VISIBLE LIGHT AS A MECHANISM TO ACTIVATE PHARMACOLOGICAL PROCESSES

Greetings and welcome dear readers, this information serves as a scientific approach to understand the behavior of drugs used against cancer in relation to the use of external light as a mechanism of activation of the same, so as to generate more effective pharmacodynamic and pharmacokinetic processes, where new therapies and treatment from them is more accurate against diseases.

In this sense, we will rely on research being conducted from the Institute of Advanced Chemistry of Catalonia, where in vitro molecules have been synthesized that allow activation control, through the implementation of external light, which allows directing and directing drugs more easily to the affected areas.

Thus, throughout the research, it has been possible to manipulate molecules with pharmacological properties that are photosensitive, that is, that are capable of reacting to the energetic changes provided by light, this being a reversible mechanism, which is why it represents a powerful process for science, since researchers can redirect the process in a scenario that allows extending the advances of science with pharmacological implications.

Consequently, research processes are being directed to the treatment of cancer, a disease that directly affects thousands of patients, as well as the family nucleus as a whole, since it is a pathology that quickly degenerates people's health. This is due to the fact that current drugs aimed at cancer control are often not able to differentiate healthy cells from those that are affected, hence the lack of selectivity of chemotherapy represents a clear disadvantage in the use of these therapeutic processes, which ends up reducing the effect of the treatment and generating secondary affections on our system.

Based on the above, photosensitive drug molecules as active ingredients allow to exercise greater control through light on the affected areas, which can solve the drawback that has been presenting the current therapies, so that would decrease the side effects and the overwhelming sequelae through which patients have to go through.

In this sense, the use of light and its incidence on chemical molecules has been very attractive at the scientific level, especially in areas related to the treatment of tumor processes, in the first instance because several variables can be controlled during the process, including intensity, exposure time, type of wavelength, among other variables that allow photosensitive molecules to have a predetermined behavior when irradiated or illuminated under particular conditions, so that effects on specific receptors can be induced under the aforementioned controls.

Therefore, at the oncological level, researchers have focused their attention on the enzymatic processes associated with histone deacetylase enzymes, since when this enzyme is misregulated it generates an impediment in the expression of certain genes, such as tumor suppressors, and under these conditions the cells are not prone to become cancer cells, hence, the central idea is the production of drugs aimed at inhibiting histone deacetylase enzymes that are misregulated, as a mechanism to cope with and stop the disease.

It should be noted that the chemical molecules implemented are based on conventional drugs; however, their low selectivity has been improved through computational means, which has made it possible to implement and design molecules that respond to light processes and that manage to be photoselective and controllable through the regulation of the aforementioned light parameters.

However, beyond the advances, Culleré, an active researcher in the investigation, states: "For the moment the drugs are in an experimental phase at the level of retinal applications and those associated with pain, although the advances in oncological matters are not so favorable".

His argument is based on the fact that the first results showed that the molecules that were activated by light inhibited the histone deacetylase enzymes as opposed to when they were inactivated in the dark, the only limitation of this advance is that the light necessary for activation was ultraviolet light, which can be harmful to cells and its reach to biological tissues is low, hence it was necessary to synthesize molecules that were activated through visible light that allowed improving the effects of activation on them.

Thus, it was possible to determine the activity in four cancer cell lines, including breast cancer, leukemia, cervix and colon, only in the light or activated phase of the molecules, since in their dark phase they do not exert any action, hence these results have allowed generating a library of drugs whose active principles are photosensitive and allow determining and controlling cell viability when irradiated with visible light that do not generate abrupt damage on the cells.

In this sense, research is still in progress and chemical and pharmacological principles continue to be developed that will allow in vivo tests to be carried out at least in species such as fish, zebras or mice, where they are treated with irradiated drugs on specific areas, while the rest of the body is kept in a dark phase to avoid side effects.

[1] Alejandro Belmonte Fernández HDACs in the regulation of gene expression and cancer expression and cancer.Artículo: Acceso Online

[2] Aída Araceli Rodríguez Hernández The role of an orthologous histone deacetylase at HD1 from A. thaliana in the response to blue light in Trichoderma atroviride. Artículo: Acceso Online

2. For more information related to the areas of science, technology, engineering and mathematics, do not hesitate to visit #stemsocial and #stem-espanol, they are communities that promote scientific advances in these areas