Image: Human breast cancer cell tagged with quantum dots

Cancer Nanomedicine is developing to cover a wide range of applications from imaging, diagnosing to treating cancers with targeted therapies. Cancer Nanomedicine works on the theory that nanometer sized particles of gold, nanomicelles and quantum dots (QDs) have unique functional properties that differ from other available discrete molecules or bulk materials. These nanomaterials when conjugated with other ligands such as monoclonal antibodies, peptides or small molecules can be used to target tumor cells and microenvironment with incredibly high specificity and affinity. Nanoparticles inherently posses a large surface area. Making them ideal for attaching multiple ligands to to create a single nanoparticle that could be used for both tumor imaging and treatment.

There are several barriers that must be overcome before these new methods can be applied clinically:

Firstly the problem of nanoparticle surface opsonisation must be overcome. Nanoparticle surface opsonisation is the process of attaching proteins and other molecules to the surface of the nanoparticle. At present this process is not efficient enough  with surface ‘fouling’ occurring where nonspecific proteins are attaching to the nanoparticles in place of the desired proteins.

Secondly the problem of nanoparticle tissue retention, targeting and tumor penetration must be addressed. These are all processes that are central to manufacturing an effective diagnostic tool and treatment method using nanoparticles.

Finally and very importantly the issue of nonbiodegradable  nanomaterials containing toxic elements must be investigated. Without an idea of the effects that these particles may have on tissue it would be inconceivable to clinically trial these treatments.

New innovative techniques need to be developed to overcome these stumbling blocks on the road to creating a nanoparticle treatment for Cancer.

To read more about this topic get the free article: Futuremedicine

-CT

Nanopaprika.eu was started back in 2007 by a Hungarian Chemistry PhD student Andras Paszternak. The website provides a great deal of communication and networking tools. Since 2007 the Nanopaprika community has grown to 2000+ members.

This virtual  international nanoscience community (TINC) comes equipped with personal chat and scientific forums ranging from Microscopy to Nanomedicine. The site now connects nano scientists from all over the globe and is media partners with more than 30 nano conferences dealing with different topics in 2009 and 2010 alone.

Nanopaprika.eu is open to all as long as they have a passion for Nano! With over 2000 scientists from across the globe Nanopaprika boasts a wealth of knowledge that any Nano enthusiast can put to good use.

- CT

Understandingnano.com was started when Earl Boysen (co-author of Nanotechnology for Dummies) observed the need for a website with easy to understand explanations on a wide variety of nanotechnology applications. Understandingnano.com provides clear and concise information that is accessible to people who may not have expertise in Nanotechnology.

It is especially pleasing to see that Understandingnano.com has a whole section dedicated to explaining the basics of the many aspects of nanotechnologies application in medicine. Whilst providing useful resources to allow the reader to delve deeper into subjects that they are most interested in.

Understandingnano.com is not limited to providing information about nanotechnologies but also provides resources relating to nanotechnology such as where to find degrees in nanotechnology, jobs and even new articles!

Understandingnano.com is a partnership between Earl and his wife, Nancy. Earl brings an understanding of the technical issues based upon a masters in Engineering Physics and 20 years of experience in integrated circuit manufacturing. Nancy is the author of over 90 books on technology related topics. Her writing skills make Understandingnano.com easy to understand and enjoyable to read.

Understandingnano.com is not affiliated with any corporation, institution, or government body and therefore its information and articles don’t contain any organizational bias. – CT

One of the most common causes of death relating to cancer in patients with solid tumours is caused by tumour cells that break off from primary tumours. They can travel to other organs and tissues in the body and set up secondary tumour colonies known as metastasise. These cells once in the peripheral bloodstream are known as circulating tumour cells (CTCs). Detection of these cells could provide critical information for managing the spread of cancer and monitoring the effectiveness of cancer therapies.

The benchmark for analysis of tumours is still through a metastatic solid biopsy unfortunately this approach is difficult to apply in the early stages of cancer. It is thought that by capturing CTCs liquid biopsies could be performed to capture the break-away tumour cells floating in the peripheral bloodstream and allow for earlier detection.

Isolating and detecting these CTCs in the blood is technically very difficult due to their low abundance (a few per millilitre) to a large amount of other cells in the blood.

This hasnt stopped a group of researchers at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA and the California Nanosystems Institute at UCLA who have developed a system to do just this. They have designed an efficinet cell capture platform based on 3D nanoscale silicon pillars with far higher efficiency then any other method.

This revolutionary cell capture technique has a very viability, which means the cells can be extracted and grown in culture allowing molecular diagnosis of cancer. Ultimately this would allow for earlier detection of cancer. This in itself would allow for a better prognosis with disease diagnosis. As with many types of cancer early detection allows for more successful treatment.

