using Combination Indices (CIs). Result: The final nanoparticle has a high efficiency in producing hydroxyl radicals and generating heat in MHT. According to CIs, we can conclude that combined using of light-based treatment and MHT in the presence of final synthesized nanoparticle have synergistic effect and a high ability to reduce the population of stem cells in both cell lines compared to single treatments. Conclusion: In this study a novel multi-functional nanoplatform acted well in dual and triple combined treatments, and showed a good performance in the eradication of CSCs, in A375 and MAD-MB-231 cell lines.
ABSTRACT
Objectives: Conventional methods of cancer treatment include surgery, chemotherapy, radiation therapy, and immunotherapy. Chemotherapy, as one of the main methods of cancer treatment, due to the lack of targeted distribution of the drug in tumor tissues, is not able to destroy cancer cells and also affects healthy tissues and causes serious side effects in patients. Sonodynamic therapy (SDT) is a promising strategy for non-invasive treatment of deep solid cancer tumors. In this study, for the first time, the sono-sensitive activity of mitoxantrone was investigated and then mitoxantrone (MTX) was conjugated to hollow gold nanostructure (HGN) to improve the efficiency of in vivo SDT. Materials and Methods: Firstly, after the synthesis of hollow gold nanoshells and the PEGylation process, conjugation of MTX was performed. Then, after evaluating the toxicity of the treatment groups in vitro, in order to perform an in vivo study, 56 male Balb/c mice that had been tumorized by subcutaneous injection of 4T1 cells were divided into eight groups of breast tumor model. Ultrasonic irradiation (US) conditions including intensity of 1.5 W/cm2 (with a frequency of 800 kHz, 5 min), MTX concentration of 2 µM, and HGN dose of 2.5 mg/kg (unit of animal weight) were used. Results: The results show that administration of PEG-HGN-MTX caused a slight reduction in tumor size and growth compared with free MTX. Ultrasound also improved the therapeutic effect of the gold nanoshell in treated groups, and the HGN-PEG-MTX-US treated groups were able to significantly reduce and control tumor size and growth. Conclusion: The findings also show that MTX and HGN can be used as sonosensitizers in SDT. Also, HGN-PEG-MTX can act as a sono-chemotherapy agent for the combination of sonodynamic therapy and chemotherapy for in vivo breast tumors.
ABSTRACT
INTRODUCTION: Ultrasonography is the preferable imaging technique for monitoring and assessing complications in kidney allograft transplants. Computer-aided diagnostic system based on texture analysis in ultrasonographic imaging is recommended to identify changes in kidney function after allograft transplantation. MATERIALS AND METHODS: A total of 61 biopsy-proven kidney allograft recipients (11 rejected and 50 unrejected) were assessed by a computer-aided diagnostic system. Up to 270 statistical texture features were extracted as descriptors for each region of interest in each recipient. Correlations of texture features with serum creatinine level and differences between rejected and unrejected allografts were analyzed. An area under the receiver operating characteristic curve was calculated for each significant texture feature. Linear discriminant analysis was employed to analyze significant features and increase discriminative power. Recipients were classified by the first nearest neighbor classifier. RESULTS: Fourteen texture features had a significant correlation with serum creatinine level and 16 were significantly different between the rejected and unrejected allografts, for which an area under the curve values were in the range of 0.575 for difference entropy S(4,0) to 0.676 for kurtosis. Using all 16 features, linear discriminant analysis indicated higher performance for classification of the two groups with an area under the curve of 0.975, which corresponded to a sensitivity of 90.9%, a specificity of 100%, a positive predictive value of 100%, and a negative predictive value of 98.0%. CONCLUSIONS: Texture analysis was a reliable method, with the potential for characterization, and can help physicians to diagnose kidney failure after transplantation on ultrasonographic imaging.
