NanoComputer

Nanoparticles carrying a toxin found in bee venom can destroy human immunodeficiency virus (HIV) while leaving surrounding cells unharmed, researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis have shown. The finding is an important step toward developing a vaginal gel that may prevent the spread of HIV, the virus that causes AIDS.
Nanoparticles (purple) carrying melittin (green) fuse with HIV (small circles with spiked outer ring), destroying the virus’s protective envelope. Molecular bumpers (small red ovals) prevent the nanoparticles from harming the body’s normal cells, which are much larger in size.
“Our hope is that in places where HIV is running rampant, people could use this gel as a preventive measure to stop the initial infection,” says Joshua L. Hood, MD, PhD, a research instructor in medicine.
The study appears in the current issue of Antiviral Therapy.
Source: http://news.wustl.edu/

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/

A biodegradable nanoparticle, designed by a Northwestern University medicine research team, turns out to be the perfect vehicle to stealthily deliver an antigen that tricks the immune system into stopping its attack on myelin and halt a model of relapsing remitting multiple sclerosis (MS) in mice. This is a breakthrough for nanotechnology and multiple sclerosis. The new nanotechnology also can be applied to a variety of immune-mediated diseases including Type 1 diabetes, food allergies and airway allergies such as asthma.

“This is a highly significant breakthrough in translational immunotherapy,” said Stephen Miller, a corresponding author of the study and the Judy Gugenheim Research Professor of Microbiology-Immunology at Northwestern University Feinberg School of Medicine. “The beauty of this new technology is it can be used in many immune-related diseases. We simply change the antigen that’s delivered.”
“The holy grail is to develop a therapy that is specific to the pathological immune response, in this case the body attacking myelin,” Miller added. “Our approach resets the immune system so it no longer attacks myelin but leaves the function of the normal immune system intact.“
Source: http://www.northwestern.edu/

Braces made from clear plastic polymer used in dental correction orthodontics have produced very good results in recent years, especially in relation to the improved esthetics when compared to metal braces, but they do present certain problems of wear and tear within the mouth. Researchers from UC3M, has produced a new material which increases mechanical as well as friction resistance, thereby maintaining the braces’ transparency. The new technique has been patented. The Polymers and Composites research group belongs to the Materials Science and Engineering and Chemical Engineering Department of the University Carlos III of Madrid, Spain. Its objective is the development and characterization of polymeric materials, focussed in their reinforcement through the
dispersion of nanoparticles. Following this method, very small additions of nanoreinforcements usually improve mechanical, electrical and optical properties, as well as the service performance of these materials.

“We were estimating the friction between teeth and the brackets [braces], and it occurred to us that nanotechnology might be of use to help us resolve this issue,” remarked Juan Baselga, head of the UC3M Polymers and Composite Group.
Source: http://www.uc3m.es/

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

Bioengineers from Johns Hopkins Center for Nanomedicine have designed nanoparticles that can safely and predictably infiltrate deep into the brain when tested in rodent and human tissue. The brain is a notoriously difficult organ to treat, but Johns Hopkins researchers report they are one step closer to having a drug-delivery system flexible enough to overcome some key challenges posed by brain cancer and perhaps other maladies affecting that organ.
Real-time imaging of a rodent brain shows that nanoparticles coated with polyethylene-glycol (PEG) (green) penetrate farther within the brain than particles without the PEG coating (red).

“We are pleased to have found a way to prevent drug-embedded particles from sticking to their surroundings so that they can spread once they are in the brain,” says Justin Hanes, Ph.D., Lewis J. Ort Professor of Ophthalmology, with secondary appointments in chemical and biomolecular engineering, biomedical engineering, oncology, neurological surgery and environmental health sciences, and director of the Johns Hopkins Center for Nanomedicine.
Source: http://www.hopkinsmedicine.org/news/media/releases/
improved_nanoparticles_deliver_drugs_into_brain

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

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

Researchers at Harvard-affiliated McLean Hospital have shown a new category of "green" nanoparticles comprised of a non-toxic, protein-based nanotechnology that can non-invasively cross the blood brain barrier and is capable of transporting various types of drugs.In an article published May 1, 2012 online in PLoS ONE, Gordana Vitaliano, MD, director of the Brain Imaging NaNoTechnology Group at the McLean Hospital Imaging Center, reported that clathrin protein, a ubiquitous protein found in human, animal, plant, bacteria and fungi cells, can been modified for use as a nanoparticle for in-vivo studies.

"This study provides a new insight into utilizing bioengineered clathrin protein as a novel nanoplatform that passes the blood brain barrier," said Vitaliano, who successfully attached different fluorescent labels, commonly used in imaging, to functionalize clathrin nanoparticles. "We were able to show that the clathrin nanoparticles could be non-invasively delivered to the central nervous system (CNS) in animals. The clathrin performed significantly."

Source: http://www.mclean.harvard.edu/news/press/current.php?kw=mclean-hospital
-researchers-report-on-a-new-nanotechnology
-that-may-enhance-medication-delivery-and-improve-mri-performance&id=175

A team of bioengineers at the University of Maryland, led by Professor Huakun Xu announced that they had successfully tested an alternative to conventional mercury cavity filling, comprised of silver nanoparticles, which not only kill unwanted microbes, but also regenerate tooth enamel. The entire materials science of nanomaterials is a still-growing field, because otherwise normal materials like silver often have fantastic physical and electrical properties when you shave them down to the nanometer scale, and quantum effects become immediately relevant. Basically, a chunk of silver acts nothing like a nanoparticle of silver – and this goes for any other nanomaterial.

The silver nanoparticles kill the bacteria by getting down to their level and attaching to their cell walls like a key with a perfect fit. This physical breach allows external matter to get inside, which disrupts the internal functions of the cell, eventually killing the bacterium. It's worth a mention that nanosilver can't do this to human cells!

Source: http://www.dental.umaryland.edu/dentaldepts/epod/
Biomaterials%20and%20Tissue%20Engineering/hxu/bio.html

Many of the current experimental "invisibility cloaks" are based around the same idea - light coming from behind an object is curved around it and then continues on forward to a viewer. That person is in turn only able to see what's behind the object, and not the object itself. Scientists from Germany's Karlsruhe Institute of Technology (KIT) have applied that same principle to sound waves, and created what could perhaps be described as a "silence cloak." For the experiments, Dr. Nicolas Stenger, from KIT,  constructed a relatively small, millimeter-thin plate, made of both soft and hard microstructured polymers. Different rings of material within the plate resonated at different frequencies, over a range of 100 Hertz.

When viewed from above, it was observed that sound wave vibrations were guided around a central circular area in the plate, unable to either enter or leave that region. "Contrary to other known noise protection measures, the sound waves are neither absorbed nor reflected," said Stenger's colleague, Prof. Martin Wegener. "It is as if nothing was there."

Source; http://prl.aps.org/abstract/PRL/v107/i17/e173901