Chemotherapy “is made a THIRD more effective” with magnetic nanoparticles

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Chemotherapy Using Magnetic Nanoparticles To Heat Cancer Cells To Over 104 ° F While Drugs Are Delivered Is A THIRD More Effective, Study Finds

  • Cancer cells are vulnerable to heat and can be attacked with magnetic particles
  • They cling to the tumor cells and a magnetic field causes them to heat up
  • This increases their sensitivity to chemo drugs carried by the nanoparticles

By Joe Pinkstone for Mailonline

Published: | Updated:

Chemotherapy could be up to 34 percent more effective thanks to a new technique that combines the treatment with magnetic particles that bake cancer cells.

Researchers at University College London found that the combination of heat and chemotherapy makes the process more effective.

Small magnetic nanoparticles attach to a tumor’s cancer cells and also carry the chemotherapy drug.

When doctors apply a harmless magnetic field from outside the body to the area, it activates the magnetic properties of the nanoparticles and causes them to heat up, heating the trapped cancer cells.

Research shows that this damages the tumor and makes it more vulnerable to pre-existing drugs.

Chemotherapy is made up to 34 percent more effective thanks to a new technique that combines the treatment with magnetic particles that boil the cancer cells (stock photo)

Chemotherapy is made up to 34 percent more effective thanks to a new technique that combines the treatment with magnetic particles that boil the cancer cells (stock photo)

The study has only been tested in a lab so far, but researchers say the early findings are significant.

Human breast cancer cells, glioblastoma (brain cancer) cells and mouse prostate cancer cells were all treated in a test tube with this new technique.

Doxorubicin – a widely used chemo drug – was applied to the magnetic nanoparticles.

Small magnetic nanoparticles carry the chemotherapy drug and also attach to the cancer cells of a tumor. When doctors apply a harmless magnetic field to the area from outside the body, the nanoparticles begin to heat up, heating the cancer cells

Small magnetic nanoparticles carry the chemotherapy drug and also attach themselves to the cancer cells of a tumor. When doctors apply a harmless magnetic field from outside the body to the area, the nanoparticles begin to heat up, heating the cancer cells

The results, which have been peer reviewed and published in the Journal of Materials Chemistry B, show promising results for the experimental method.

Heat and doxorubicin together killed 98 percent of brain cancer cells after 48 hours. The drug killed only 73 percent of the cells when applied without heat.

For the breast cancer cells, 89 percent of the cancer was eliminated by the combination, and this drops to just 77 percent for the drug alone.

Senior author Professor Nguyen TK Thanh said: ‘Our study demonstrates the enormous potential of combining chemotherapy with heat treatment delivered through magnetic nanoparticles.

While this combination of therapy has already been approved for the treatment of fast-growing glioblastomas, our results suggest it has the potential to be more widely used as a broad anti-cancer therapy.

This therapy also has the potential to reduce the side effects of chemotherapy, by ensuring that it targets cancer cells more than a healthy problem. This needs to be explored in further preclinical testing. ‘

WHY CAN’T CHEMO WORK?

Cancer cells can figure out how to resist chemotherapy.

There are several reasons why this can happen.

The cells that are not killed can mutate and change in response, repair the DNA damaged by the drug, or develop a mechanism that renders it useless.

Therefore, the success of the drugs often depends on the failure of the cancer cell’s repair mechanisms.

Cancer cells can produce hundreds of copies of a particular gene, also known as gene amplification, causing an overproduction of a protein that stops the effectiveness of the treatment.

Cancer cells are sometimes able to push the drug on their own, using a molecule called p-glycoprotein.

Since chemotherapy is the first line of treatment, it is a major concern if it does not work.

Professor Workman, CEO of The Institute for Cancer Research, said: “ The ability of cancer to adapt, evolve and become drug resistant is the cause of the vast majority of deaths from the disease and the largest challenge we face in overcoming it. ‘

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