Benchmark Technology for Cancer Treatment- NANOTECHNOLOGY

Search for newer technology has always fascinated researchers. Nano technology is a multidisciplinary field, which recently has emerged as one of the most propitious field in cancer treatment. Nano technology is definitely a medical boon for diagnosis, treatment and prevention of cancer disease. It supports and expands the scientific advances in genomic and proteomics and builds on our understanding of the molecular underpinnings of cancer and its treatment. The various nanotechnological approaches in cancer treatment have been encompassed in the current article. One of them includes localized delivery of heat and the localized imaging of biological materials through nanoparticles. The delivery may be in vitro or in vivo and is useful for the localized treatment of cancer and disorders involving over proliferation of tissue. Other approach relates to a novel process of manufacture of nanoparticles of substantially water insoluble materials from emulsions. These emulsions have the ability to form a single liquid phase upon dilution of the external phase, instantly producing dispersible solid nanoparticles. The formed nanoparticles can be used in a wide range of therapeutic treatments of cancer. Additional approach comprises of solid tumors having an acidic extra cellular environment and an altered pH gradient across their cell compartments. Nanoparticles responsive to the pH gradients are promising for cancer drug delivery. Such pH-responsive nanoparticles consist of a corona and a core, one or both of which respond to the external pH to change their soluble/insoluble or charge states, thereby they have therapeutic advantages over the conventional pH-insensitive counterparts. An alternative advancement discloses a method/system utilizing interaction of electromagnetic pulses or ultrasonic radiation with nano- and micro particles for enhancement of drug delivery in solid tumors. These particles can be attached to antibodies directed against antigens in tumor vasculature and selectively delivered to tumor blood vessel wall. A widespread understanding of these new technologies can provide essential breakthroughs in the fight against cancer.

Tiny man-made nanoparticles have been used to successfully smuggle a powerful cancer drug into tumor cells leaving healthy cells unharmed. When tested in mice, the Nan structure-based therapy was 10 times as effective at delaying tumor growth and far less toxic than the drug given alone. Researchers believe the therapy could transform many cancers from killer into chronic, treatable diseases.4,5 The major goals in designing nanoparticles as a delivery system are to control particle size, surface properties and release of pharmacologically active agents in order to achieve the site-specific action of the drug at the therapeutically optimal rate and dose regimen. Though liposome have been used as potential carriers with unique advantages including protecting drugs from degradation, targeting to site of action and reduction toxicity or side effects, their applications are limited due to inherent problems such as low encapsulation efficiency, rapid leakage of water-soluble drug in the presence of blood components and poor storage stability. On the other hand, polymeric nanoparticles offer some specific advantages over liposome. For instance, they help to increase the stability of drugs/proteins and possess useful controlled release properties. The purpose of the chemotherapy and radiation is to kill the tumor cells as these cells are more susceptible to the actions of these drugs and methods because of their growth at a much faster rate than healthy cells, at least in adults. Research efforts to improve chemotherapy over the past 25 years have led to an improvement in patient survival but there is still a need for improvement.6, 7 Current research areas include development of carriers to allow alternative dosing routes, new therapeutic targets such as blood vessels fueling tumor growth and targeted therapeutics that are more specific in their activity. Several nano biotechnologies mostly based on nanoparticles, have been used to facilitate drug delivery in cancer. The magic of nanoparticles mesmerizes everyone because of their multifunctional character and they have given us hope for the recovery from this disease. Although we are practicing better drug delivery paths into the body, we ultimately seek more accurate protocols to eradicate cancer from our society.  This review will primarily address new methods for delivering drugs, both old and new, with a focus on nano particle formulations and ones that specifically target tumors.

Nanotechnology Cancer

Welcome to Nanotechnology Cancer – a very serious website exploring the application of nanotech in cancer therapies. Basically an information website, use this as a starting point when discussing cancer therapies with your chosen medical professionals. The field of nanotechnology in medicine is growing every week, and being on top of the newest information is the best way you can arm yourself with understanding what options are available for the treatment of cancer.

