Killing Breast Cancer in the Dark

August 3, 2009

Professor Zeev Gross, from the Technion [Israel Institute of Technology] has played no small role in the new research paper that shows positive results for the new therapy based on the chemical compound gallium corroles. Using a new-to-science organic chemical called a corrole, Gross was able to develop a powerful method that synthesizes these chemicals for practical use in medicine. The beauty of the new chemical compound is that it not only works in diagnostics, lighting up and showing doctors where the cancer cells are, it is also kills the cancer at the same time.

Gross tells ISRAEL21c, “They are highly florescent. We found at the cellular level [gallium corroles were] useful for imaging, but also found it could kill cancer with high specificity and could be an alternative to chemotherapy. We were surprised. It could be used for selective killing of cancer cells…In most cases, if people want to get a closer look at a drug in vivo, they have to attach a fluorescent probe to it—and that turns it into a different molecule. But in our case, the active molecule we're tracking does the fluorescing. We get to track the original, unmodified molecule and are hence able to follow its distribution among different organs in live animals.”

In the new study, the international team combined a gallium corrole with a protein carrier, so that the corrole would show an affinity to cancer cells. They report fewer side effects compared to other breast cancer treatments. The Israel–US team was able to shrink breast cancer tumors at doses five times lower than standard chemo treatments (based on a drug called doxorubicin). Also, the corroles could be injected straight into the bloodstream and not into the tumor, making the treatment, if developed clinically, easier to administer. For more information: chr10zg@techunix.technion.ac.il; 972-4-829-3954

Excerpts from an article by Karin Kloosterman, israel21c.org

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