On February 11, 2013, the Department of Physical Sciences invited the Barry Community to a lecture by Fulbright Scholar Ondrej Sedlacek, PhD, entitled “Structural and Chemical Aspects of HPMA Copolymers as Drug Carriers.”
About the lecture:
Targeted delivery and controlled release using polymer carriers became a widely studied approach to circumvent side effects of anti-cancer drugs. The drug is attached to a polymer carrier by biodegradable linker. This biologically inactive prodrug conjugate is delivered to the cancer tissue, where it is concentrated by e.g., Enhanced Permeation and Retention (EPR) accumulation or ligand-based targeting. In tumor tissue, the conjugate releases its cargo in biologically active form. In this talk, I will delineate the recent development of N-(2-hydroxypropyl) methacrylamide (HPMA)-based polymer conjugates with anti-cancer drug Doxorubicin as a promising candidate for advanced therapy of solid tumors.