Tag: Oncology

Injectable Hydrogel for Transcatheter Intravascular Embolization: Interview with Dr. Rahmi Oklu, Founder of Obsidio

Obsidio Inc., a medical device company based in Columbia, South Carolina, has developed an embolic hydrogel (called a gel embolic material: GEM) designed to be delivered minimally invasively through a clinical catheter for blood vessel occlusion. Applications include controlling blood flow in vascular injuries and aneurysms, reducing tumor blood su (Read more...)

Plugging Holes in Blood Vessels Caused by Nanoparticle Therapy

While targeting nanoparticles to attack cancer cells can be effective at reducing primary tumors, they tend to create tiny holes within blood vessel walls that let some cancer cells escape and metastasize elsewhere. This is a serious side effect that may limit the usefulness of many nanoparticle-based cancer therapies in the long run, so researcher (Read more...)

Cold Plasma to be Tested as Killer of Cancer Cells

Cold plasma is an unusual gaseous substance in which only the electrons are heated to thousands of degrees, with the rest of the material remaining at room temperature. Purdue University researchers have advanced this field and have helped to make it ready for clinical applications, since cold plasma has the ability to kill target cells […]

Device Speeds Cervical Cancer Screening

When screening for cervical cancer, immunofluorescence staining is used to identify the presence of proteins that are biomarkers for the disease. It is a slow and meticulous process that requires lab technicians to prepare individual cells for analysis. Even then, since not all cells show the same disease characteristics, the rate of false negative (Read more...)

Chip Captures Circulating Tumor Cells, Keeps Them Alive

Cancer metastasis continues to pose difficulties for clinicians. Tumors shed cells which travel throughout the body and attach themselves at distant sites, causing new tumors to sprout. These so-called circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are extremely rare and difficult to pick out from whole blood, in part because they’re often a similar size to (Read more...)

Computational Simulations to Guide Cancer Therapy

Researchers from Argonne National Laboratory and University of Chicago have developed a new supercomputer-based tool to model tumor progression and destruction by the immune system. Their work demonstrates that computational simulations of immune-tumor interactions can infer whether or not a given tumor can be destroyed with immunotherapy. This exc (Read more...)

Self-Powered Microrobots Deliver Drugs to Tumors in the Gut

Treating tumors within the GI system is often a difficult challenge, frequently requiring invasive surgery. Scientists at Caltech have now developed self-propelled microrobots that can deliver drugs to precise spots within the intestines, and that can let clinicians monitor and control their activity. Besides drug delivery, the microrobots have the (Read more...)

New Infrared Chemical Imaging Method to Diagnose Cancers

Prostate cancer can be very difficult to diagnose, with way too many patients undergoing surgeries that turn out to be unnecessary. Now, researchers at Purdue University, Boston University, and the Chinese Academy of Sciences have developed an infrared chemical imaging technique that may improve diagnostic studies and in the process cut down on exc (Read more...)

New Biomaterial Improves Brain Cancer Survival in Rats

Researchers from the University of Nottingham have developed a new biomaterial that delivers chemotherapies to treat brain cancer. Their work demonstrates that their biodegradable paste led to increased survival compared to controls, and that half of all rats in a study were clear of any cancer as confirmed by laboratory tests. This exciting develo (Read more...)

Thin Microgels Encapsulate and Protect Therapeutic Cells

Cell-based therapies, such as those involving the delivery of stem cells, require a way to encapsulate cells inside a protective package in order for them to not be destroyed and washed out by the body. There have been successful attempts to contain therapeutic cells within hydrogels, but the resulting materials were bulky and could not […]

Harmonic Nanoparticles for Theranostic Applications

Researchers from Ecole Polytechnique Fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland have developed new nanoparticles for theranostic (therapeutic and diagnostic) applications. Their work describes the synthesis of these particles and demonstrates that by stimulating at a long, safe wavelength, the nanoparticles can cleave bonds that hold onto dr (Read more...)