Scientists Use Nanorobots To Target Cancer Cells

There is research that was successfully carried out on mice that use nanorobots to navigate through the bloodstream to deliver drugs to the cancerous cells. The research was being carried out by teams from Polytechnique Montreal, Universite de Montreal and McGill University under the leadership of Professor Sylvain Martel. Nicole Beauchemin, a professor of Biochemistry, Medicine, and Oncology at McGill University and researcher at the Rosalind and Morris Goodman Cancer Research Center, is also the study's co-author.

Although human trials have not been announced yet, this is a huge breakthrough because chemotherapy is toxic for the entire human body and therefore treating a poison with poison. With the use of these nanorobots, which are actually a strain of bacteria known as MC-1 that is equipped with magnetic iron oxide nanocrystals. This means that these nanorobots are found in nature and are also self-propelled.

Professor Martel explains that the nanorobotic agents are loaded with drugs that are moved by taking the most direct path between the drug's injection point and the area of the body to cure. The bacteria enters a tumor, detects any oxygen-depleted tumor areas known as hypoxic zones (which are generally resistant to most therapies) and then inject the drug straight to them.

The way the nanorobots know where to go is through a synthesized chain of magnetic particles. The MC-1 will move in the direction of a computer controlled magnetic field while using a sensor to measure the concentration of oxygen in active tumor areas. This method of injecting the medication will target tumors without jeopardizing other organs and tissues and therefore lessens the meaning behind treating a poison with poison in this case.

With this new advancement in the treatment of cancer, we are getting closer to a cure to the disease. This is also an indication of the advancement in technology and medicine as a whole which may in the future allow for more and better treatments for numerous diseases.