Nanotrain For Targeted Cancer Drug Transport

University of Florida researchers have developed a “DNA nanotrain” that fast-tracks its payload of cancer-fighting drugs and bioimaging agents to tumor cells deep within the body. The nanotrain’s ability to cost-effectively deliver high doses of drugs to precisely targeted cancers and other medical maladies without leaving behind toxic nano-clutter has been the elusive Holy Grail for scientists studying the teeny-tiny world of DNA nanotechnology.
nano_train-nanochain

Most nanotechnology relies on a nanoparticle approach, and the particles are made of inorganic materials; after they’ve been used as a carrier for the drug, they’ll be left inside the body,” said the study’s lead investigator, Weihong Tan, a UF distinguished professor of chemistry, professor of physiology and functional genomics, and a member of the UF Shands Cancer Center and the UF Genetics Institute. “Compared to existing nanostructures, our nanotrain is easier and cheaper to make, is highly specific to cancer cells, has a lot of drug-loading power and is very much biocompatible.

DNA nanotechnology holds great promise as a new way to deliver chemotherapy directly to cancer cells, but until now, scientists have not been able to direct nanotherapies to consistently differentiate cancer cells from healthy ones. Other limiting factors include high costs, too-small amounts of drugs delivered and potential toxic side effects.
Source: http://news.ufl.edu/

Nano-hitchhikers Track Stem Cells Entering Heart

The promise of repairing damaged hearts through regenerative medicine — infusing stem cells into the heart in the hope that these cells will replace worn out or damaged tissue — has yet to meet with clinical success. But a highly sensitive visualization technique developed by Stanford University School of Medicine scientists may help speed that promise’s realization.
stem_cell

All stem cell researchers want to get the cells to the target site, but up until now they’ve had to shoot blindly,” said Gambhir, who is also the Virginia and D.K. Ludwig Professor in Cancer Research and director of the Molecular Imaging Program at Stanford. “With this new technology, they wouldn’t have to. For the first time, they would be able to observe in real time exactly where the stem cells they’ve injected are going and monitor them afterward. If you inject stem cells into a person and don’t see improvement, this technique could help you figure out why and tweak your approach to make the therapy better.”

Source: http://med.stanford.edu/

Nanoparticles Mimic Cholesterol Transporter and Attack Lymphoma

C. Shad Thaxton, of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center at Northwestern and member of the Northwestern University Center of Cancer Nanotechnology Excellence, and Leo Gordon, of Northwestern’s Feinberg School of Medicine, led research team that developed a biomimetic High-density lipoprotein HDL – nanostructure. HDL is well-known for its role in protecting the body from developing coronary artery disease, but HDL also helps lymphomas and other cancers acquire the large amounts of cholesterol they need to maintain the structure of their cell membranes as they grow rapidly. Researchers at Northwestern University have taken advantage of this dependency on HDL to create an HDL-mimicking nanoparticle that starves lymphoma cells of cholesterol, triggering them to commit programmed cell death without the use of any other anticancer agent.To create their biomimetic HDL nanostructures, the researchers start with spherical gold nanoparticles that are five nanometers in diameter and add the human protein ApoA1 and two phospholipids found in native HDLs.
nanoparticle mimics cholesterol

Drs. Thaxton and Gordon and their collaborators then treated mice with human lymphomas with the biomimetic HDL nanoparticles. This treatment stopped tumor growth when the tumors were derived from lymphoma cells.

