Project: Prevention of glioblastoma recurrence by injection in the resection cavity of a hydrogel formed by targeted lipid nanocapsules loaded with anticancer drugs

Acronym	GLIOGEL (Reference Number: EURONANOMED2017-082)
Duration	01/04/2018
Project Topic	Despite their low prevalence (annual global incidence of 5 cases out of 100,000 in the European Union and United States), Glioblastoma (GBM) malignant brain tumours, result in high morbidity and mortality. Due to recurrences from infiltrating GBM cells at the border of resection, the median survival is 14 months with the current standard of care (surgical resection combined with adjuvant radiotherapy and/or chemotherapy). Our preliminary data showed that the NFL-TBS.40-63 peptide (NFL) is able to adsorb at the surface of lipid nanocapsules (LNCs) and drug-loaded LNCs can be targeted in vivo to GBM cells in mice with a therapeutic efficacy. In addition, a polymer-free hydrogel of LNCs can be obtained due to a LNC network association using a crosslinking agent. The sustained release of drug-loaded LNCs from the hydrogel improved the in vivo therapeutic efficacy comparing to the drug alone. These two studies were carried out independently and the GLIOGEL project proposes to combine these two concepts. We hypothesize that a hydrogel of drug-loaded LNCs could be injected at the resection site to fill the gap of approximately one month between the resection and conventional radiochemotherapy, and could provide a sustained and local delivery of anticancer drugs that will limit GBM recurrences (i) by maintaining a therapeutic concentration at the resection borders as well as ensuring a sustained diffusion in the surrounding tissue without crossing the blood brain barrier and (ii) by specifically targeting GBM cells with the presence of NFL at the LNC surface. This translational multidisciplinary research proposal will be bridging nanotechnology, chemical engineering, pharmaceutical sciences and neuro-oncology research. The technology will be scaled-up for clinically relevant requirements.
Network	EuroNanoMed III
Call	Joint Transnational Call for Proposals (2017) for “European Innovative Research & Technological Development Projects in Nanomedicine”

Project partner

Number	Name	Role	Country
2	Université d'Angers	Coordinator	France
3	Université Catholique de Louvain	Partner	Belgium
4	Université Laval	Partner	Canada
5	Gliocure SAS	Partner	France