Discovery of protein to detect nuclear material and cancer therapies
Written by Adeel Abbas
Scientists at LLNL and Penn State University have teamed up to show how a protein can be used in the recovery of actinium, an important radioactive metal for both cancer treatments as well nuclear detection.
This is a ground-breaking development for the field of actinium chemistry and pharmaceuticals,” said co-corresponding author Joseph Cotruvo Jr., an assistant professor from Penn State.
Other Livermore researchers include Ziye Dong, Paul Wooddy, and Mavrik Zavarin in addition to Joseph Mattocks at Penn State.
Radioactive metals hold unique and essential places in a variety of medical imaging applications, but they require lengthy separation processes for their purification. Actinium-based therapies could revolutionize cancer medicine with treatment efficacy hundreds of times higher than current drugs!
The team has shown that lanmodulin can be used to bind and purify actinium, as well as another radioisotope- medicinal yttrium 90 which is typically found in cancer therapies or diagnostics.
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The unprecedented efficiency of this approach also allows preparation at much lower costs while probing its chemistry more conveniently than ever before! This process may extend into many other radioactive isotopes such as those used for imaging purposes; meaning we will soon have access not only with one type but rather several types all within reach thanks again to these breakthroughs made today by scientists worldwide.
Scientists have found the first actinium-protein complex in an extinction event. The researchers showed that lanmodulin is more efficient at binding than other molecules, like radium or strontium which can be present due to process impurities and physiological elements such as calcium. They also discovered this protein’s ability among rare earth metals too!
While the research is still preliminary, it offers insights into actinium’s fundamental chemistry and suggests that lanmodulin could be a basis for new treatments.
Further information:
Gauthier J.-P. Deblonde et al, Capturing an elusive but critical element: Natural protein enables actinium chemistry, Science Advances (2021). DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.abk0273. www.science.org/doi/10.1126/sciadv.abk0273