Nanoparticles Target Cancer Cells

Nanotechnology was the technologies of the future. Now the future is looking more and more like the present as Cornell researchers have attached antibodies to nanoparticles to attack colorectal cancer cells.

ITHACA, N.Y. – Another weapon in the arsenal against cancer: Nanoparticles that identify, target and kill specific cancer cells while leaving healthy cells alone.

Led by Carl Batt, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Food Science, the researchers synthesized nanoparticles – shaped something like a dumbbell – made of gold sandwiched between two pieces of iron oxide. They then attached antibodies, which target a molecule found only in colorectal cancer cells, to the particles. Once bound, the nanoparticles are engulfed by the cancer cells.

To kill the cells, the researchers use a near-infrared laser, which is a wavelength that doesn’t harm normal tissue at the levels used, but the radiation is absorbed by the gold in the nanoparticles. This causes the cancer cells to heat up and die.

“This is a so-called ’smart’ therapy,” Batt said. “To be a smart therapy, it should be targeted, and it should have some ability to be activated only when it’s there and then kills just the cancer cells.”

One can imagine a variety of ways to activate toxins once those toxins have entered cancer cells. The challenge is that to just come up with antibodies that will target all the cancer in a body is a major challenge.

I am wondering whether cancer will ultimately be stopped by precisely delivered poisons or by pieces of RNA delivered into cancer cells to suppress and activate selected genes in the DNA. It is like the difference between bombs and software. Blow up the cells up or regain control over them?

[Via http://dromeish.wordpress.com]

Tip # 5: Be Different!

Tip # 5: Be Different.  Stand out in the application process!

There are far too many “cookie cutter” applicants who all look the same on paper and in black interview suits.  You need to set yourself apart from all of the other applicants.

Figure out what is special about you and what you have to offer the field of medicine that is different from all of the other applicants.  Get involved in a variety of activities and when you find something that you love, stick with it.

Participate in activities because you really want to do them and enjoy them, not because they will look good on your resume.

[Via http://darwishmd.wordpress.com]

Cancer killing nanotech assassins

Nanotechnology is proving to have many medical applications, and the bulk of those apps are in cancer research. Here’s the latest from Cornell.

The release:

Like little golden assassins, ’smart’ nanoparticles identify, target and kill cancer cells

ITHACA, N.Y. – Another weapon in the arsenal against cancer: Nanoparticles that identify, target and kill specific cancer cells while leaving healthy cells alone.

Led by Carl Batt, the Liberty Hyde Bailey Professor of Food Science, the researchers synthesized nanoparticles – shaped something like a dumbbell – made of gold sandwiched between two pieces of iron oxide. They then attached antibodies, which target a molecule found only in colorectal cancer cells, to the particles. Once bound, the nanoparticles are engulfed by the cancer cells.

To kill the cells, the researchers use a near-infrared laser, which is a wavelength that doesn’t harm normal tissue at the levels used, but the radiation is absorbed by the gold in the nanoparticles. This causes the cancer cells to heat up and die.

“This is a so-called ’smart’ therapy,” Batt said. “To be a smart therapy, it should be targeted, and it should have some ability to be activated only when it’s there and then kills just the cancer cells.”

The goal, said lead author and biomedical graduate student Dickson Kirui, is to improve the technology and make it suitable for testing in a human clinical trial. The researchers are now working on a similar experiment targeting prostate cancer cells.

“If, down the line, you could clinically just target the cancer cells, you could then spare the health surrounding cells from being harmed – that is the critical thing,” Kirui said.

Gold has potential as a material key to fighting cancer in future smart therapies. It is biocompatible, inert and relatively easy to tweak chemically. By changing the size and shape of the gold particle, Kirui and colleagues can tune them to respond to different wavelengths of energy.

Once taken up by the researchers’ gold particles, the cancer cells are destroyed by heat – just a few degrees above normal body temperature – while the surrounding tissue is left unharmed. Such a low-power laser does not have any effect on surrounding cells because that particular wavelength does not heat up cells if they are not loaded up with nanoparticles, the researchers explained.

Using iron oxide – which is basically rust – as the other parts of the particles might one day allow scientists to also track the progress of cancer treatments using magnetic resonance imaging, Kirui said, by taking advantage of the particles’ magnetic properties.

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The research was funded by the Sloan Foundation and the Ludwig Institute for Cancer Research, which has been a partner with Cornell since 1999 to bring laboratory work to clinical testing. The research is reported in the Feb. 15 online edition of the journal Nanotechnology.

Text by Anne Ju, Cornell Chronicle

[Via http://davidkirkpatrick.wordpress.com]

Just keep swimming...

I went here again. After vowing I wouldn’t. But this time it was awesome. Probably because I was one of the more, um, enthusiastic campers this year. Maybe it was the anticipation of a night of inebriation. A night that I thought of surprisingly often during the week leading up to it, thinking “Yes, right now you are lugging three bags full of notes, a computer, your lunch AND dinner and don’t look like coming home before 9pm but…there is a alcohol-induced relaxation in four sleeps.”

I am now that someone who looks longingly forward to getting drunk. Having just looked at treating alcohol-dependance I’m aware that’s one big step in an interesting direction. I now understand my friend,who, when he started med 6 six ago, tried to explain that when you work so hard, you have to play hard. And fast. To get the maximum out of that allocated night.

My study routine has been more serious this year. More midnight oil. More caffeine. More stationary involved. There are scissors, glue sticks, coloured pens, sticky tab things and multiple books. I’m just barely keeping my head above the surface of the information tidal wave by grasping onto this ridiculous amount of stationary. It’s keeping me afloat.