Source: http://nano.cancer.gov/

Nano-Capsules Kill Cancer Cells

How to be more precise and less invasive when treating cancer tumors? A team led by researchers from the UCLA -University of California Los Angeles- Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science has developed a degradable nanoscale shell to carry proteins to cancer cells and stunt the growth of tumors without damaging healthy cells. Yi Tang, a professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering and a member of the California NanoSystems Institute at UCLA, reports developing tiny shells composed of a water-soluble polymer that safely deliver a protein complex to the nucleus of cancer cells to induce their death. The shells, which at about 100 nanometers are roughly half the size of the smallest bacterium, degrade harmlessly in non-cancerous cells.
nanocapsule
Delivering a large protein complex such as apoptin to the innermost compartment of tumor cells was a challenge, but the reversible polymer encapsulation strategy was very effective in protecting and escorting the cargo in its functional form,” said Muxun Zhao, lead author of the research and a graduate student in chemical and biomolecular engineering at UCLA.
Source: http://newsroom.ucla.edu/

Gold Nanoparticles To Kill Tumors

Scientists at the Uninersity of Missouri -MU-, Oak Ridge National Laboratory and the University of Tennessee at Knoxville created a gold nanoparticle that can transport powerful radioactive particles directly to tumors for treatment. We’ve all heard that “it’s not wise to use a cannon to kill a mosquito.” But what if you could focus the cannon’s power to concentrate power into a tiny space? In a new study, University of Missouri researchers have demonstrated the ability to harness powerful radioactive particles and direct them toward small cancer tumors while doing negligible damage to healthy organs and tissues.
Gold-Nanoparticle-150x135
The nanoparticle that the research team led by David Robertson, director of research at the MU Research Reactor, created is multi-layered. At the core, lies the element, actinium, surrounded by four layers of material. Robertson’s team then coated the nanoparticle with gold.

If you think of beta particles as slingshots or arrows, alpha particles would be similar to cannon balls,” said J. David Robertson, “Scientists have had some successes using alpha particles recently, but nothing that can battle different cancers. For example, a current study using radium-223 chloride, which emits alpha particles, has been fast-tracked by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration because it has been shown to be effective in treating bone cancer. However, it only works for bone cancer because the element, radium, is attracted to the bone and stays there. We believe we have found a solution that will allow us to target alpha particles to other cancer sites in the body in an effective manner.”
Source: http://munews.missouri.edu/

Make Cancer Cells Starve to Death

How do you annihilate lymphoma without using any drugs? Starve it to death by depriving it of what appears to be a favorite food: HDL cholesterol. Northwestern Medicine® researchers discovered this with a new nanoparticle that acts like a secret double agent. It appears to the cancerous lymphoma cell like a preferred meal – natural HDL. But when the particle engages the cell, it actually plugs it up and blocks cholesterol from entering. Deprived of an essential nutrient, the cell eventually dies. A new study by C. Shad Thaxton, MD, assistant professor in urology, and Leo Gordon, MD, Abby and John Friend Professor of Oncology Research, shows that synthetic HDL nanoparticles killed B-cell lymphoma, the most common form of the disease, in cultured human cells, and inhibited human B-cell lymphoma tumor growth in mice.
gold nanoparticles_250
Northwestern Medicine® researchers have discovered a new nanoparticle that acts like a secret double agent. The nanoparticle – originally developed by C. Shad Thaxton, MD, as a possible therapy for heart disease – closely mimics the size, shape, and surface chemistry of natural HDL particles. But it has one key difference: a five nanometer gold particle at its core. After it attaches to a lymphoma cell, the gold particle’s spongy surface helps to kill it.
This has the potential to eventually become a nontoxic treatment for B-cell lymphoma which does not involve chemotherapy,” said Gordon, a co-corresponding author with Thaxton on the paper. “It’s an exciting preliminary finding.” The paper was published on Monday, January 21, in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.
Source: http://www.feinberg.northwestern.edu/