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Nanoparticles Promise Increased Efficacy in Cancer Treatments

The disease that is commonly known as cancer is just uncontrolled cell growth caused by a host of factors. This growth may be triggered by several diseases, the common ground for all these diseases is the fact that they share the attribute of unrestrained growth of cells. There are more than 100 different types of cancer. The malignant cells of cancer can spread to other parts of the body through the blood and lymphatic system.

It is in a single cell than cancer begins. The body is made up of millions of cells, they divide and grow in a controlled manner to keep the body healthy. Old and damaged cells are replaced with new ones. This is a perfectly controlled process that goes on in our bodies to keep us healthy. But sometimes, things go horribly wrong. The DNA of a single cell can change or get damaged. They may mutate, producing abnormal cells that affect normal cell division and growth. When this happens, cells grow rapidly and uncontrollably. The extra cells form a mass called tumor. Cancer is really too many cells than what the body needs.

Modern technological advances witness breakthrough findings in Nanotechnology and its application in medicine. This field is particularly beneficial for the treatment of Cancer. ‘Cancer Research’ reports therapies based on nanotechnology with targeted small molecules, in treating cancer. The molecules, otherwise known as nanoparticles, improve the efficacy of chemotherapy. Abraxane is the  most commonly used nanoparticle medication. Abraxane, by virtue of being a nanoparticle bound compound, readily dissolves in water.

The many headlines that you read today on cutting edge research and breakthroughs in Oncology may be slightly misleading and could create unrealistic expectations. We are still quite a long way from effective applications of the several promising findings revealed by research. Clinical application of research findings is a typically long drawn out process, it takes years for FDA to approve and millions of dollars in trials and follow up research. Not to mention that for commercially viable production, the market has to accept it.

Besides, most promising research may suddenly find itself at a dead end with no progress in sight. This is the nature of scientific research, it takes dedication, money and time to pursue an idea till it becomes a success in real life.

The positive outcome of all this research is that considerable progress has been made in cancer research. Cancer is now more manageable than ever. We know that the brilliant minds of the research community is progressing in the right direction and hopefully the dreaded disease will soon succumb to a cure.

The Kanzius Cancer Cure ? A Medical Cinderella Story

Did you ever dream you’d be the one to find the cure for cancer? Probably not. And neither did John Kanzius, but he has set the world of cancer treatment on its ear. Let me fill you in.

John Kanzius, a former radio and television executive from Pennsylvania, was diagnosed with a rare, incurable form of non-Hodgkins Leukemia in his late fifties. In the course of his 36 rounds of chemotherapy, he was in the company of many other patients undergoing similar treatment at Texas University’s M.D. Anderson Cancer Center in Houston.

What haunted John, even more than his own situation, was the faces of the children in the Anderson cancer ward. In a CBS 60 Minutes broadcast in April 2008, John said to host Leslie Stahl, “I saw the smiles of youth and saw their spirits were broken. And you could see they were sort of asking, ‘Why can’t they do something for me?’…I still remember them holding onto their teddy bears…”

Revelation on a Sleepless Night

The side effect of chemo for John was extreme nausea and insomnia. On one of those sleepless nights, John had a true “aha” moment. He remembered his childhood when he spent a lot of time building radios from scratch and got to thinking about the power of radio waves. Intrigued, he got out of bed and went in search of a way to start testing his idea.

John’s wife Marianne woke up later to the sound of clanking metal. It was John – cutting up pie pans from the kitchen cupboard – and Marianne feared that her husband had lost his mental grip. “She felt sorry for me” commented John in later interviews.

Hot Dogs and Home Bakeware

John’s idea was a matter of brilliant simplicity: basically, radio waves are harmless to humans. But focus them on metal particles and they target the metal with intense heat. What if cancerous tumors were injected with a metallic compound and then zapped with radio waves? Would it kill the cancerous cells and leave surrounding tissue undamaged?

Without surgery?

Without chemo?

Without side effects?

