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Air Force Treating Wounds With Lasers and Nanotech

•By Katie Drummond •May 5, 2010

Forget stitches and old-school sutures. The Air Force is funding scientists who are using nano-technology and lasers to seal up wounds at a molecular level.

It might sound like Star Trek tech, but it’s actually the latest in a series of ambitious Pentagon efforts to create faster, more effective methods of treating war-zone injuries.

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Ultrasensitive imaging method uses gold-silver 'nanocages'

WEST LAFAYETTE, Ind. - New research findings suggest that an experimental ultrasensitive medical imaging technique that uses a pulsed laser and tiny metallic "nanocages" might enable both the early detection and treatment of disease.

The system works by shining near-infrared laser pulses through the skin to detect hollow nanocages and solid nanoparticles - made of an alloy of gold and silver - that are injected into the bloodstream.

Unlike previous approaches using tiny metallic nanorods and nanospheres, the new technique does not cause heat damage to tissue being imaged. Another advantage is that it does not produce a background "auto fluorescent" glow of surrounding tissues, which interferes with the imaging and reduces contrast and brightness, said Ji-Xin Cheng (pronounced Gee-Shin), an associate professor of biomedical engineering and chemistry at Purdue University.

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UCLA researchers create 'fly paper' to capture circulating cancer cells

New method may help improve diagnosis, prognosis and treatment monitoring

By Rachel Champeau November 18, 2009

Just as fly paper captures insects, an innovative new device with nano-sized features developed by researchers at UCLA is able to grab cancer cells in the blood that have broken off from a tumor. 

 

These cells, known as circulating tumor cells, or CTCs, can provide critical information for examining and diagnosing cancer metastasis, determining patient prognosis, and monitoring the effectiveness of therapies. 

 

Metastasis — the most common cause of cancer-related death in patients with solid tumors — is caused by marauding tumor cells that leave the primary tumor site and ride in the bloodstream to set up colonies in other parts of the body. 

 

The current gold standard for examining the disease status of tumors is an analysis of metastatic solid biopsy samples, but in the early stages of metastasis, it is often difficult to identify a biopsy site. By capturing CTCs, doctors can essentially perform a "liquid" biopsy, allowing for early detection and diagnosis, as well as improved treatment monitoring.

 

To date, several methods have been developed to track these cells, but the UCLA team's novel "fly paper" approach may be faster and cheaper than others — and it appears to capture far more CTCs.

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Small Nanoparticles Bring Big Improvement to Medical Imaging

If you’re watching the complex processes in a living cell, it is easy to miss something important—especially if you are watching changes that take a long time to unfold and require high-spatial-resolution imaging. But new research* makes it possible to scrutinize activities that occur over hours or even days inside cells, potentially solving many of the mysteries associated with molecular-scale events occurring in these tiny living things.

A joint research team, working at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) and the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases (NIAID), has discovered a method of using nanoparticles to illuminate the cellular interior to reveal these slow processes. Nanoparticles, thousands of times smaller than a cell, have a variety of applications. One type of nanoparticle called a quantum dot glows when exposed to light. These semiconductor particles can be coated with organic materials, which are tailored to be attracted to specific proteins within the part of a cell a scientist wishes to examine.

“Quantum dots last longer than many organic dyes and fluorescent proteins that we previously used to illuminate the interiors of cells,” says biophysicist Jeeseong Hwang, who led the team on the NIST side. “They also have the advantage of monitoring changes in cellular processes while most high-resolution techniques like electron microscopy only provide images of cellular processes frozen at one moment. Using quantum dots, we can now elucidate cellular processes involving the dynamic motions of proteins.”

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Step forward for nanotechnology: Controlled movement of molecules

Scientists in the United Kingdom are reporting an advance toward overcoming one of the key challenges in nanotechnology: Getting molecules to move quickly in a desired direction without help from outside forces. The study is scheduled for the October issue of ACS Nano, a monthly journal.

