Christian Poulie

α-Radiation Therapy of Antibiotics Resistant Infections

Global health is at risk due to increasing antibiotic resistance. So far, the treatment options of these infections are restricted to very few medical interventions – often with serious side effects. Throughout this project, we will develop a new strategy to kill pathogens that are resistant to current antibiotics. We will employ targeted radionuclide therapy, which is ideal for killing these pathogens, due to double stranded DNA breaks, caused by α-particles. Additionally, the α-particles range in tissue is only a few μm, which limits unwanted cytotoxicity to the patient. The novel radiopharmaceuticals will be labelled with a pure α-particle emitter. The compounds will be screened in various cell assays. Compounds with a good performance will be tested in animal models. This approach offers the possibility to treat antibiotic resistant infections in a new and effective way and improves the chance of survival of infected patients.

Mentors:

Basic mentor: Associate Professor Matthias Manfred Herth, Department of Drug Design and Pharmacology, University of Copenhagen

Clinical mentor: Professor Andreas Kjær, Department of Clinical Physiology, Nuclear Medicine and PET, Rigshospitalet