Apr14/08)- Important new developments have occurred in the utilization of nanotechnology to combat cancer, see radio waves & nano particles destroy cancer. |
Blood vessels surrounding tumors are leakier than those in healthy tissue, so the gold plated glass nano shells injected into the bloodstream tend to accumulate at tumor sites. These particles 'glow' when subjected to low intensity infra-red radiation, which allows the tumor area to be found by something called 'optical coherence tomography'. This involves shining low power, infrared light onto the tissue and then measuring where the scattered light bounces back from the nanoparticles. Then a higher-power infrared laser is applied to each tumor site for 3 minutes to heat the tissue.
When this was done in recent experiments at Rice University in Houston, the results were amazing. They found the tumors had been almost completely destroyed. Eighty per cent of the mice thus treated survived for more than seven weeks, while all the control mice, who did not receive the nano particles, died after three weeks. There were no signs of cancer returning in the mice who had their tumors destroyed.
At this point there is one big roadblock however...infrared light only 'lights up' the nano spheres 2mm below the skin; so its only useful for tumors near the surface, such as cervical, mouth and skin cancers. However, the research team plans to modify the nanoshells so that they work with more deeply penetrating radiation, such as X-rays.
Houston-based Nanospectra Biosciences is expected to begin trials of the nanospheres in humans sometime over the next few months.
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