Biotech Startup Combines Nanotechnology with Advanced Polymers to Help Researchers Study Invasive Brain Tumor Cells

Nanofibers Solutions, a Central Ohio biotech startup, is helping cancer researchers at Ohio State create molecule-sized nanofibers that mimic the structure of white matter in the brain in order to better predict the migratory behaviors of malignant tumor cells.  By combining nanotechnology with a medically approved polymer, researchers can produce a more natural, three-dimensional environment for studying cancer cells outside the brain and can test potential drugs for treating the disease. 

Malignant brain tumor cells often migrate into surrounding healthy brain tissue, making these tumors extremely difficult or impossible to cure even after surgery, radiation and chemotherapy. These highly migratory cells follow fibrous tracks that are part of the brain’s neural topography. Migratory cells resist clinical treatments and often produce a fatal tumor recurrence.

John Lannutti and Jed Johnson, both professors of materials science and engineering at Ohio State’s College of Engineering, are co-inventors and co-founders of Nanofiber Solutions.  The company was the first place winner in the OSU/Deloitte Business Plan competition in 2009 and received a TechGenesis grant to further develop and commercialize the technology. 

For more on this story, see the press release and video from OSU