When the city of Emeryville, California decided to urbanize a couple of years ago, Alnis BioSciences, which had laboratories in one of the areas to be revitalized, needed to move.
“We were looking for a place to move because the city was tearing down our warehouse to encourage urban renewal and build a mall,” says Stephen Barry, company president.
Alnis needed a high-tech lab for drug research, and also wanted proximity to top universities and scientists versed in drug delivery and nanotechnology. As a drug development company focused on treating cancer as well as infectious and inflammatory diseases, Alnis benefits from collaborations with researchers in a several fields, ranging from oncology, to radiology, to biochemical engineering and chemistry.
After looking locally in the San Francisco area, as well as checking out facilities in cities such Boston and Houston, Barry chose the BioVenture Center, a biotechnology business incubator organized by Becton, Dickinson and Company in Research Triangle Park (RTP). Here, Alnis scientists develop drug formulas using state-of-the-art lab equipment and collaborate with scientists at Becton Dickinson and with scientists at other RTP companies and the area’s universities.
Barry says the location’s proximity to Duke’s leading cancer treatment facilities and UNC-Chapel Hill’s Carolina Center of Cancer Nanotechnology Excellence was one of the many reasons Alnis BioSciences chose North Carolina. “It was about getting back to people and places where we could collaborate. There’s a great collegial atmosphere here―that was a really big draw along with all the other pharmaceutical companies in RTP,” he says.
In many fields, especially drug delivery research, biotechnology works hand in hand with nanotechnology, the study of material at the level of atoms and molecules―the nanometer level (one billionth of a meter).
North Carolina ranks third in the nation in the number of biotechnology companies, according to a study by Ernst and Young. For many companies, particularly small research companies like Alnis, this concentration of biotechnology activity often translates directly into greater collaboration with top thinkers in the field. North Carolina’s focus in biotechnology is a big draw for many companies, including those in related fields such nanotechnology and information technology.
This convergence of these fields is creating a wave of new, innovative drug delivery methods in North Carolina and all over the world. When nanotechnology is combined with other branches of science, the potential for new technologies increases dramatically. Experts predict that nanotechnology will become an enabling technology, meaning it will help further develop and renew already established fields of science and technology as well as whole industries.
Alnis melds biotechnology with nanotechnology to find new ways to deliver cancer drugs. The problem with many current cancer treatments, Barry says, is that they send medicines with substantial toxicity throughout the body―to tumors as well as healthy tissue. “We want to deliver more chemotherapy to tumors and less to healthy tissue,” he says.
The company is researching a way to treat cancer using nanoparticles, called NanoGels. These nanoparticles can act as a shell, encasing the medicine while it circulates in the bloodstream until it reaches the tumor. “When the chemotherapy is in the NanoGel, it is hydrophilic, meaning it’s not sticky,” says Barry. “That way, it doesn’t stick to healthy tissue as it circulates in the body.” Special targeting agents on the outside of the nanoparticle identify tumors by their signature structures and stick to the cancerous tissue.
However, once attached to the tumor, the nanoparticles release the medicine and then disintegrate. This way, the tumor gets the medicine and the rest of the body remains free from the powerful medication, in turn reducing side effects. NanoGels are currently undergoing preclinical development.
Most recently, Alnis has encapsulated magnetic material within NanoGels to create MagNaGel particles. With magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), Alnis plans to track MagNaGel particles in the body as they accumulate in cancerous tumors. Then, by alternating magnetic fields, the magnetic nanoparticles will heat, enabling the cancer medicine to better penetrate the tumor.
Barry says he expects nanotechnology to change the way we treat diseases. “It’s our belief that you will ultimately see revolutionary improvements in cancer treatments and I think you will see multiple nanotech cancer drugs entering clinical trials in the next few years,” he says.
So in more ways one, the urban renewal in California―tearing down the warehouse used by Alnis BioSciences―enabled a different kind of renewal on the opposite side of the nation. In its new home in North Carolina, the small biotech/nanotech company now is more vibrant than ever, finding new partners for collaboration and novel avenues for cancer research and treatments.
Research at Alnis BioSciences is funded in part through a contract with the National Cancer Institute.
