Main description:

Electroporation-Based Therapies for Cancer reviews electroporation-based clinical studies in hospitals for various cancer treatments, including melanomas, head and neck cancers, chest wall breast carcinomas, and colorectal cancers, as well as research studies in the lab using cell lines, primary cells, and animals.

Cancer kills about one American per minute, amounting to over 500,000 deaths in the United States and millions, worldwide, each year. There is a critical need for safe, effective, and affordable alternative treatment modalities, especially for inoperable, recurring, and chemo-resistant cancers, that do not respond well to current treatment regimen. An electrical-pulse-mediated, enhanced drug delivery technique known as electroporation is one way to effectively treat these patients.

This technique is especially suitable for low- and middle-income countries, where lack of infrastructure and resources leads to cancer diagnoses at late stages. This quick, safe, effective, economical, out-patient-based technique is a boon to these patients for palliative and other care with enhanced quality of life. This book features discussions by interdisciplinary authors-including practicing oncological surgeons, medical professionals, and academic and other researchers-of the basics and clinical medical applications of electroporation.

Contents:

Dedication
Epigraph
List of figures and tables

Figures
Tables

Acknowledgments
About the editor
About the contributors
Introduction

Motivation:
Organization of the chapters
Audience

1. Electrochemotherapy - A novel cancer treatment

Abstract:
1.1 Why electrochemotherapy?
1.2 References

2. Clinical electrochemotherapy for chest wall recurrence from breast cancer

Abstract:
2.1 Introduction
2.2 Scope of the problem
2.3 Treatment options for chest wall recurrence
2.4 Clinical experience with electrochemotherapy
2.5 Electrochemotherapy: the engineer's point of view
2.6 Conclusions and perspectives
2.7 Acknowledgments
2.8 References

3. Clinical electrochemotherapy for advanced superficial melanoma

Abstract:
3.1 Introduction
3.2 Therapeutic options in advanced melanoma
3.3 Clinical experience with electrochemotherapy
3.4 Conclusions and perspectives
3.5 References

4. Low and high voltage electrochemotherapy for breast cancer: an in vitro model study

Abstract:
4.1 Introduction
4.2 Anatomy of the breast and its cancer
4.3 Drug delivery issues
4.4 Chemotherapy issues
4.5 Common adverse effects of anticancer drugs
4.6 Anticancer drug resistance
4.7 Electroporation and electrochemotherapy
4.8 Materials and methods
4.9 Results and discussion
4.10 Conclusions
4.11 Acknowledgments
4.12 References

5. Why electroporation is a useful technique for cancer treatments

Abstract:
5.1 Introduction
5.2 What is electroporation (EP)?
5.3 Irreversible electroporation (IRE)
5.4 Electrochemotherapy (ECT)
5.5 Example of a hydrophilic agent used with electrochemotherapy
5.6 Local delivery by intratumoral injection versus systemic administration in EP
5.7 Prerequisites for effective ECT
5.8 ECT can overcome multidrug resistance
5.9 Intense nanosecond pulsed electric fields (nsPEFs)
5.10 Electroporation therapies can produce a reduction in blood flow to tumors
5.11 Properties of solid tumors
5.12 Why do tumors have increased susceptibility to (EP) permeabilizing pulses, compared to that of normal tissue?
5.13 Membrane composition and mineral concentrations of cancer cells affect the electrical properties
5.14 Oxygen levels vary in solid tumors
5.15 Glycolysis and pH
5.16 Conclusions
5.17 References

6. Electrically-enhanced proliferation control of cancer-stem-cells-like adult human mesenchymal stem cells - a novel modality of treatment

Abstract:
6.1 Introduction - stem cells
6.2 Mesenchymal stem cells
6.3 Cancer and cancer stem cells
6.4 Electrochemotherapy
6.5 In-vitro study of ECT on MSC
6.6 Materials and methods
6.7 Results and analyses
6.8 Discussion and conclusions
6.9 Future directions
6.10 Acknowledgments
6.11 References

7. An in vitro study of electroporation of leukemia and cervical cancer cells

Abstract:
7.1 Introduction
7.2 Materials and methods
7.3 Results and analysis
7.4 Conclusions
7.5 Acknowledgments
7.6 References

8. Low voltage nanosecond electroporation for breast cancer treatment: an in vitro study

Abstract:
8.1 Introduction
8.2 Materials and methods
8.3 Results and analysis
8.4 Discussion and conclusions
8.5 Acknowledgment
8.6 References

9. Low and high voltage electroporation of in vitro human ovarian adenocarcinoma cells

Abstract:
9.1 Introduction
9.2 Materials and methods
9.3 Results and analysis
9.4 Discussion and summary
9.5 Acknowledgments
9.6 References

10. Irreversible electroporation: a drug-free cancer treatment

Abstract:
10.1 Introduction
10.2 Materials and methods
10.3 Results and analyses
10.4 Discussion and conclusions
10.5 Acknowledgments
10.6 References

11. Targeted delivery of siRNA and other difficult to transfect molecules using electroporation: current status and future scope

Abstract:
11.1 Introduction
11.2 siRNA - a potential therapeutic tool for cancer treatment
11.3 siRNA-Gene targets in Cancer
11.4 Delivery of siRNA
11.5 Electroporation-based siRNA delivery
11.6 Summary and Future Scope
11.7 References

12. Electric field distribution study of breast tumors

Abstract:
12.1 Introduction
12.2 Electric field concepts
12.3 Electrical properties of cells
12.4 Finite element modeling
12.5 Electric field intensity used in clinical electrochemotherapy
12.6 Electrodes used
12.7 Thermal effects of electroporation
12.8 Simulation
12.9 Breast modeling
12.10 Results and discussion
12.11 Conclusions
12.12 References

Index