A completely new form of cancer treatment has been discovered that would possibly eradicate tumors and act as a possible alternative to chemotherapy.
Scientists at Rice University in Texas called the strategy a “new generation” of molecular machines, generally known as “molecular jackhammers” (MJH).
It occurs by utilizing a cyanine dye, similar to those used in medical imaging, which is then attached to a cancer cell and stimulated using infrared light, which might penetrate deep into a human without damaging them.
This vibrates the cell, causing its membrane to tear open and destroy the cancer.
“Our technology could have lower unintended effects in contrast to chemotherapy,” said Ciceron Ayala Orozco, lead writer on the study, who added it might be only against solid tumors.
“Because the molecules might be used at secure doses where the molecule alone is non toxic, the molecule only destroys the tumors where the near-infra-red light is directed to the tumor area. Due to this fact, the damage might be selective to the tumor area and keep the remainder of the body secure.”
Human testing won’t occur for a few years yet, due to the necessity to follow Food and Drug Administration guidelines.
“At this point our results are a proof of concept that demonstrates that a tumor might be eliminated with this technology,” Mr. Ayala Orozco said.
“But this doesn’t translate directly to the expected ends in patients.”
While human testing is a good distance off, initial results with mice have been very promising.
After they tested this new technology on test mice with melanoma, 50 percent of the rodents became cancer-free.
They imagine that when their testing and dosage is optimized, they will produce even greater results.
Rice University chemist Dr James Tour said that MJHs have “good enough energy to destroy any membrane of a cell”.
“It is rather rare to see this aggressive cancer leave and ‘never’ return within the 7-month period,” he said. “And this was not optimized.”
When testing on the mice, they found their method had a 99 percent efficiency against human tumors grown on the mice’s flanks, and 100% on their dose-dependent/optimized studies.
“Inject the MJH, wait half-hour. Shine a light for 10 minutes,” Dr Tour said.
“How hard is that?”
Calling it nanomechanical therapy, Dr Tour said that the research adds “a new modality of treatment”.
“That’s a big deal to expand one’s arsenal like that,” he said.
Rice University scientists are actually researching if the technology may very well be coupled with immunotherapy, hoping to use it to locate “the last vestiges of cancer” in a person’s body.