Transport Anti-Cancer Drugs, Article Review Example

The authors of the article discuss an instance in which a biological protein can be utilized to transport anti-cancer drugs for targeted therapy. Pharmacologists have been able to create a large number of cancer pharmaceuticals, but these drugs have been largely unsuccessful in clinical trials due to issues related to drug delivery. As a consequence, it has been necessary to determine how these medications can be encapsulated in biological compounds that are recognized by the body and are therefore able to reach the target site before they are metabolized. Pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic studies have revealed that the toxic effects of drugs are markedly increased if they are metabolized at an inappropriate time or location. The authors postulate that a protein called MRP3, which is responsible for the transport of organic anion S-(2,4-dinitrophenyl-)glutathione, is resistant to many common cancer drugs such as etoposide and methotrexate. While this transporter helps the body naturally resist some of these drugs, it can potentially be harnessed to serve as a means by which drugs can be delivered to specific organs.

The author’s purpose was to explain a mechanism by which cancer drugs can be rendered ineffective in the human body. This is an important message because there are many factors that relate to drug resistance, and in this situation, this resistance is likely due to the chemical makeup of commonly used drugs. This is useful to the intended audience because it will allow researchers to build off these findings in order to determine how this knowledge can be utilized to increase the efficacy of treatment with cancer pharmaceuticals.

The strong point of this article is derived from the data shown by the cytotoxicity assays. Since many different drugs are tested to determine the longevity of the cells in environment with the MRP3 transporter present, we gain a greater understanding of the medications that interact with this molecule. This therefore suggests to researchers and physicians that in some cases, drugs such as methotrexate and etoposide will not be effective due to their interaction with MRP3. However, since this experiment was performed in vitro, it is possible that these interactions do not occur similarly in vivo. We must consider that the body is more complex and there may be variables present that would confound this relationship if the experiment were to be repeated.

If I had the opportunity to ask the authors questions, I would ask them if they are likely to repeat the experiment in vivo and whether they believe that their results will remain the same. In addition, I would ask them to justify their drug selection for the cytotoxicity testing. Since this research will be the most valuable to health if it can reach clinical trials for drug delivery, it would be valuable to test this concept in in vivo models of varying complexity and to determine a greater pharmacokinetic and pharmacodynamic understanding of this protein-drug interaction.

My opinion of the issue being described is that this is a highly important topic in the field of oncology and pharmacology. One of the major barriers to the creation of successful pharmaceuticals is that there is occasionally a lack of understanding as to how the drug will interact with the body. Therefore, the observation that MRP3 captures some commonly used drugs is useful so that future work can determine how the interaction could be blocked or enhanced for more effective drug delivery. This work has the potential to be a starting point for a breakthrough in the field.

Works Cited

Kool M, Van der Linder M, De Haas M, Scheffer GL, De Vree JML, Smith AJ, Jansen G, Peters GJ, Ponne N, Scheper RJ, Elferink RPJ, Baas F, Borst P. “MRP3, an organic anion transporter able to transport anti-cancer drugs”. Proc. Natl. Acad. Sci.97 (1999): 6914–6919.