Molecular Activations by Ionizing Radiation for Theranostic Approaches – MAIRTA

The development of tools establishing both a diagnostic and adapted therapeutic actions with control in space and time, is crucial in the emerging field of personalized medicine. Several sophisticated photoactivable systems, able to induce specific molecular actions, have been proposed in the last few years. Nevertheless, their clinical application is highly restrained due to the impossibility to activate them by non-invasive external stimuli deeper than few millimetres below the skin.

This project aims at developing MRI-detectable theranostic compounds able to induce specific molecular actions triggered by tissues-penetrating external stimuli, without any restriction in depth, such as X-rays. In this way, complementary therapeutic effects will locally be produced and controlled. These new activation techniques are expected to bring out original theranostic approaches for the treatment of cancer.