Kanzius conducted the initial experiments with hot dogs – yes, the all-American Ball Park Frank. First he injected the hot dog with copper sulfite, then he aimed the radio waves at the hot dog placed in his home-made (from his wife’s pie pans) radio wave machine. Using a thermometer, he compared the temperature of the injected metallic site to the non-metallic areas of the hot dog. Lo and behold, the heat was concentrated in the metallic areas while the rest of the hot dog was cool and undamaged.

“God, maybe I’ve got something here”, exclaimed John.

Add a Pinch of Nanotechnology to the Recipe

With a viable testing idea, the trick now seemed to be how to introduce the metallic component into the cancer cells. John Kanzius had shared his theory with his surgeon, Dr. Steven Curley, a professor of surgical oncology at the Anderson Cancer Center. (That facility, by the way, was rated number one in cancer treatment by US News and World Report for four of the past six years.) As fate would have it, Dr. Curley had another patient at Anderson that could help. That patient was Rick Smalley – who had won the Nobel Prize for discovering nanoparticles made from carbon.

If you aren’t familiar with nanotechnology, it is the engineering of materials at the atomic level. One nanometer is equal to one-billionth of a meter, which means you can fit 100,000 of them on the tip of a hair. Researchers have already been able to attach metallic nanoparticles to cancer cells in mice and rabbits.

Long story short, Dr. Curley asked Smalley for some nanoparticles, explaining why he wanted them. Smalley was skeptical, telling Curley it would never work and not to get his hopes up, but he did give him a vial of nanoparticles to experiment with.

The Deep Heat Beat Goes On

Sadly, John Kanzius died on February 18, 2009 from pneumonia contracted as a result of chemotherapy. Prior to that, Rick Smalley died of lymphoma. Kanzius had hoped to live long enough to be one of the first human test subjects for the Kanzius Radio Frequency treatment, but it was not to be. Smalley had gone from initial skepticism to being one of Kanzius’ biggest supporters. One of his final wishes, expressed to Dr. Curley was “don’t stop, no matter what you do…this will change medicine forever.”

I honestly believe, as does Dr. Curley, that this is one of the most exciting developments in modern medical research. Clinical trials are set to begin in the fall of 2009. The FDA approval process is being accomplished step by step, which provides credibility and justification for further study.

Please stay tuned for more installments on the progress of research and development of the Kanzius Radio Frequency Therapy. I’ll be following all of the published details and will share them will you in an ongoing series as they come in.

In the meantime, stay aware and stay healthy. And do consult your physician before making any changes to your exercise, diet or supplement regimen.

See you next time.

Sources:

“ The Kanzius Machine: A Cancer Cure? Inventor Tells 60 Minutes He Hopes To Live Long Enough To See Machine Cure Humans”, 60 Minutes, CBSnews.com, July 20, 2008
Curley, S, M.D., “Spring 2009 Update”, John Kanzius Research Foundation, Clark, Matt, “Patents approved for cancer treatment developed by Sanibel resident”, naplesnews.com, April 3, 2009
Bruce, David, “Study shows Kanzius’ concept works”, Erie-Times News, Dec 19, 2008
Piddock, Charles, “Deep Heat – A Leukemia Patient invents a potential cure for the disease”, Current Science, Jan 9, 2009
Phillips, C, “Treatment Approach Using Radiofrequency Waves Heats Up”, NCI Cancer Bulletin, Mar 24, 2009, Vol 6/No 6

NanoSense – how Nanotechnology is improving our everyday lives – part 1

We are all now on a Fantastic Voyage

Do you remember ‘Fantastic Voyage’ – the sci-fi film in which scientists shrank a submarine and crew, injected them into a dying man , and saved him from certain death before being resized for more adventures?

Scripted by Harry Kleiner in 1966 and novelized for Bantam paperbacks 6 months later by Isaac Asimov, it spawned an animated TV series as well as a Salvador Dali painting.  Now, some 40 years later, it is seeing practical application in space and cancer medicine, as well as arguably more prosaic areas like materials science.   

