Seminário Kattesh V. KATTI - 13.01.2014 às 14 h - Auditório da Biblioteca

Cancer continues to cause premature death, disability and discomfort as the death toll globally from this disease has not changed significantly for the several decades. Management of this single disease alone consumes over a trillion dollars globally taking away 1.5 percent of the world’s gross domestic product (GDP). Despite numerous discoveries toward the development of highly sophisticated and tumor cell specific therapies, the lost years of human lives and productivity continue to cause the largest drain on the global economy. As part of our ongoing efforts toward the development of new, novel and relatively non-toxic antitumor agents, we are currently interested in combination therapies that take advantage of well-established FDA approved cytotoxic chemotherapeutic agents (such as cisplatin, doxorubicin, etoposide and the likes) in conjunction with naturally available phytochemicals with capabilities to modulate NFκB family of redox transcription factors. Our rationale is derived from sound scientific foundation that most of the human cancers become resistant to therapies based on traditional FDA approved cytotoxic chemotherapeutic agents and that such drug resistant cancer cells can be sensitized through interaction with redox active phytochemicals via cellular redox system modifiers. Our overall objective is to utilize the tremendous healing and curing power of naturally available phytochemicals in order to make the currently available FDA approved chemotherapeutic agents more effective through combination therapies through modulation of ROS and stress kinase pathways at the cellular level—all through novel Green Nanotechnology approaches. The intervention of phytochemicals from herbs, plants, fruits and African-origin roots is expected to create a new field of integrative medicine which combines holistic approaches of herbal medicine to make the overall combination therapy more effective, less toxic and ultimately bringing down health care costs globally. Our new holistic integrative medicine (HIM) approach utilizes novel green nanotechnology to encapsulate cellular redox system modifying phytochemicals based antioxidants to afford effective delivery, enhance bioavailability and thus achieve modulation/deactivation of NFκB family of redox transcription factors in order to control malignancies of breast, prostate, pancreas, colon, leukemia, lymphoma and various human tumors. In this lecture, discussions will focus on novel Green Nanotechnology approaches for (i) the development of nanoparticles derived from redox active phytochemicals from tea, grapes, African herbs/roots; (ii) combination therapeutic approaches involving FDA approved cytotoxic agents and nanoparticles with capabilities to modulate cellular redox systems and (iii) Overall oncological implications of Green Nanotechnology in the context of reducing the global burden of cancer in terms of cost, achieving enhanced efficacy and making phytochemical-based cancer therapeutic agents available globally at affordable costs.

1. Katti, et.al: Functionalized Radioactive Gold Nanoparticles in Tumor Therapy. Wiley Interdisciplinary Reviews: Nanomedicine and Nanobiotechnology, 2012; vol. 4, no. 1, pp. 42–51,

2. Katti, and Shukla et.al; Laminin Receptor Specific Therapeutic Gold Nanoparticles (198AuNP-EGCg) Show Efficacy in Treating Prostate Cancer; Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences-PNAS-2012 2012 vol. 109 no. 31; 12426-12431

3. Katti, et.al: Gum arabic-coated radioactive gold nanoparticles cause no short-term local or systemic toxicity in the clinically relevant canine model of prostate cancer; International Journal of Nanomedicine: 2014:9 5001–5011