Therapeutic effect of paclitaxel liposomes delivered by ultrasound with microbubbles on nude mice bearing intracranial glioblastoma xenografts monitored by bioluminescence imaging

The therapeutic effect of chemotherapy of glioblastoma is very limited due to the existence of blood-brain barrier. Focused ultrasound combined with microbubbles is an attractive method to deliver therapeutic agents to brain tissue noninvasively, transiently and locally. Paclitaxel is a potent anti-cancer agent. Thus, the objective of this study is to investigate the therapeutic effect of paclitaxel liposomes delivered by ultrasound with microbubbles on nude mice bearing intracranial glioblastoma. Sonication (frequency: 1.051 MHz, pulse length: 10 ms, PRF: 1 Hz, time: 60s, peak-rarefactional pressure: 0.6 MPa) was applied combined with lipid-shelled microbubbles (mean dia.: 1.91 μm, conc.: 4.70×10
⁹
/mL, 0.4 μL/g). Bioluminescence imaging studies were conducted for in vivo longitudinal monitoring of the glioblastoma growth of each mouse. For the group treated with paclitaxel liposomes delivered by ultrasound with microbubbles, the intracranial tumors growth was significantly retarded and the median survival time increased 25% compared to the untreated control group. The work suggested that paclitaxel liposomes delivered by ultrasound with microbubbles could improve therapeutic antitumor effect.