Chemotherapy-induced Alopecia - Relief Managed by Engineered Silk

ongoing

This research project, CARMESilk, aims to develop an innovative solution for preventing chemotherapy-induced alopecia (CIA) to improve cancer patients' quality of life. CIA is one of the most distressing side effects of cancer, affecting up to 65% of cancer patients undergoing treatment, causing social withdrawal, decreased self-esteem, and depression. Doxorubicin, a chemotherapeutic agent from the group of anthracyclines, is used as cancer drug in breast, ovary, bladder, and thyroid cancers, among others, and it has an incidence of CIA of 60-100%. Current therapies focus mainly on scalp cooling technology with limited availability, high cost, long-time treatment, and not recommended for children. For this reason, the development of effective CIA prevention technologies has the potential to be truly life-changing for cancer patients by alleviating the psychological distress associated with treatment and by empowering patients to maintain a sense of normalcy and control during a challenging period. CARMESilk, aims to create a novel, patient-friendly technology, silk fibroin-based, that selectively captures doxorubicin within the hair matrix, via minimally invasive routes, thereby preventing hair loss while still maintaining chemotherapy efficacy. The fabrication of a 3D bioprinted scalp model using human hair follicles will establish the way for personalized CIA prevention strategies. CARMESilk is an interdisciplinary project combining nanotechnology, materials science, and bioengineering with a patient-centric approach. The project, as a Global fellowship, will be performed over three years, in US (2 years) and in Germany (1 year), with experts in the tissue engineering field. The achievement of CARMESilk goals will represent an improvement in patients' quality of life, a proof of concept of the technology that can be applied to other chemotherapy agents, highly impacting CIA prevention during an already challenging period.