Drug-loaded nanoparticles could fight infections and clots

Associate professor Maria Kempe, her brother and colleague Dr Henrik Kempe and members of staff at Skåne University Hospital have shown that the principle works in animal experiments.

They have succeeded in attaching a clot-dissolving drug to the nanoparticles and, with the help of magnets, directed the particles to a blood clot in a stent in the heart to dissolve it.

A stent is a tube-shaped metal net used to treat narrowing of the coronary arteries. First the artery is expanded using a balloon catheter, then a stent is inserted to keep the artery open. However, the method is not without problems — depending on the type of stent inserted, the cells of the artery wall can grow and again obstruct the artery or a blood clot can develop in the stent.

In the Lund researchers’ experiments, the nanoparticles were coated with a drug used to treat blood clots. But the particles could also carry other drugs, such as drugs to stop the cell growth that makes an artery become narrower.