An Insulin-Gold Nanoplatform as Enhanced Antibody-Drug Conjugate Cancer Therapy

Introduction

Antibody-drug conjugates (ADCs) have emerged as promising therapies by combining the precision targeting abilities of antibodies with the potency of chemotherapy drugs, to directly attack cancer cells and minimize damage to healthy tissue. However, approved ADCs show low efficacies in treating solid tumours, due to inherent challenges.

Challenges in ADCs

These challenges include:

1. Design Challenges: Limitations in the drug-antibody ratio and the ability to integrate multiple drug types.
2. Delivery Challenges: Pharmacokinetics and tumor barriers that restrict ADC accumulation and distribution within tumours.

Project Overview

In the framework of the ERC-CoG project, we are developing gold nanoparticles (GNPs) that harness insulin for the delivery of large therapeutics, including antibodies, across biological barriers.

Development of Golden-ADC Nanoplatform

As part of this research, we have recently revealed that these insulin-GNPs can be further developed as an ADC nanoplatform. This Golden-ADC nanoplatform enables:

• Simple conjugation of large payloads of multiple antibodies and drug types.
• Efficacy in cancer cell models.
• Enhanced in vivo tumor accumulation, deep penetration, and wide distribution throughout the tumour.

PoC Proposal

In this PoC proposal, we will test our Golden-ADC nanoplatform for effective and safe treatment of triple negative breast cancer. This is due to the potential high benefits that our nanoplatform can provide for this hard-to-treat cancer, which has a long-standing paucity of effective therapies.

Goals of GOLDEN ADC

Within GOLDEN ADC, we aim to achieve significant progress in the technology development process by:

• Proof of concept demonstration of efficacy and safety of the Golden-ADC conjugated with multiple drugs in in-vivo triple negative breast cancer models.
• Achieving business readiness through:
  • Consolidating the IP strategy.
  • Undertaking a comprehensive market analysis.
  • Engaging with end-users.
  • Developing the business strategy.