Enhanced antitumor potency of polyethylene glycolylated tumor necrosis factor-alpha: A novel polymer-conjugation technique with a reversible amino-protective reagent
S. Tsunoda et al., Enhanced antitumor potency of polyethylene glycolylated tumor necrosis factor-alpha: A novel polymer-conjugation technique with a reversible amino-protective reagent, J PHARM EXP, 290(1), 1999, pp. 368-372
Citations number
22
Categorie Soggetti
Pharmacology & Toxicology
Journal title
JOURNAL OF PHARMACOLOGY AND EXPERIMENTAL THERAPEUTICS
We attempted to develop a novel method for the chemical modification of cyt
okines with synthetic polymers to increase in vivo therapeutic efficacy. A
pH-reversible amino-protective reagent, dimethylmaleic anhydride (DMMAn), w
as used for polymer conjugation of tumor necrosis factor-alpha TNF-alpha wi
th polyethylene glycol (PEG). The novel PEGylated TNF-alpha, PEG-TNF-alpha(
+), which was pretreated with DMMAn before PEGylation, had 20% to 40% highe
r specific activity than PEG-TNF-alpha(-) (not treated with DMMAn) in vitro
. Moreover, PEG-TNF-alpha(+) more potently caused tumor necrosis in Meth-A
solid tumors in mice than did PEG-TNF-alpha(-). The middle fraction (M) of
PEG-TNF-alpha(+), which was of the optimal degree of modification among PEG
-TNF-alpha(+)s with different molecular weights, caused the highest degree
of tumor hemorrhagic necrosis: 30-fold higher than native TNF-alpha and 2-f
old higher than the most potent MPEG-TNF-alpha(-) that also had nearly the
same molecular weight. Significantly, improvements in antitumor activity in
vivo were more marked than were changes in specific activity. Furthermore,
native TNF-alpha caused a dose-dependent body weight loss in mice, whereas
no obvious side effects were observed in any PEG-TNF-alpha-treated mice. T
hese results suggest that PEGylation using DMMAn is a useful for clinical c
ytokine delivery.