UCL research team breakthrough in delivering drugs to the brain
8 March 2013
http://www.ucl.ac.uk/news/news-artic...rebreakthrough
Researchers at UCL have made a breakthrough in the way that drugs could be delivered to the brain.
Ijeoma F. Uchegbu, Mariarosa Mazza, Andreas G. Schätzlein and their colleagues have tackled the difficult problem of constructing drugs which are able to pass through the blood-brain barrier – a mechanism which prevents many chemicals in the bloodstream from passing into the brain, including synthetic compounds administered as medication as well as harmful environmental toxins.
A new class of drugs – peptide drugs – are now at the forefront of tackling this problem, which, if solved, could revolutionise delivery of pain relief as well as offer hope in treating neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases. Enabling such drugs to cross the blood-brain barrier is key to revolutionising the treatment of these conditions...