What if you could plaster cancer cells with glowing "Here We Are" signs, so surgeons could be confident that they'd removed every last speck of a tumor? That's what Haiying Liu has in mind for his new fluorescent probe.
"Doctors need to pinpoint cancer tissue, but that can be hard," said Liu, a chemistry professor at Michigan Technological University. Test-tube cancer antibodies coupled with special enzymes have been used to highlight malignancies during surgery, since they bind to tumor cells, but they have a drawback.
"They are colorless," he said. "You can label something, but if you can't see it, that's a problem." Now Liu has developed a probe that could cling to those enzyme-coated antibodies and make them glow under fluorescent light. The journal Analytic Chimica Acta recently published the research.
The fluorescent probe has some appealing medical properties:
The probe bonds to an enzyme that has a long track record in medical science. Beta-galactosidase has been widely used to label a variety of antibodies that have been used in multiple medical applications, including cancer surgery. "If we could make beta-galactosidase glow brightly during surgery, it could play a major role in improving outcomes," Liu said.
In the new paper, Liu's team showed how the probe bonds to beta-galactocidase in a solution of living cells. In the future, they would like to collaborate with medical researchers to refine their system, incorporating enzyme-labelled cancer antibodies and developing it as a guide for surgeons.
"Doctors want to remove all the cancer, but they also don't want to cut too much," Liu said. "We want to make their job a little easier."
Materials provided by Michigan Technological University. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.
Disclaimer: DoveMed is not responsible for the accuracy of the adapted version of news releases posted to DoveMed by contributing universities and institutions.
Primary Resource:
Jingtuo Zhang, Cong Li, Colina Dutta, Mingxi Fang, Shuwei Zhang, Ashutosh Tiwari, Thomas Werner, Fen-Tair Luo, Haiying Liu. A novel near-infrared fluorescent probe for sensitive detection of β -galactosidase in living cells. Analytica Chimica Acta, 2017; DOI: 10.1016/j.aca.2017.02.039
and connect with fellow professionals
At DoveMed, our utmost priority is your well-being. We are an online medical resource dedicated to providing you with accurate and up-to-date information on a wide range of medical topics. But we're more than just an information hub - we genuinely care about your health journey. That's why we offer a variety of products tailored for both healthcare consumers and professionals, because we believe in empowering everyone involved in the care process.
Our mission is to create a user-friendly healthcare technology portal that helps you make better decisions about your overall health and well-being. We understand that navigating the complexities of healthcare can be overwhelming, so we strive to be a reliable and compassionate companion on your path to wellness.
As an impartial and trusted online resource, we connect healthcare seekers, physicians, and hospitals in a marketplace that promotes a higher quality, easy-to-use healthcare experience. You can trust that our content is unbiased and impartial, as it is trusted by physicians, researchers, and university professors around the globe. Importantly, we are not influenced or owned by any pharmaceutical, medical, or media companies. At DoveMed, we are a group of passionate individuals who deeply care about improving health and wellness for people everywhere. Your well-being is at the heart of everything we do.
0 Comments
Please log in to post a comment.