Not only this as measuring abundance of cancer cells in the peripheral blood will allow for monitoring the efficacy of cancer treatments to monitor disease regression. – CT

Source: Nanowerk

Image: Annie Cavanagh, Wellcome images

NanoMedicine will revolutionise the way we view and treat disease.

If Medical Nanotechnology were to only achieve a fraction of its potential it would provide a new era of health and longevity for human life.

NanoMedicine would provide a way of detecting disease before patients would even display symptoms and provide a way of treating that disease without side effects.
It could provide a way of detecting disease at the cellular level in the earliest stages of disease. New techniques being developed would do away with lengthy waits for results of diagnostic tests and would provide instantaneous diagnosis. The earlier a disease is diagnosed the earlier it can be treated an often the more successful the treatment would be.

With current techniques in development tailored drug delivery could become commonplace in a clinical setting. This would enable treatment of cancer without side effects. Targeted drug delivery systems would mean the cancer drugs would only affect the cancerous cells sparing the healthy cells. Negating the usual effects of chemo and radiotherapies, whilst simultaneously having a higher efficacy.

Nanoparticles inside prostate tumor cells stained green courtesy of the Burnham Institute for Medical Research.

Presently many Nanotechnologies in Medicine are still only at experimental and early trial levels.
At MedicalNanotec we provide up to date information and news from the cutting edge of scientific advancement in Medical Nanotechnology. Head over to our blog to read the newest information… – CT

Nanotechnology is the term given to the study of matter control at an atomic and molecular level. Nanotechnology is loosely defined as structures, which are smaller than 100 nanometres also known as 10-9.

One of the prominent problems still facing nanotechnology is how it should be defined. Most definitions include the study and control of phenomena and materials, which are smaller then 100nm. It is often stated that the average human hair is 80,000nm wide giving a perspective of the scale that nanotechnologists work at.

Many argue that any definition of nanotechnology must include a reference to molecular systems and devices. Many nanotechnology ‘purists’ even go as far to say that the definition must contain a reference to ‘functional systems’.
Maybe the easiest way to form a definition about nanotechnology is to ask academics in the field how they themselves would define the field that they work in. This has been done in the inaugural issue of Nature Nanotechnology, which has asked 13 researchers from a variety of fields what nanotechnology means to them.

Picture courtesy of DOE.

Some experts caution against a definition of Nanotechnology based on size, which would rule out many materials and devices including pharmaceuticals.

Highlighted as an important factor to add to the definition is that nano-structures must be man-made. Otherwise the definition would have to include every natural bio-molecule, in effect redefining much of what occurs in chemistry and molecular biology into ‘nanotechnology’.

The most important determinant is that a nano-structure must posses the important size-dependent quantum effects that are exclusively due to its nano-scale size.

A great definition has come from Nanowerk defining nanotechnology as:

‘The study of phenomena and manipulation of materials at atomic, molecular and macromolecular scales, where properties differ significantly from those at a larger scale; and nanotechnologies as the design, characterisation, production and application of structures, devices and systems by controlling shape and size at the nanometer scale.’

What is the significance of the Nano-scale?

People are interested in the nano-scale as at this scale the way materials act begins to differ to the way materials of a larger scale would usually act.

But nanotechnology is not a new thing, chemists have been creating polymers from nano-scale materials, nanotechnology has been used to create the features on computer chips for over 20 years now. However, new developments in the field have allowed the examination and manipulation of materials at the nano-scale, which has allowed the development of nanotechnology as a new and exciting field.

Video Introduction to Nanotechnology from Richard Feynman’s classic lecture in 1959 entitled ‘There’s Plenty of Room at the Bottom – An Invitation to Enter a New Field of Physics.’

The properties of materials change at the nano-scale due to the difference of properties, which are described by quantum physics. For example materials of grain sizes around 10nm may be as much as seven times as tough as their ordinary counterparts with grain sizes bigger then 100nm.

Nanomaterials have a larger surface area compared to the same mass of material produced in a larger form, making these materials more chemically reactive, changing their strength or electrical properties.

How can Nanotechnology be used?

To date nanotechnology has been used in coatings for surfaces i.e. self-cleaning windows, in electronics, cosmetics and environmental applications. The ability to engineer precisely at the nano-scale has had huge benefits for the production of industrial components for information and communication technologies, automotive and aerospace industries.

A very exciting new avenue for nanotechnology is its application into a clinical setting to create new avenues for treating and possibly preventing disease. - CT

In essence Nano medicine is the application of Nanotechnology in Medicine, which can also be termed Medical Nanotechnology.

Nano Meidcine describes the highly specific treatment of disease at the molecular level.

Nanotechnology has many perspective applications in Medicine ranging from nano-silver paint for bacterial growth prevention to medical imaging and treatment of disease.

