The mini-microscope will see cancer cells freely circulating through the skin
A new method of detecting cancer cells will help fight metastases
Alexander Berezin, Compulenta
Existing diagnostic technologies detect cancer cells in the blood too late, while the fight against them is most effective at an early stage of the disease. The search for tumor cells directly in the patient's bloodstream promises to solve this vital problem.
It often happens that even after a visible cure from the disease, which is quite achievable with the detection of cancer in the early stages, a single cancer cell that has entered the blood can be transferred by it to any other organ or tissue and take root there, threatening a relapse.
Tumor cells freely circulating in the blood are dangerous even singly.
Naturally, taking a few milliliters of blood does not always allow you to find them.
(Here and below are illustrations by L.A. Cicero.)These freely circulating tumor cells, of course, are not a secret for doctors: after successful anticancer therapy, blood is taken from the patient and with the help of special antibodies they try to identify the "seeds" of a potential next-generation tumor.
The technique is quite workable, but with one condition: the number of freely circulating tumor cells in the blood should be very large. Meanwhile, it is at such moments that cancer has usually already managed to gain a foothold somewhere else, that is, the most profitable moment to fight it has been missed: the early stage of the disease development in a new place has already ended. What should I do?
A group of engineers, scientists and doctors from Stanford University (USA) is developing a mini-microscope capable of noninvasively detecting such cells earlier than is possible now. Of course, this gives a much greater chance to take preventive actions against them and strike a preemptive blow against the second wave of cancer in the body.
The project was the result of the joint efforts of engineer Olav Solgaard, surgeon Geoffrey Gurtner and oncologist Michael Clarke. Their method is based not on the analysis of a single blood sample taken from a patient, but on in vivo flow cytometry. In other words, the cells are fixed directly in the body using a laser.
To do this, a harmless dye is injected into the patient's bloodstream, under the influence of which fluorescence appears in freely circulating tumor cells – and only in them. The doctor only needs a pen-sized microscope for diagnosis, which focuses a low-power laser (in fact, not much different from a banal laser pointer) on a blood vessel passing slightly below the surface of the patient's skin. Thanks to the coherent light of the laser, which plays the role of illumination for a fluorescent tumor cell, the trace of the illuminated object is easily visible. By observing the blood flow in a large vessel, the doctor will be able to analyze the amount of blood that is tens and hundreds of times higher than what is taken to search for cancer cells today. I want to believe that the desired tumor cell with this approach will not be able to hide.
In case the angle of illumination is unsuccessful, the microscope is equipped with a counter of colored cells that keeps automatic records.
The new method requires a single injection of dye and a pen-sized microscope.Now the authors of the development are testing the technique on mice, and sick animals are easily detected at any stage of the disease.
Next in line (and, as they say, very soon) is the testing of a microscope with an automatic search for cancer cells in humans. In the meantime, clinical trials of an already certified green dye for highlighting cells in the blood vessels of patients who have undergone treatment for breast cancer are underway.
The developers expect from their technology "a sharp leap in the effectiveness of cancer detection in the early stages," hoping that its implementation will decisively facilitate the treatment of cancer patients. We join their aspirations!
Prepared based on materials from Stanford University: Stanford scientists build a microscope to spot the seeds of cancer.
Portal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru02.10.2013