Cure for Cancer: Cellular Cyborgs
In the campaign against cancer your body is the battlefield. Which kind of sucks, because while we can easily burn and blast tumors to ash the collateral damage forbids such dramatic tactics. Advances in targeting techniques such as metallic nanorods to focus lasers are the smart bombs of this struggle, but some scientists have asked a brilliant question: why not just arm the locals?
MIT researchers are doing exactly that. Human immune B and T cells already know what they have to do - they naturally home in on tumor sites in the body - the problem is they can't do it when they get there. The B cell's antibodies ping harmlessly off the malignancy, while T cell cytotoxic attacks just can't get the job done.
The scientists have shown that they can arm this natural defense force with tiny chemical backpacks, turning them into the coolest little cyber-cells ever to grace a bloodstream. By grafting on a polymer chemical container the cells can carry a chemical payload. Dyes and pigments can be used to paint tumors, making them easier to detect, allowing a follow up with chemotherapeutic cargos.
The tiny backpacks are bonded to the surface of the cells, but cover a small enough area to allow their host to function normally. It might seem that such a minute munition wouldn't be useful, which is why it uses the same strategy as the body - make loads of them. The backpacks can be added to cells en masse, chemically designed to hook on to passing cells in a temperature controlled process which allows them to be produced tanks at a time.
Doctors using these combat corpuscles can provide intelligence as well as ammunition: when tiny magnetic particles are added to the patch, the carriers can be steered by remotely applied magnetic fields for pinpoint precision.
Nanotech-enabled cyber-immune cells. Curing cancer and cooler than sci-fi.
By Luke McKinney
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