Reducing Lengh Makes Carbon Nanotube Non Toxic

Safety fears about carbon nanotubes, due to their structural similarity to asbestos, have been alleviated following research showing that reducing their length removes their toxic properties. A University College London - UCL -team, showed evidence that the asbestos-like reactivity and pathogenicity reported for long, pristine nanotubes can be completely alleviated if their surface is modified and their effective length is reduced as a result of chemical treatment. The finding has been published in in the journal Angewandte Chemie.
carbon_nanotube_small_sq
The apparent structural similarity between carbon nanotubes and asbestos fibres has generated serious concerns about their safety profile and has resulted in many unreasonable proposals of a halt in the use of these materials even in well-controlled and strictly regulated applications, such as biomedical ones. What we show for the first time is that in order to design risk-free carbon nanotubes both chemical treatment and shortening are needed”, said Professor Kostas Kostarelos, Chair of Nanomedicine at the UCL School of Pharmacy who led the research with his long term collaborators Doctor Alberto Bianco of the CNRS in Strasbourg, France and Professor Maurizio Prato of the University of Trieste, Italy.
Source: http://www.ucl.ac.uk/

How To Detect The Smallest Virus Particle

A research team from the City University of New York -CUNY-, has developped a method to detect a single virus particle, which is in the size range of a nanoparticle. (About 80,000 nanoparticles side by side would have the same width as a human hair). Their work has made it possible, for the first time, to detect the smallest virus particle. Since even one viral particle can represent a deadly threat, the research likely will make an important contribution to ongoing research on early detection of such diseases as AIDS and cancer. The team’s breakthrough involved adding a nano-antenna to the light-sensing device to enhance the signal.

The idea that light can ‘sense’ the presence of nanoparticles and respond to their arrival was groundbreaking,” Dr. Kolchenko from CUNY says. “Since all the deadliest viruses and most interesting biological molecules – proteins and DNA — belong to the nano world, our research proved truly innovative, and its promise is almost unlimited in terms of detecting pretty much everything of interest in life sciences,” he adds.
Let’ds remind that a Norwegian team has found one month ago a way to measure individual particle in the blood. SEE former article : http://www.nanocomputer.com/?p=4393
Source: http://www1.cuny.edu/

Color In Brown Your White Hair For Good

A french team led by Philippe Walter from University Pierre et Marie CurieUPMC- in Paris , France explain that gold nanoparticles — 40,000-60,000 of which could fit across the width of a human hair — are a hot topic. Scientists are exploring uses, ranging from electronics and sensors to medical diagnostic tests and cancer treatments. Gold nanoparticles have been deposited on hair for use as electrodes, and gold nanoparticles had been used to dye wool. Walter’s team looked at a new use — dyeing hair, inspired by the ancient Greeks’ and Romans’ use of another metal, lead, to color their hair. In their discovery scientists are reporting the first synthesis of gold nanoparticles inside human hairs. Their study appears in ACS’ journal Nano Letters.

Gold nanoparticles darken hair after treatment for one day, center,
and 16 days, right (untreated hairs, left).

After soaking white hairs in a solution of a gold compound, the hairs turned pale yellow and then darkened to a deep brown. Using an electron microscope, the scientists confirmed that the particles were forming inside the hairs’ central core cortex. The color remained even after repeated washings.
Source: http://portal.acs.org

5 Times More Efficient Against a Childhood Cancer

In a world-first, researchers from the Australian Centre for Nanomedicine at the University of New South Wales (UNSW) in Sydney – Australia – have developed a nanoparticle that could improve the effectiveness of chemotherapy for neuroblastoma by a factor of five. Neuroblastoma is an aggressive childhood cancer that often leaves survivors with lingering health problems due to the high doses of chemotherapy drugs required for treatment. Anything that can potentially reduce these doses is considered an important development. The UNSW researchers developed a non-toxic nanoparticle that can deliver and release nitric oxide (NO) to specific cancer cells in the body. The findings of their in vitro experiments have been published in the journal Chemical Communications.

When we injected the chemo drug into the neuroblastoma cells that had been pre-treated with our new nitric oxide nanoparticle we needed only one-fifth the dose,” says co-author Dr Cyrille Boyer from the School of Chemical Engineering at UNSW.
By increasing the effectiveness of these chemotherapy drugs by a factor of five, we could significantly decrease the detrimental side-effects to healthy cells and surrounding tissue.

