Grant to help doctor develop special gum
Thanks to a new grant, those battling head and neck cancers may have a new weapon in their arsenal – chewing gum.
The grant, called the LSU System’s Leveraging Innovation for Technology Transfer ( LIFT2) Program, will help LSU researchers across the state move their inventions to market.
Dr. Cherie-Ann Nathan, professor and chair of otolaryngology/head and neck surgery at the School of Medicine in Shreveport, is among the first of its grant recipients. Nathan is receiving the maximum amount possible:
$50,000, which will go toward producing a potentially cancerpreventing gum that harnesses the natural powers of curcumin, a substance found in the Indian spice turmeric.
“Curcumin is a promising anticancer nutraceutical,” Nathan said. One roadblock in her effort to apply the research to human health is that the stomach, the traditional way oral medicine enters the body, does not absorb curcumin well. Nathan hypothesized gum may be a more effective delivery system because it allows for direct mucosal absorption of curcumin, bypassing the stomach. Mucosa are the soft, moist tissues that line parts of the body like the mouth.
“In addition, oral mucosa delivery should result in significant local tissue levels for patients with head and neck cancer, thereby providing additional benefit to these patients,” Nathan said.
In other words, patients will be absorbing the drug where they need it most.
The funds from LIFT2 will allow Nathan to contract with a medicinal chemist to perfect the curcumin gum, which will deliver the substance much the same way that nicotine gum helps smokers kick the habit.
“In collaboration with Boudreaux’s Specialty Compounding Pharmacy, we have initiated development of a chewing gum that is pouched sublingually and absorbed by the oral mucosa,” Nathan said.
“Formulating the gum required a lot of effort and cost, and hence Boudreaux’s Pharmacy was unable to carry on with the research. Additional funding will allow us to formulate a curcumin chewing gum and determine whether it has significantly better bioavailability over the standard capsular formulation.”
Boudreaux’s Pharmacy is Louisiana’s first prescription compounds accredited pharmacy.
The partnership with Boudreaux’s Pharmacy will allow Nathan’s research to move closer to reality for patients. “We will collaborate with a compounding pharmacist, Patsy Angelle, who will formulate a curcumin chewing gum for prolonged mucosal absorption. The compounding pharmacy as our subcontractor will test various compositions of chewing gum with the goal to achieve the highest possible amount of curcumin in a piece of gum with optimal release rate,” Nathan said.
Other curcumin products have been on the market for years, but because they are so poorly absorbed by the stomach, the benefits that those products deliver are dubious at best. Nathan’s research should change that by placing a product on the market that can provide real benefit.
“Successful results of the study will not only demonstrate the proof of concept but would also send a strong marketing message due to scientific publication of the results,” Nathan said.
“Consumers would understand then that they get the full benefits of curcumin through improved bioavailability via transmucosal delivery. This would differentiate the product in the marketplace.
“It is important to note that very few of the current curcumin products are supported by quality research or have sound evidence of bioavailability, and yet they sell hundreds of millions of dollars of powders, tablets and capsules each year.”
The LSU LIFT2 program was created by the LSU Board of Supervisors in January to help Leverage Innovation for Technology Transfer across all the campuses of the LSU system.
“Innovations” include creative and artistic works as well as devices, drugs, software and other more traditional inventions. The grants are awarded after being scored by an external review panel on criteria related to primarily technical merit and commercial potential. Results of the research from these first grants are expected within 12 months.
“We expect that formulating the gum samples will take three months,” Nathan said. “After our subcontractor manufactures curcumin chewing gum, we will start subject accrual that should take about three months. The measurement of serum curcumin levels will be initiated immediately after participant accrual and will require several months since the protocol for curcumin level determination has multiple steps.
“This is an exciting project with great potential to prevent head and neck cancers based on our bench research involving a number of collaborators, especially fellow faculty members Dr.
Kenneth McMartin and Dr. Tammy Dugas and support from the Feist-Weiller Cancer Center,” Nathan said. “Our lab is thrilled to be one of the inaugural awardees of the LIFT2 grant.”
– Kirk Fontenot