Today it is called ‘Nanotechnology’ and in this series of brief articles we’ll be exploring how it is beginning to influence the world around us.  It begins by linking medical and building science.

Nanontechnology in a Nutshell

The science of Nanotechnology deals with very, very small structures, usually less than 100 nanometers in diameter.  With 1 nanometer being 1 billionth of a meter, you’ll get some idea of how small this is by imagining the earth as having a diameter of 1 meter with 1 billion apple pips (seeds) inside it.  Or, looked at another way, the dimension ratio between a meter and a nanometer is the same as between earth and an apple.  

For the mathematical purists among you 1nm = 10 -09 m, i.e. 1/1,000,000,000

Einstein might have imagined this by building a train wagon in his mind, giving this a length, width and height of 1nm and then fitting this inside a few hundreds of hydrogen molecules.

For scientists and technologists this has special interest because at this size materials reveal unique properties when compared not only with ordinary bulk sized materials, but also their molecules. In essence they take advantages of properties that neither individual molecules nor molecular structures exhibit.

For example, if we could see it a gold nanoparticle deposited on a surface would appear purple, rather than shiny and ‘golden’ that we presently recognize.

Again, if you can imagine a molecule as having a very small atom at it’s core with many electrons spinning around this, all held together by the power of attraction, then you’ll get some idea of the scale of things they are working with.

Another example of particular interest to scientists and technologists currently working, or considering working  in this area is that of Titanium Dioxide (titania).  This is used in paints to give that extremely white, opaque finish.  But nanonised titania is completely transparent.    


Nanomedicine

Drug discovery, drug delivery and continuing miniaturization are three areas in which medicine has joined our Fantastic Voyage. Long-term, in-vivo diagnostics and more targeted therapy without side effects are on the horizon. Being able to look for drug targets on a cellular rather than multi-cellular, or tissue basis can be much more precise. Biosensors and molecule probes allow cellular processes to be examined and drug development aimed at molecular targets.

Latest treatment techniques already allow a drug to be put inside a nanoparticle, like a carbon or silicon nanotube.  This might also hold antibodies to bind the drug, enabling smaller doses to be delivered direct to the targeted tissue. Various nanoparticle drug formulations are already being investigated in animal models and early stage clinical studies in humans.

Treating Cancer & Diabetes

Using such nanobots, i.e. vehicles for carrying treatments, radioactive generators are already being injected.  Going direct to the infected tissue these give small radiation doses to treat the cancer without all the unpleasant side effects of radiation therapy.   

By encapsulating pancreatic cells inside nanoparticles they can be kept alive to secrete insulin without being attacked by antibodies.  It’s not a cure for diabetes, but does avoid unpleasant injections, delivering the insulin in a natural way.

Brain Tumors and Space Medicine

Neuroscientists are developing nanoparticles to cross the brain-blood barrier and could be treating brain tumors within a couple of years.  Meanwhile NASA is pursuing remote diagnostics and treatments for space travelers, like radiation damaged cells.  As Cecilia Haberzettl, founder and president of TechnoMed Strategic Partners, recently wrote in Nanotechnology

“When a cell is damaged by radiation it expresses different proteins on its surface. The nanobot would detect those proteins and then repair the cell, either by giving it antioxidants or by enhancing the natural mechanisms of DNA repair by some technique yet to be defined. Or, if the damage is severe, the nanobot could trigger the cell to die. All of that could happen while the astronauts are up in space, while avoiding communication delays due to the distance from the Earth.”

Next Time

From treating humans to treating the buildings in which they live, how nanotechnology is being used in materials science and how a Greek entrepreneurial scientist has developed products that protect surfaces from stains, moulds, and fungus.  Personally recognised by Bill Gates, founder of Microsoft, for the innovative nature of their work, they are undoubtedly delivering cutting edge nanotech inventions and technical excellence to improve and add value to a wide range of everyday products.

Look out for the next article to learn how this little company is experiencing burgeoning international growth by delivering massive advances and technical excellence in surface protections.