Source: http://www.eurekalert.org

Gene Delivery Vehicle Goes To The Heart Of The Target.

Many types of tumor form a compact mass, like the phalanx formation of Greek antiquity. And although many drugs are known to be toxic to cancer cells, they are often unable to percolate into the inner recesses of the tumor. Upon intravenous administration, for instance, cytotoxic drugs may only be able to penetrate the outermost layers of a solid tumor. A team led by Ludwig Maximilians Universitat Munchen LMU-Germany – pharmacologist Dr Manfred Ogris has now developed a new type of gene delivery vehicle, which is designed to open up a route through the vascular network that supplies the tumor so that drugs can reach their target. A new strategy employing gene therapy could provide a solution to this problem. The idea is to deliver the gene for TNFα directly and specifically to the tumor cells. If this worked, the tumor cells themselves could produce and secrete the cytokine, ensuring that its local concentration becomes sufficiently high to permeabilize the blood vessels only in the immediate vicinity of the tumor.

We first designed a version of the TNFα gene that allows for the production of large amounts of the protein,” Dr. Baowei Su, first author on the study, explains.
Source: http://www.en.uni-muenchen.de/

Nanoparticule Delivers 3 Times More Doses Against Bladder Cancer

A team of University of California Davis – UC Davis - scientists has shown in experimental mouse models that a new drug delivery system allows for administration of three times the maximum tolerated dose of a standard drug therapy for advanced bladder cancer, leading to more effective cancer control without increasing toxicity. The delivery system consists of specially designed nanoparticles that home in on tumor cells while carrying the anti-cancer drug paclitaxel. The same delivery system also was successfully used to carry a dye that lights up on imaging studies, making it potentially useful for diagnostic purposes.

We have developed a novel, multifunctional nanotherapeutics platform that can selectively and efficiently deliver both diagnostic and therapeutic agents to bladder tumors,” said Chong-Xian Pan, principal investigator of the study and associate professor of hematology and oncology at UC Davis. “Our results support its potential to be used for both diagnostic and therapeutic applications for advanced bladder cancer.”

Source: http://www.ucdmc.ucdavis.edu/publish/news/cvc/7104

Self-Assembled Nanoparticle for chemotherapy

Excitement around the potential for targeted nanoparticles (NPs) that can be controlled by stimulus outside of the body for cancer therapy has been growing over the past few years. More specifically, there has been considerable attention around near-infrared NIR light as an ideal method to stimulate nanoparticles from outside the body. NIR is minimally absorbed by skin and tissue, has the ability to penetrate deep tissue in a noninvasive way and the energy from NIR light can be converted to heat by gold nanomaterials for effective thermal ablation of diseased tissue.

In new research from Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH), researchers describe the design and effectiveness of a first-of-its-kind, self assembled, multi-functional, NIR responsive gold nanorods that can deliver a chemotherapy drug specifically targeted to cancer cells and selectively release the drug in response to an external beam of light while creating heat for synergistic thermo-chemo mediated anti-tumor efficacy. The study is electronically published in Angewandte Chemie International Edition.

Source: http://www.brighamandwomens.org

Non-Invasive Treatment For Deep Cancer

PhotoDynamic therapy (PDT) as a non-invasive treatment of cancer is limited by the penetration depth of visible light needed for its activation. A Bioengineering team from the National University of Singapore – NUS - led by Associate Professor Zhang Yong has invented a novel method which will pave the way for PDT to treat deep-seated cancer as well. The researchers also revealed how they have been able to control gene expression – the release of certain proteins in our body – using their nanoparticles which could convert NIR (Near Infrared) light to UV light (visible light needed for effective activation).
NIR is a safe light as opposed to UV light, which could cause damage to cells. NIR can also penetrate deeper into tissues to target tumours.

