A New Therapy for Sepsis: Bioengineers Develop Nanoparticles to Boost the Immune System

About the episode

Nanoparticles developed by bioengineers at Eindhoven University of Technology and immunologists at Radboud university medical center first counteract an overreaction of the immune system and then boost the immune system.

Sepsis is a life-threatening condition that kills about 3,500 people every year in the Netherlands alone. In sepsis, the immune system malfunctions due to an infection with a bacteria, fungus or virus. This disruption consists simultaneously of an excessive immune response, called hyperinflammation, and a kind of paralysis of the immune system.

In hyperinflammation, tissues become damaged and organs can fail. In immune paralysis, the immune system becomes depleted and paralyzed, which can prevent the body from properly resisting a new infection.

For years, scientists worldwide have been searching for a good therapy against sepsis. What you then need is a drug that can counter both the overreaction and the paralysis of the immune system. Not an easy job.

But researchers have now succeeded. In a petri dish with immune cells, they saw how a specific protein succeeded in combating inflammation and at the same time generating immunity.

They have now combined this protein with another endogenous protein, a so-called fusion protein. They then incorporated this newly developed fusion protein into fat particles to form a nanomedicine that interacts very specifically with immune cells to treat sepsis.

In follow-up research, the therapy should also be tested in patients and using a biotech incubator BioTrip the researchers hope to be able to quickly translate their research to the clinic.

Read more about the research here: