Cancer Research UK Announces Nanotech Breakthrough

Filed in archive Research on March 13, 2009

Photo courtesy of iStockphoto, Image# 2367173

Following up on the post below, more nanotech cancer-fighting news: researchers at Cancer Research UK this week announced the development of a treatment "whereby tiny nano particles carried anti-tumor genes into cancer cells and 'zapped' them by causing them to make proteins that killed the cancer," according to Medical News Today's Catharine Paddock.

"Cancer Research UK's andreas Schatzlein, based at the School of Pharmacy in London, said it was the first time that nanoparticles had been shown to target tumors in such a selective way," according to Reuters.

"Once inside the cell, the gene enclosed in the particle recognises the cancerous environment and switches on," Schatzlein says. "The result is toxic, but only to the offending cells, leaving healthy tissue unaffected. We hope this therapy will be used to treat cancer patients in clinical trials in a couple of years."

More here from The Press Association ... more here from BBC News ... more here from Computerworld ... and the press release is here.