Near Infrared Light -NIR-, besides being non-toxic, is able to penetrate deeper into our tissues. When NIR reaches the desired places in the body of the patient, the nanoparticles which we have invented, are able to convert the NIR back to UV light (upconversion) to effectively activate the genes in the way desired – by controlling the amount of proteins expressed each time, when this should take place, as well as how long it should take place” explains Prof Zhang.

Source: http://www.eng.nus.edu.sg/ero/announcement/web-zhangyong0912.pdf

How Double-Strands RNA Is Remodeled Inside Cells?

Molecular biologists at The University of Texas at Austin have solved one of the mysteries of how double-stranded RNA is remodeled inside cells in both their normal and disease states. The discovery will have great implications for treating cancer and viruses in humans. They use chemical energy to clamp down and pry open RNA strands, thereby enabling the formation of new structures. This remodeling of RNA is essential to the basic functioning of cells.

If you want to couple fuel energy to mechanical work to drive strand separation, this is a very versatile mechanism,” said co-author Alan Lambowitz, the Nancy Lee and Perry R. Bass Regents Chair in Molecular Biology in the College of Natural Sciences and director of the Institute for Cellular and Molecular Biology. “These findings could have far-reaching implications for our ability to control the activities of proteins in this class when their functions go awry in disease states,” comments Michael Bender, program director in the Division of Genetics and Developmental Biology at the National Institutes of Health, which partially funded the work.
Source: http://web5.cns.utexas.edu/news/2012/09/ancient-enzymes-function-like-nanopistons-to-unwind-rna/

RNA Nanotechnology Shows Promise To Treat Cancers

A new study by University of Kentucky -UK- researchers shows promise for developing ultrastable RNA nanoparticles that may help treat cancer and viral infections by regulating cell function and binding to cancers without harming surrounding tissue. The study demonstrated that regulation of cellular functions progressively increased with the increasing number of functional modulesin the nanoparticle.

A major problem with cancer treatments is the ability to more directly and specifically deliver anti-cancer drugs to cancer metastases,” Evers said. “Using the nanotechnology approach that Peixuan Guo and his group have devised may allow us to more effectively treat cancer metastasis with fewer side effects compared to current chemotherapy.
The study, published in Nano Today , was carried out in the laboratory of Peixuan Guo, the William S. Farish Endowed Chair in Nanobiotechnology in the UK College of Pharmacy and the UK Markey Cancer Center, in collaboration with Dr. Mark Evers, director of the UK Markey Cancer Center.
Source: http://uknow.uky.edu/content/new-study-shows-promise-using-rna-nanotechnology-treat-cancers-and-viral-infections

New Nanoparticle Shrinks Tumors

MIT researchers have developed RNA-delivering nanoparticles that allow for rapid screening of new drug targets in mice. In their first mouse study, done with researchers at Dana-Farber Cancer Institute and the Broad Institute, they showed that nanoparticles that target a protein known as ID4 can shrink ovarian tumors. The nanoparticle system, described in the online edition of Science Translational Medicine, could relieve a significant bottleneck in cancer-drug development, says Sangeeta Bhatia, the John and Dorothy Wilson Professor of Health Sciences and Technology and a member of the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT.

In a study of mice with ovarian tumors, the researchers found that treatment with RNAi nanoparticles eliminated most of the tumors.

Source : http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/new-nanoparticules-shrink-tumors-in-mice-0816.html

Supramolecular Nanochemistry To Fight Tumors

Researchers at Brigham and Women's Hospital (BWH), affiliate to Harvard Medical School,  are the first to report a new approach that integrates rational drug design with supramolecular nanochemistry in cancer treatment. Supramolecular chemistry is the development of complex chemical systems using molecular building blocks. The researchers utilized such methods to create nanoparticles that significantly enhanced antitumor activity with decreased toxicity in breast and ovarian cancer models

 

"This work is effectively moving beyond using nanotechnology as drug 'delivery' vehicles to reengineering drugs themselves so that they become nanomedicines." said Shiladitya Sengupta, PhD, MSc, BWH associate bioengineer, and senior study author . 

