9-Hydroxycamptothecin

Facile Fabrication of 10-Hydroxycamptothecin-Backboned Amphiphilic Polyprodrug with Precisely Tailored Drug Loading Content for Controlled Release.[Pubmed:29847101]

Bioconjug Chem. 2018 Jul 18;29(7):2239-2247.

Polymeric prodrugs with precisely controlled drug loading content (DLC) and rapid intracellular destabilization generally require complicated chemistry that hinders large-scale manufacture. For this purpose, we reported in this study a facile construction of reduction-sensitive amphiphilic polyprodrugs with an anticancer drug, 10-hydroxycamptothecin (HCPT), and a hydrophilic poly(ethylene oxide) (PEG) moiety as the alternating building blocks of the multiblock copolymer using Cu(I)-catalyzed azide-alkyne cycloaddition (CuAAc) click coupling between azide-SS-HCPT-SS-azide and alkyne-PEG-alkyne. Adoption of PEGs with two different molecular weights (MWs) of 400 and 1450 Da (PEG400 and PEG1450) afforded two polyprodrugs with different DLCs. Both formulations can self-assemble into spherical micelles with hydrodynamic diameter smaller than 200 nm, and exhibit glutathione (GSH)-triggered degradation for promoted drug release. A further comparison study revealed that the PEG1450-based polyprodrug is a better formulation than the analogue constructed from PEG400 in terms of in vitro drug release behaviors, and cytotoxicity. This work thus provides a facile yet efficient strategy toward polymeric prodrugs with precisely controlled DLC and reduction-triggered degradation for enhanced anticancer drug delivery.

Enhanced liver-targeting via coadministration of 10-Hydroxycamptothecin polymeric micelles with vinegar baked Radix Bupleuri.[Pubmed:29895488]

Phytomedicine. 2018 May 15;44:1-8.

BACKGROUND: Vinegar baked Radix Bupleuri (VBRB) is a wildly used traditional Chinese medicine, it could be used as a meridian guided drug to enhance liver targeting efficiency of the delivered drug in addition to its therapeutic effect. PURPOSE: To investigate the liver targeting effect induced by VBRB via coadministration with 10-Hydroxycamptothecin loaded polymeric micelles. METHODS: First of all, the inhibitory effect of VBRB on the activity of glutathione S-transferase (GST) was investigated in vitro to select the most effective extract. After oral administration of 10-Hydroxycamptothecin (HCPT) polymeric micelles with low, medium and high doses of VBRB, pharmacokinetic parameters, including the ratio of Cmax in the liver (Ce) and the relative uptake efficiency (RUE), were employed to assess the liver targeting efficiency. RESULTS: It was found that VBRB extract BC1 has the strongest inhibition effect on GST activity in the five extracts. By coadministration of HCPT loaded micelles with three doses of BC1, the AUC0-t of HCPT in the liver raised by 42.5%, 23.0%, -0.2%, with RUE 1.45, 1.23, 1.02 for low, medium and high dose groups, respectively, indicating that low and medium dose of BC1 presented better liver-targeting enhancing effect than that of the high dose, which corresponded to the commonly used dose of VBRB in traditional Chinese medicine formulae. CONCLUSIONS: VBRB could effectively enhance the liver-targeting efficiency of HCPT loaded polymeric micelles after oral coadministration. Such a simple but effective strategy may enlighten on the potential use of meridian guided drug together with modern drug delivery system to achieve better active drug targeting.