Researchers at the Centre are finding new ways to deliver drugs to the brain.

Glioblastoma is the most aggressive and common type of brain tumour. It is thought to originate from astrocytes, but the cause is not known in most cases, making prevention difficult.

The current standard treatment to alleviate the most deleterious symptoms would include surgery, followed by a series of chemotherapy and radiation therapy. Despite treatment, tumours always recurs, leading to a very poor prognosis for survival, with less than 10% of patients surviving longer than 5 years.

Why funding is needed

Currently, a PhD student is studying how brain cells react to our nanosystem candidates and how these nanosystems diffuse across the brain after being administrated via the nasal cavity. These pre-clinical experiments are expensive, and a PhD studentship has limited funds for lab supplies.

We aim to raise £10,000 to support this PhD project and generate the data that will support our applications to translational funding.

What researchers are doing

In light of this critical medical needs, the recent developments in nanotechnologies and, in particular, drug delivery systems based on engineered nanomaterials, are offering new opportunities.

These so-called nanomedicines are now considered for application in a wide range of diseases, from infection to cancer, via diabetes. They are used to deliver drugs, genes or compounds with immunological properties.

However, delivering any compound to the brain is very challenging. Moreover, bringing a drug delivery system into the brain may present unexpected side effects.

To overcome these two challenges, we first aim to deliver compound to the brain via an inhaler, and we want to determine which nanosystem candidate will have the best safety profile to be administrated in the brain.

Beyond glioblastoma, we hope our brain nanosystem candidate(s) will also be the perfect candidate(s) for a range of other neurological conditions.