Source: http://www.brighamandwomens.org/about_bwh/publicaffairs/news/pressreleases/PressRelease.aspx?PageID=%201212

Nanopores to Detect DNA Damage, Prevent Mutation

Scientists from the University of Utah have adapted the “nanopore” method to find DNA damage that can lead to mutations and disease. Indeed sequencing DNA – decipher genetic blueprints – is faster and cheaper by passing strands of the genetic material through molecule-sized poresStrands of DNA are made of “nucleotide bases” known as A, T, G and C. Some stretches of DNA strands are genes.The new method looks for places where a base is missing, known as an “abasic site,” one of the most frequent forms of damage in the 3-billion-base human genome or genetic blueprint. This kind of DNA damage happens 18,000 times a day in a typical cell as we are exposed to everything from sunlight to car exhaust. Most of the damage is repaired, but sometimes it leads to a gene mutation and ultimately disease.

 

We’re using this technique and synthetic organic chemistry to be able to see a damage site as it flies through the nanopore,” says Henry White, distinguished professor and chair of chemistry at the University of Utah and senior coauthor of the new study.

 

Source: http://unews.utah.edu/news_releases/utah-chemists-use-nanopores-to-detect-dna-damage/

Nanoparticles To Cure Myeloma

One of the difficulties doctors face in treating multiple myeloma (MM) comes from the fact that cancer cells of this type start to develop resistance to the leading chemotherapeutic treatment, doxorubicin, when they adhere to tissue in bone marrow. Now researchers from the University of Notre Dame have engineered nanoparticles that show great promise for the treatment of the MM, an incurable cancer of the plasma cells in bone marrow.

The nanoparticles are coated with a special peptide that targets a specific receptor on the outside of multiple myeloma cells. These receptors cause the cells to adhere to bone marrow tissue and turn on the drug resistance mechanisms. But through the use of the newly developed peptide, the nanoparticles are able to bind to the receptors instead and prevent the cancer cells from adhering to the bone marrow in the first place.

Our research on mice shows that the nanoparticle formulation reduces the toxic effect doxorubicin has on other tissues, such as the kidneys and liver,” says Tanyel Kiziltepe , a research assistant professor with the Department of Chemical and Biomolecular Engineering and AD&T at Notre Dame University.

Source: http://newsinfo.nd.edu/news/31468-multifunctional-nanoparticles-promise-to-improve-blood-cancer-treatment/

Rna Nanoparticule To Shutdown Cancerous Genes

Using a technique known as “nucleic acid origami,” chemical engineers have built tiny particles made out of DNA and RNA that can deliver snippets of RNA directly to tumors, turning off genes expressed in cancer cells.To achieve this type of gene shutdown, known as RNA interference, many researchers have tried — with some success — to deliver RNA with particles made from polymers or lipids. However, those materials can pose safety risks and are difficult to target, says Daniel Anderson, an associate professor of health sciences and technology and chemical engineering, and a member of the David H. Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research at MIT

Researchers successfully used this nanoparticle, made from several strands of DNA and RNA, to turn off a gene in tumor cells. 

When you think of metastatic cancer, you don’t want to just stop in the liver,” Anderson says. “You also want to get to more diverse sites.”

Source: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/rna-interference-lightweight-nanoparticle-0604.html

Gene therapy to rejuvenate

Several studies have demonstrated that the average life of organisms, including that of mammals, can be lengthened by acting on different genes. Until now this has included permanent modifications in animal genes starting in the embryonic phase, something which is not intended to be carried out with humans. Researchers at CNIO and CBATEG now have proved it possible to prolong the life of mice using a treatment which acts directly on the genes, but is used in adult animals and is applied only once. This is achieved through gene therapy, a strategy never before used to fight the aging process.

