Research Projects

Owing to their fascinating nature, chiral systems and their effects are inevitable in nature ranging from amino acids and nucleic acids (at the molecular level) etc. to conch shells and spiral galaxies (at the structural level) etc. The biological entity needs homochiral molecules at various levels to maintain homeostasis. Thus by exploiting the enantiomeric preference of biological systems, different chiral synthetic materials can be designed for different biological applications based on chirality. Nanomaterial possesses extraordinary properties that make them an excellent candidate for healthcare applications thus inducing chirality in nanomaterials has the potential for enantiomer dependent therapeutic applications because of cell selectivity based on chirality which can lead to different biological responses such as uptake behaviour and immune response etc. On the other hand, Melanoma a type of skin cancer that occurs because of mutation in melanocytes is one of the most dangerous skin cancer types which accounts for 80 percent death rate. Additionally, metastatic melanoma is the most lethal cancer type and occurs because of very high mutation and tissue heterogeneity. Mutations in BRAF and MEK are responsible for melanoma thus therapeutic strategies (drugs/small molecules) were explored to target BRAF, and MEK and to block the mitogen-activated protein kinase (MAPK) pathway. But with most of the therapeutic strategies resistance (both intrinsic and acquired resistance) was observed either to MAPK pathway inhibitors or immune checkpoint blockade treatment. Thus innovative strategies must be explored to inhibit the drug resistance in melanoma. Since, the chirality of nanomaterials such as inorganic, ceramics, and semiconducting, etc. has been shown to modulate cellular uptake, and adhesion and also able to bind with different biomolecules such as proteins and nucleic acids, etc. differently based on enantiomers thus exploring chiral nanomaterials based nanotherapeutics against drug resistant melanoma can improve the efficacy of available treatment. Given this, in the current proposal water dispersible chiral magnetic nanomaterials (Chiral MNPs) will be prepared to deliver microRNA and siRNA, etc. inside cisplatin-resistant melanoma cells and to induce apoptosis in them. Chiral MNPs will be prepared with excellent anisotropic and structural stability. Moreover based on chirality it will be able to load nucleic acids strongly and can modulate its delivery inside skin cancer cells. Furthermore, for realtime monitoring, these chiral MNPs can generate tumor-targeted magnetic resonance imaging and can also induce apoptosis in resistant cells through hyperthermia thus creating a synergistic effect against drug resistant melanoma.