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MIT engineer creates cancer-detecting implant
Cancer victims have it rough. Not only is the disease incurable, but once you have it you get poked, prodded and tanked full of radioactive substances just to keep track of the tumor. That may not always be the case, however, now that Dr. Michael Cima at MIT has developed an implant capable of continuously monitoring a tumor.
Cima, a professor of materials science and engineering, created the cylinder-shaped, 0.2-inch-long implant, and stuffed it full of cancer-detecting nanoparticles. When cancer-related substances pass through the implant's porous membrane, they bind with the magnetic nanoparticles, which clump together in the implant. The result shows up loud and clear on an MRI scan.
The implant works on lab mice, and Cima believes it could be available for humans in the next few years. It's intended to be a tumor monitor for already diagnosed patients, but perhaps a future version could be implanted into healthy people who are at high risk of contracting cancer (for either genetic or environmental reasons) and might assist in catching the disease early. We can hope.
PhysOrg, via KurzweilAI.net
By Drone at 8:53 PM ON 07/21/09
"Not only is the disease incurable". This is nonsense. There are countless examples to the contrary.
By James Street at 1:17 AM ON 07/22/09
Go team go! This is the future of cancer research.
Also: If you can manage to implant devices that monitor other biological processes then you can evaluate the effectiveness of therapies.
I repeat: This is the future of cancer research and like all other revolutionary activities it is not seen, not understood and not funded.
So what. It's always been that way.
Continue and don't let the bastards get you down.
By pamelarose36 at 9:24 AM ON 07/22/09
All good stuff and we could get results faster if we could get all these guys sharing their ideas. Check this out:
http://news.bbc.co.uk/1/hi/health/7270913.stm
By MiaDoll87 at 10:25 AM ON 07/22/09
The fact that it is treatable does not make an illness curable. Many people who are treated and "cured" will get cancer again, and possibly multiple times. In other words, they are not "cured". Personally, I have heard from some doctors that there is in fact actual cures for cancer (at least some of them) but the FDA would not approve them, so they are not being used.
By JPWMS129 at 4:14 AM ON 07/23/09
They dont have ANY CURES for any ailment. "Common cold" - nope. Cancer - nope. Leukemia - nope. HIV - nope. Hep A-F - nope. etc etc etc.
No profit in curing people.
By Drone at 4:23 AM ON 07/24/09
Go ask Lance Armstrong if they cured him of cancer.
By IsoTek at 5:11 AM ON 07/28/09
"They dont have ANY CURES for any ailment"
Funny, I am sure that strep throat I had as a child went away after I took some penicillin.
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"They dont have ANY CURES for any ailment" Funny, I am sure that strep throat I had as a child went away after I t...More »