There are very exciting new techniques being developed to utilize nanotechnology to treat a multitude of diseases. Notably there is a large amount of research being conducted into techniques for targeted drug delivery.
Nano medicine is the next step in medical advancement allowing the treatment of disease at the cellular level. This would allow treatments to be as non-invasive as possible whilst at the same time only affecting diseased areas of the body.

Bright green/yellow showing cancer drug entering a cancerous cell from purdue.edu

There are still many problems to be addressed in terms of disease treatment. Nano medicine provides a new avenue for developing ways of combating these stumbling blocks. For instance for many ailments surgery is an inevitability, but surgery can be very damaging to the body. Many patients may have complications after surgery or reductions in quality of life. With Nanotechnology it may be possible to treat disease in a non-invasive way. A prime example of this is the treatment of tumors with a reduction in side-effects, through the development of targeted drug delivery systems negating the need for the poison, slash and burn techniques currently used in medicine for their treatment.

Nano Medicine is a hugely interdisciplinary field with the need for collaboration between many disciplines in science to aid the implementation of novel Nanotechnologies in medicine. – CT

Bioengineers at Duke University have developed a simple and importantly inexpensive method for loading nano-scale delivery vehicles with cancer drug payloads. This nanoformulation was shown to eliminate tumours after a single treatment. In a great step forward for limiting toxicity the nano-scale delivery vehicle breaks down into harmless byproducts after delivery of the drug.

These nano-delivery systems have become very attractive to researchers because of their ability to infiltrate efficiently into tumour cells. The nano-formulations make use of the leaky more porous blood vessels that supply tumours to accumulate easilyin the tumour cells. This means a higher concentration of drug is delivered efficiently to the tumour cells with a lower dosage administered. This reduces the side-effects associated with systemic chemotherapy administration.

Results showed that the nano-formulation increased the maximum tolerated dose of the drug four-fold compared to the drug by itself. This meant that after one injection it created almost complete tumour regression, whereas the drug by itself would usually have only a modest effect in shrinking the tumours.

Just as importantly the research team have produced a delivery system that is inexpensive and could be used with other drugs, which could be used to increase the effectiveness of other drugs.

The delivery system uses E. coli bacteria which have been genetically engineered to produce an artificial peptide known as chimeric polypeptide. E. coli having been used so often to produce proteins is a very efficient producer of these proteins giving a high yield.

When the drug associates with the chimeric polypeptide it can take on characteristics it doesn’t usually posses. Most drugs do not dissolve in water, which limits their ability to be taken up by cells. Attachment to the chimeric polypeptide allows it to become soluble in water.

The latest experiments using this delivery system involved the use of doxorubicin commonly used in the treatment of blood cancers, breast, ovarian and other cancers.

The team at Duke are now looking at testing the formulation on different cancers in different organs. – CT

Source: Nanowerk

CLINAM: The third conference for clinical nanomedicine will give an insight into state of the art clinical nanomedicine and will report the most recent findings in the field.

The conference will introduce the unsolved medical problems that are awaiting novel techniques for addressing them. From this base the debate will turn to how nanotechnologies involvement could help find a novel approach to treating disease. Giving clear views on how Nanotechnology can be applied to medicine. The conference gives a great format for in depth discussions about the topics covered.

Translating the knowledge to practice is the subtitle of the 2010 conference, which underlines the aim of translating research in nanotechnology to frontline treatment of patients and to find the best way of doing this.

The reasons to go to CLINAM 2010:

• Meet at the established interdisciplinary Event on Clinical Nanomedicine
• Attend the clinical meeting to further the acceleration of the development of Nanomedicine.
• Use Europe’s largest platform in Europe for debate between clinical researchers, scientists, engineers and experts from medicine, physics, chemistry, pharmacy, biology, biochemistry and materials science.
• Discuss the promise and limits and implications of Nanomedical tools, techniques, and materials in the context of unsolved medical problems.
• Investigate the clinical evidence from established nanodrugs.

There will be many exhibitions running throughout the conference with places reserved for universities and institutions.- CT

Find ore information at CLINAM.org

Professor Errki Ruoslahti of the University of California Santa Barbara’s Burnham Institute for Medical Research has been awarded $2.8 million to develop ‘Hybrid nanotechnologies for detection and synergistic therapies of breast cancer’.

The research team are developing new diagnostic tools to improve early detection, and reduce unnecessary procedures. This will be achieved through the use of nanoparticles as a contrast agent to aid the detection of tumours, which at present would not be detected by MRI. This would both help to diagnose a tumor and help stage its development.

This highlights the promise of nanomedicine for the future. As nanoparticles can be engineered to perform a diverse set of functions, such as targeting to a tumour for both synergistic diagnostics and treatment by targeting a therapeutic agent with the nanoparticle. – CT

Source: UCSB