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Antitumor Effect of Paclitaxel-Loaded PEGylated Immunoliposomes Against Human Breast Cancer Cells

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Abstract

Purpose

The antitumor effect of paclitaxel-loaded PEGylated immunoliposome (PILs) was investigated in breast cancer cell lines and the xenograft model.

Methods

Herceptin was conjugated to paclitaxel-loaded PEGylated liposomes (PLs). In vitro cellular uptake and cytotoxicity of PILs were determined in breast cancer cell lines while in vivo antitumor efficacy was evaluated in the xenograft nude mouse model.

Results

The PILs formulation was able to significantly increase the HER2 mediated cellular uptake of paclitaxel compared to the PLs in cell lines overexpressing HER2 (BT-474 and SK-BR-3 cells). However, in the MDA-MB-231 cells, which express low levels of HER2, the difference between the PILs and PLs formulation was not significant. The biological activity of Herceptin was maintained throughout the conjugation process as exhibited by the antitumor dose–response curves determined for Herceptin itself, for the thiolated Herceptin alone and subsequently for the immunoliposome-coupled Herceptin. In BT-474 and SK-BR-3 cells, the cytotoxicity of the PILs was more potent than that of Taxol. Moreover, in in vivo studies, PILs showed significantly higher tumor tissue distribution of paclitaxel in the BT-474 xenograft model and more superior antitumor efficacy compared to Taxol and PLs. However, in the MDA-MB-231 xenograft model, PILs and PLs showed similar tumor tissue distribution as well as antitumor activity.

Conclusions

These results suggest that HER2-mediated endocytosis is involved in the PILs formulation. The ability of the PILs formulation to efficiently and specifically deliver paclitaxel to the HER2-overexpressing cancer cells implies that it is a promising strategy for tumor-specific therapy for HER2-overexpressing breast cancers.

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Abbreviations

CHOL:

cholesterol

DMEM:

Dulbecco’s modified eagle medium

EPR:

enhanced permeability and retention

FBS:

fetal bovine serum

HER2:

human epidermal growth factor receptor-2

MEM:

minimum essential medium

MPEG2000-DSPE:

1,2-distearoyl-sn-glycero-3-phosphoethanolamine [methoxy(polyethyleneglycol)-2000]

MTT:

3-(4,5-dimethylthiazol-2-ly)– 2,5-diphenyl-tetrazolium bromide

PBS:

phosphate-buffered saline

PEG:

polyethylene glycol

PILs:

PEGylated immunoliposomes

PLs:

PEGylated liposomes

S100PC:

soybean phosphatidylcholine

Rh-PE:

rhodamine labeled-phosphatidylethanolamine

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Acknowledgements

This research was financially supported by the Ministry of Science and Technology (M10528010004-06N2801-00410) in Korea. The authors would like to thank the Lipoid GmbH (Germany) and Genentech companies for providing phosphatidylcholine and Herceptin, respectively.

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Authors and Affiliations

  1. College of Pharmacy, Shenyang Pharmaceutical University, Shenyang, 110016, People’s Republic of China

    Tao Yang & Fu-De Cui

  2. College of Pharmacy and Research Institute of Pharmaceutical Sciences, Seoul National University, Seoul, 151-742, South Korea

    Tao Yang, Min-Koo Choi, Suk-Jae Chung, Chang-Koo Shim & Dae-Duk Kim

  3. College of Pharmacy, Ewha Womans University, Seoul, 120-750, South Korea

    Seung-Jin Lee

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  1. Tao Yang
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Correspondence to Dae-Duk Kim.

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Yang, T., Choi, MK., Cui, FD. et al. Antitumor Effect of Paclitaxel-Loaded PEGylated Immunoliposomes Against Human Breast Cancer Cells. Pharm Res 24, 2402–2411 (2007). https://doi.org/10.1007/s11095-007-9425-y

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  • DOI: https://doi.org/10.1007/s11095-007-9425-y

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