I am slightly behind but I know I can make it up if I study all this weekend. Something I wouldn’t even contemplate last year, but now is just a given. The work has to be done. So it will be done. The end.

My bachelor-of-arts-habits just won’t cut it with Med. The long afternoon reading sessions curled up with a novel and a tea. Weekends of recipes that came with cooking times of days, not minutes. Ringing friends to go do something, anything, anywhere because “I’m bored”. Whole “days off”. These concepts just won’t fit inside this new year. They didn’t fit last year, no matter how hard I tried to make them.

Reading blogs for 10 minutes. Sitting on the sun-drenched balcony for a quick breakfast. Tea in the library. Meals of dip + bread + fruit. Packets in my locker. Supplements. Calling a neglected friend whilst walking to or from uni, or waiting for lunch to heat up in the common room microwave. Afternoons off. Sleeping.

These might just do.

For now.

[Via http://shesmedicallyblonde.wordpress.com]

Nine new electronic reference resources

One of my favorite electronic collections is the Credo Reference collection.  It includes well over 400 reference works, and what makes it amazing is that you can search them all at the same time.   These items have just been added to the collection:

(Want to access databases from off-campus?  Read this.)

Psychology:

Sun, Ron, ed. The Cambridge handbook of computational psychology. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2008. (Publisher’s description)

Twol, Graham J., et al., eds. Dictionary of forensic psychology. Cullompton, Devon, UK: Willan, 2008. (Publisher’s description)

Nadel, Lynn, ed. Encyclopedia of cognitive science. Chichester, West Sussex: John Wiley, 2005. (Publisher’s description)

Social sciences:

Flannery, Daniel J., Alexander T. Vazsonyi, Irwin D. Waldman, eds. The Cambridge handbook of violent behavior and aggression. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2007. (Publisher’s description)

Rowley, Charles K., and Friedrich Schneider, eds. The encyclopedia of public choice. Dordrecht: Kluwer Academic Publishers, 2004. (Publisher’s description)

Science:

Porteous, Andrew, ed. Dictionary of environmental science and technology. Chichester, West Sussex, England: Wiley, 2008. (Publisher’s description)

Cooper, David N., ed. Encyclopedia of the human genome. Chichester: Wiley, 2005. (Publisher’s description)

Medicine:

Ramachandran, V.S., ed. Encyclopedia of the human brain. San Diego, CA: Academic Press, 2002. (Publisher’s description)

History:

Wilson, Katharina M., and Nadia Margolis, eds. Women in the Middle Ages: an encyclopedia. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press, 2004. (Publisher’s description)

[Via http://mckillopcataloger.wordpress.com]

A common variant of the latrophilin 3 gene, LPHN3, confers susceptibility to ADHD and predicts effectiveness of stimulant medication

Recent advance in the genetic study of ADHD

Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has a very high heritability (0.8), suggesting that about 80% of phenotypic variance is due to genetic factors. This study used the integration of statistical and functional approaches to discover a novel gene that contributes to ADHD. For the statistical approach, the researchers started with a linkage study based on large multigenerational families in a population isolate, followed by fine mapping of targeted regions using a family-based design. Family- and population-based association studies in five samples from disparate regions of the world were used for replication. Brain imaging studies were performed to evaluate gene function. The linkage study discovered a genome region harbored in the Latrophilin 3 gene (LPHN3).

In the world-wide samples (total n=6360, with 2627 ADHD cases and 2531 controls) statistical association of LPHN3 and ADHD was confirmed. Functional studies revealed that LPHN3 variants are expressed in key brain regions related to attention and activity, affect metabolism in neural circuits implicated in ADHD, and are associated with response to stimulant medication. Linkage and replicated association of ADHD with a novel non-candidate gene (LPHN3) provide new insights into the genetics, neurobiology, and treatment of ADHD.

Authors: M Arcos-Burgos, M Jain, M T Acosta et. al.
National Human Genome Research Institute, National Institutes of Health, Bethesda, MD, USA.
Published in: Molecular Psychiatry advance online publication 16 February 2010;doi: 10.1038/mp.2010.6

[Via http://mohdjamil.wordpress.com]

Health 2.0 in News: Self-Guided Research and Dangers of Google Buzz

• Online video viewing accelerates – where is Pharma? (Pharma Strategy Blog)

The number of videos viewed grew almost 150%, from 14.3 billion to 33.2 billion, while the duration of the average video viewed grew 28%, from 3.2 to 4.1 minutes.

• The top-10 words doctor writers should ban (The Doctor Writer): Really valid suggestions including benign or acute.

• Medicine 2.0 in a historical perspective (Biomedicine on Display)

• Google Buzz “antisocial networking” exposed details of “estranged spouses, current lovers, attorneys and doctors” (Clinical Cases and Images): “Doctors should be very cautious when using social media to communicate with patients. In general, “friending” patients on Facebook, Buzz and Twitter is not a good idea at the current level of social network services, and is best avoided.”

• Is Self-Guided Research Dangerous to Your Health? (The Decision Tree)

• The Connected Physician (Pharma 2.0): Bunny Ellerin discusses the recent Manhattan Research Report focusing on physicians.

• Researcher Creates ‘Facebook for Scientists’ (New York Times):

Enter ResearchGATE, which its founder Dr. Ijad Madisch (pictured) fairly describes as “Facebook for scientists.” In close to two years of operation, ResearchGate has built a social network of more than 250,000 researchers from 196 countries. Over 1,000 subgroups have been formed for specific disciplines, and 60,000 research documents have been uploaded for sharing with others on the site. These guys aren’t pretending they’re farmers.

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[Via http://scienceroll.com]