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Engineers produce 'how-to' guide for controlling the structure of nanoparticles

Engineers produce 'how-to' guide for controlling the structure of nanoparticles

Tiny objects known as nanoparticles are often heralded as holding great potential for future applications in electronics, medicine and other areas. The properties of nanoparticles depend on their size and structure. Now researchers from North Carolina State University have learned how to consistently create hollow, solid and amorphous nanoparticles of nickel phosphide, which has potential uses in the development of solar cells and as catalysts for removing sulfur from fuel. Their work can now serve as a "how-to" guide for other researchers to controllably create hollow, solid and amorphous nanoparticles – in order to determine what special properties they may have.

The study provides a step-by-step analysis of how to create solid or hollow nanoparticles that are all made of the same material. "It's been known that these structures could be made," says Dr. Joe Tracy, an assistant professor of material science engineering at NC State and co-author of the paper, "but this research provides us with a comprehensive understanding of nanostructural control during nanoparticle formation, showing how to consistently obtain different structures in the lab." The study also shows how to create solid nanoparticles that are amorphous, meaning they do not have a crystalline structure.

Tracy explains that there is a great deal of interest in the formation of hollow nanoparticles and amorphous nanoparticles. But for many kinds of nanoparticles, there had previously been no clear understanding of how to control the formation of these structures. As a result of the new study, Tracy says, "nanoparticles with desired structures can be made more consistently, making it easier for researchers to determine their electronic, optical and catalytic properties." For example, amorphous nanoparticles may be of use in future electronic applications or for nanostructure fabrication. Tracy stresses that while the NC State researchers were able to show how to create hollow nanoparticles and amorphous nanoparticles, they were not able to create nanoparticles that were both hollow and amorphous.

The study could also have implications for many additional types of nanoparticles, not just nickel phosphide. Tracy says that the findings "could provide important insights for further studies to control the structures of many other kinds of nanoparticles, with a wide array of potential applications." These could include metal oxide, sulfide, selenide and phosphide nanoparticles.

Specifically, the researchers found that they could control whether nickel phosphide nanoparticles would be hollow or solid by adjusting the ratio of phosphorus to nickel reactants when they synthesized the nanoparticles. The researchers found that they could create amorphous solid nanoparticles by controlling the temperature.

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The study, "Nickel Phosphide Nanoparticles with Hollow, Solid, and Amorphous Structures," was co-authored by Tracy, NC State post-doctoral researcher Junwei Wang and NC State Ph.D. student Aaron Johnston-Peck. The research was funded by NC State and the National Science Foundation, and was published online by Chemistry of Materials.

Contact: Matt Shipman
matt_shipman@ncsu.edu
919-515-6386
North Carolina State University

Therapeutic Nanoparticles Give New Meaning to Sugar-Coating Medicine

A research team at NIST studying sugar-coated nanoparticles for use as a possible cancer therapy has uncovered a delicate balancing act that makes the particles more effective than conventional thinking says they should be. Just like individuals in a crowd respecting other people's personal space, the particles work because they get close together, but not too close.

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New Nanochemistry Technique Encases Single Molecules in Microdroplets

Inventing a useful new tool for creating chemical reactions between single molecules, scientists at NIST have employed microfluidics to make microdroplets that each contain a single molecules of interest. By combining this new microfluidic with techniques to merge multiple droplets, the research may ultimately lead to new information on the structure and function of important organic materials such as proteins, enzymes, and DNA.

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Using magnetism to turn drugs on and off

Many medical conditions, such as chronic pain, cancer and diabetes, require medications that cannot be taken orally, but must be dosed intermittently, on an as-needed basis, over a long period of time. Researchers at Children's Hospital Boston have devised a drug delivery solution that combines magnetism with nanotechnology.

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Nanotechnology treatment for burns reduces infection, inflammation

Treating second-degree burns with a nanoemulsion lotion sharply curbs bacterial growth and reduces inflammation that otherwise can jeopardize recovery, University of Michigan scientists have shown in initial laboratory studies. The results are reported today at the Interscience Conference for Antimicrobial Agents and Chemotherapy. 

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