Nanoparticles that mimic platelets by rushing towards blood-vessel obstructions could deliver clot-busting drugs for use in stroke treatment.
Blocked blood vessels experience higher shear forces than do healthy vessels, causing platelets to stick to vessel walls near the blockage. Donald Ingber at Harvard University in Boston, Massachusetts, and his team created nanoparticle aggregates (pictured) that break up into their component parts under high shear forces, and swarm the blood clot area. The nanoparticles are coated with tissue plasminogen activator (tPA), which dissolves blood clots. More than 80% of mice with clots blocking the lungs' main arteries survived after being treated with the drug-coated nanoparticles — whereas all untreated animals died within an hour.
The nanoparticles reduce by 100-fold the amount of tPA needed to dissolve a clot compared with injection of the protein into the blood. Delivery using the particles also reduces the chances of tPA causing bleeding elsewhere in the body.
Science http://dx.doi.org/10.1126/science.1217815 (2012)
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Nanoparticles home in to clear clots. Nature 487, 142 (2012). https://doi.org/10.1038/487142a
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DOI: https://doi.org/10.1038/487142a
