Nano Technology in cancer
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# Exploring Nanotechnology in Cancer #


Nanotechnology offers the unprecedented and paradigm-changing opportunity to study and interact with normal and cancer cells in real time, at the molecular and cellular scales, and during the earliest stages of the cancer process. Through the concerted development of nanoscale devices or devices with nanoscale materials and components, the NCI Alliance for Nanotechnology in Cancer will facilitate their integration within the existing cancer research infrastructure. The Alliance will bring enabling technologies for:

Imaging agents and diagnostics that will allow clinicians to detect cancer in its earliest stages
Systems that will provide real-time assessments of therapeutic and surgical efficacy for accelerating clinical translation
Multifunctional, targeted devices capable of bypassing biological barriers to deliver multiple therapeutic agents directly to cancer cells and those tissues in the microenvironment that play a critical role in the growth and metastasis of cancer
Agents that can monitor predictive molecular changes and prevent precancerous cells from becoming malignant
Novel methods to manage the symptoms of cancer that adversely impact quality of life
Research tools that will enable rapid identification of new targets for clinical development and predict drug resistance




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# Why Nanotechnology in Cancer?



Nanoscale devices are somewhere from one hundred to ten thousand times smaller than human cells. They are similar in size to large biological molecules ("biomolecules") such as enzymes and receptors. As an example, hemoglobin, the molecule that carries oxygen in red blood cells, is approximately 5 nanometers in diameter. Nanoscale devices smaller than 50 nanometers can easily enter most cells, while those smaller than 20 nanometers can move out of blood vessels as they circulate through the body.

Because of their small size, nanoscale devices can readily interact with biomolecules on both the surface of cells and inside of cells. By gaining access to so many areas of the body, they have the potential to detect disease and deliver treatment in ways unimagined before now. And since biological processes, including events that lead to cancer, occur at the nanoscale at and inside cells, nanotechnology offers a wealth of tools that are providing cancer researchers with new and innovative ways to diagnose and treat cancer.

# Nanotechnologies


Work is currently being done to find ways to safely move these new research tools into clinical practice. Today, cancer-related nanotechnology is proceeding on two main fronts: laboratory-based diagnostics and in vivo diagnostics and therapeutics.

# Nanotechnology and Diagnostics


Nanodevices can provide rapid and sensitive detection of cancer-related molecules by enabling scientists to detect molecular changes even when they occur only in a small percentage of cells.


@ Nanowires

In this diagram, nano sized sensing wires are laid down across a microfluidic channel. These nanowires by nature have incredible properties of selectivity and specificity. As particles flow through the microfluidic channel, the nanowire sensors pick up the molecular signatures of these particles and can immediately relay this information through a connection of electrodes to the outside world.

These nanodevices are man-made constructs made with carbon, silicon and other materials that have the capability to monitor the complexity of biological phenomenon and relay the information, as it is monitored, to the medical care provider.

They can detect the presence of altered genes associated with cancer and may help researchers pinpoint the exact location of those changes.

Reference Scientific Bibliography:
Cancer Detection/Diagnosis via Nanotechnologies and Nanosensor

@ Cantilevers

Nanoscale cantilevers - microscopic, flexible beams resembling a row of diving boards - are built using semiconductor lithographic techniques. These can be coated with molecules capable of binding specific substrates-DNA complementary to a specific gene sequence, for example. Such micron-sized devices, comprising many nanometer-sized cantilevers, can detect single molecules of DNA or protein.

As a cancer cell secretes its molecular products, the antibodies coated on the cantilever fingers selectively bind to these secreted proteins. These antibodies have been designed to pick up one or more different, specific molecular expressions from a cancer cell. The physical properties of the cantilevers change as a result of the binding event. Researchers can read this change in real time and provide not only information about the presence and the absence but also the concentration of different molecular expressions.

Nanoscale cantilevers, constructed as part of a larger diagnostic device, can provide rapid and sensitive detection of cancer-related molecules


# Nanotechnology and Cancer Therapy


Nanoscale devices have the potential to radically change cancer therapy for the better and to dramatically increase the number of highly effective therapeutic agents. Nanoscale constructs can serve as customizable, targeted drug delivery vehicles capable of ferrying large doses of chemotherapeutic agents or therapeutic genes into malignant cells while sparing healthy cells, greatly reducing or eliminating the often unpalatable side effects that accompany many current cancer therapies.

@ Nanoshells


Nanoshells have a core of silica and a metallic outer layer. These nanoshells can be injected safely, as demonstrated in animal models.

Because of their size, nanoshells will preferentially concentrate in cancer lesion sites. This physical selectivity occurs through a phenomenon called enhanced permeation retention (EPR).

Scientists can further decorate the nanoshells to carry molecular conjugates to the antigens that are expressed on the cancer cells themselves or in the tumor microenvironment. This second degree of specificity preferentially links the nanoshells to the tumor and not to neighboring healthy cells.

As shown in this example, scientists can then externally supply energy to these cells. The specific properties associated with nanoshells allow for the absorption of this directed energy, creating an intense heat that selectively kills the tumor cells. The external energy can be mechanical, radio frequency, optical - the therapeutic action is the same.

The result is greater efficacy of the therapeutic treatment and a significantly reduced set of side effects.

@ Nanoparticles


Nanoscale devices have the potential to radically change cancer therapy for the better and to dramatically increase the number of highly effective therapeutic agents.

In this example, nanoparticles are targeted to cancer cells for use in the molecular imaging of a malignant lesion. Large numbers of nanoparticles are safely injected into the body and preferentially bind to the cancer cell, defining the anatomical contour of the lesion and making it visible.

These nanoparticles give us the ability to see cells and molecules that we otherwise cannot detect through conventional imaging. The ability to pick up what happens in the cell - to monitor therapeutic intervention and to see when a cancer cell is mortally wounded or is actually activated - is critical to the successful diagnosis and treatment of the disease.

Nanoparticulate technology can prove to be very useful in cancer therapy allowing for effective and targeted drug delivery by overcoming the many biological, biophysical and biomedical barriers that the body stages against a standard intervention such as the administration of drugs or contrast agents.


Posted by MC Muhammed Rahoof
E-mail mcrahoof786[at]gmail.com
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