While this brilliant new research has only been tested in mice, a new nanoparticle, recently discovered by researchers at the University of Michigan, has been shown to easily bypass the blood-brain barrier, which has stopped many proven anti-cancer drugs from reaching the brain.

Researchers hope this could one day lead to new clinical therapies for treating glioblastoma. Excitingly, the study found that blocking a protein known as STAT3 in glioblastoma, reactivated the immune system against the tumour with profound effects.

The mice in the the trial experienced no tumour recurrence as their immune system defeated the brain cancer. This occurred without any additional therapeutic drugs or other clinical treatments.

“It’s still a bit of a miracle to us,” said Joerg Lahann, the Wolfgang Pauli Collegiate Professor of Chemical Engineering and a co-senior author of the study. “Where we would expect to see some levels of tumour growth, they just didn’t form when we rechallenged the mice. I’ve worked in this field for more than 10 years and have not seen anything like this.”

This early research suggest that the combination of therapeutic drugs and novel nanoparticle delivery not only eradicates glioblastoma tumours in mice but results in “immunological memory” – the immune system’s ability the recognise and attack remaining malignant cancer cells. 

“This is a huge step toward clinical implementation,” said Maria Castro, the R.C. Schneider Collegiate Professor of Neurosurgery and a co-senior author of the study. “This is the first study to demonstrate the ability to deliver therapeutic drugs systemically, or intravenously, that can also cross the blood-brain barrier to reach tumours,”, Prof. Castro said of the nanomedicine.