Cancer research is not a new concept by any means, but one University of Saskatchewan student is using an innovative approach that addresses oral cancer treatment through colon cancer research methods and, in doing so, is working to fill a gap in the studies of oral cancer.

Patients suffering from oral cancer are often faced with the added trauma of limited treatment options: either radiation or invasive surgery. Killing oral cancer cells in a non-invasive way is Dania Alkhani’s goal.

As a fourth-year dentistry student at the U of S, Alkhani holds a prior degree in biopharmaceutical sciences, specializing in medicinal chemistry. As such, Alkhani is no stranger to drug synthesis, a process that is critical to the creation of compounds that have the potential to revolutionize oral cancer treatment in the future.

“Synthesizing compounds means we are making certain structures that the formulated final drug will be based on, so if we have this compound that we created and it is very effective against oral cancer cells, then we take that and do further testing on it and eventually it can become a formulated drug,” Alkhani said.

Every student in the College of Dentistry at the U of S must complete a two year research project component to obtain an undergraduate degree. Alkhani decided to combine her prior education in medicinal chemistry with her current degree work in dentistry and set about researching drug synthesis options in the hope of creating something innovative.

What she found was that there was very little research surrounding synthesizing compounds for oral cancer, though she did find one U of S professor who is doing something similar.

“I read about Dr. Dimmock; he is a very well-rounded and experienced chemist and he does drug synthesis for colon cancer, and I approached him and asked whether we would be able to do this with oral cancer and make it dental related. He said if we could formulate a project and a timeline, then he would do it with me,” Alkhani said.

Jonathan Dimmock, professor emeritus in the College of Pharmacy and Nutrition, has been doing work on colon cancer, among other cancers, for several years. Along with the “invaluable assistance” of Swagatika Das and Umashankar Das — both medical doctors in the College of Pharmacy and Nutrition —  Alkhani and Dimmock set to work on filling this gap.

Dimmock speaks to the significance of their research and how it has the potential to affect positive change on multiple levels.

“First of all, there is the patient need, which I think is not trivial and needs to be pursued, that is one thing; and secondly, it gives an example of collaboration between colleges, so colleges don’t become isolated and you know, ‘You go your way and I go my way,’ which isn’t very academic at all,” Dimmock said.

Their research has already gained national recognition at the Canadian Dental Association National Conference in St. John’s N.L., which Alkhani attended on Aug. 26–29. Now, Alkhani will be representing Canada on an international level when she presents their research at the American Dental Association Conference in Washington, D.C. from Nov. 5–10.

Despite the excitement surrounding the project, Alkhani acknowledges that the cancer-killing compounds are still in the preliminary stages of development and there remains a lot of work ahead.

“We have a compound that is very potent, meaning that it is very effective in terms of killing oral cancer cells. All we have to do now is improve its selectivity, so we want to make sure that it is not very much like a chemotherapeutic type of agent, where it just kills whatever cells it can that proliferate quickly; we want to target specifically cancer cells,” Alkhani said.

It has already been several years since Alkhani first approached Dimmock about this project, and she points out that in the field of medicinal chemistry or pharmaceutical world, it can take upwards of approximately 20 years from the start to the formulation of the drug.

Although Alkhani will be graduating soon, she is prepared to see this project through and insists that students of all disciplines should never give up on the pursuit of their dreams.

“I think, in the end, that if you have a perspective and you want to go for it, then I think that you should go for it. They say to not let fear or failure stop you and I think that is where a lot of my energy is coming from now.”