The therapy demonstrated to be safe and effective in mice. Researchers worked with adult mice aged one year and older mice aged two. In both cases the gene therapy had a "rejuvenating" effect. The mice which were treated at one year of age on average lived 24% longer.

This research is led at the Spanish National Cancer Research Centre (CNIO) by director Maria A. Blasco, in collaboration with Eduard Ayuso and Fátima Bosch, of the Centre for Animal Biotechnology and Gene Therapy (CBATEG) at the Universitat Autonoma de Barcelona UAB, Spain.

Sourcehttp://www.uab.es/servlet/Satellite/latest-news/news-detail/lifespan-of-mice-grows-by-24–1096476786473.html?noticiaid=1337064121411

Temperature method to distinguish cancerous cells

A Spanish and French research team have described a new technique for measuring the temperature inside a single cell without altering the cell’s metabolism. 




The new technique uses transfected green fluorescent protein (GFP) as a temperature nanoprobe and measures the polarization anisotropy of the GFP fluorescence. This rapid and non-invasive thermal nanoscopy differs from previous intents in that it does not alter cellular processes with the introduction of synthetic nano-objects. Furthermore, it is fully compatible with widespread GFP cellular biology.This advance complements the optical toolbox for biologists and could help to provide new understanding of cellular processes, such as those involved in Cancer.

The research is published in NanoLetters, by Jon Donner, Sebastian Thompson and Mark Kreuzer in the group led by ICREA Professor at ICFO, Romain Quidant, in collaboration with Guillaume Baffou, ex-ICFOnian now at Institut Fresnel in Marseille, France, 

Source: http://pubs.acs.org/doi/abs/10.1021/nl300389y

Cancer: Nanoparticules Do Better Than Chemotherapy

Alliance researchers, Robert Langer, Sc.D. (Massachusetts Institute of Technology) and Omid Farokhzad, M.D., (Harvard Medical School), with a team of researchers from BIND Biosciences demonstrated the ability of a nanomedicine to target a receptor found on cancer cells and accumulate at tumor sites. The study, published in the journal Science Translational Medicine, indicates the treatment is safe in mice and is capable of shrinking patient tumors.

The nanoparticles feature a homing molecule that allows them to specifically attack cancer cells, and are the first such targeted particles to enter human clinical studies. Originally developed by researchers at MIT and Brigham and Women’s Hospital in Boston, the particles are designed to carry the chemotherapy drug docetaxel, used to treat lung, prostate and breast cancers, among others The particles were also shown to be safe and effective: Many of the patients’ tumors shrank as a result of the treatment, even when they received lower doses than those usually administered. 

Source: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2012/cancer-particle-0404.html

Stem Cells to Kill Cancer

Could engineered human stem cells hold the key to cancer survival? Scientists at the Institute of Bioengineering and Nanotechnology (IBN) in Singapore, have discovered that neural stem cells possess the innate ability to target tumor cells outside the central nervous system. This finding, which was demonstrated successfully on breast cancer cells, was recently published in leading peer reviewed journal, Stem Cells.

Despite decades of cancer research, cancer remains a leading cause of death worldwide, accounting for 7.6 million deaths in 2008, and breast cancer is one of the most common causes of cancer deaths each year.  The high fatality rate of cancer is partially attributed to the invasive ability of malignant tumors to spread throughout the human body, and the ineffectiveness of conventional therapies to eradicate the cancer cells.

A team of researchers led by IBN Group Leader, Dr Shu Wang, has made a landmark discovery that neural stem cells (NSCs) derived from human induced pluripotent stem (iPS) cells could be used to treat breast cancer. The effectiveness of using NSCs, which originate from the central nervous system, to treat brain tumors has been investigated in previous studies. This is the first study that demonstrates that iPS cell-derived NSCs could also target tumors outside the central nervous system, to treat both primary and secondary tumors.

Source: http://www.a-star.edu.sg/?TabId=828&articleType=ArticleView&arti, cell stemcleId=1626