Slashdot Mirror
Extremely Accurate Nanotech Cancer Test Developed
Sylvestre writes "Medical News Today reports that Harvard researchers have developed an accurate test for cancer using nanotechnology. From the article: 'Harvard University researchers have found that molecular markers indicating the presence of cancer in the body are readily detected in blood scanned by special arrays of silicon nanowires -- even when these cancer markers constitute only one hundred-billionth of the protein present in a drop of blood. In addition to this exceptional accuracy and sensitivity, the minuscule devices also promise to pinpoint the exact type of cancer present with a speed not currently available to clinicians.'"
God promised that the cure for cancer would be discovered at Oral Roberts University! Oral even said so!
-jcr
The only title of honor that a tyrant can grant is "Enemy of the State."
Wouldn't easy, reliable testing be good for hypochondriacs? Then they'd be able to tell, conclusively, that they're not sick!
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
Given that this tests blood samples outside of the body, I would expect military uses to be more along the lines of detecting exposure to chemical/biological/radioactive agents, rather than detecting battle wounds.
"[Regarding the 'cloud,'] ownership was what made America different than Russia." -- Woz
I have a nano cure for thirst. Nano-H2O contains nanoscopic molecules of water that will quench your thirst. Best of all, it's for sale now!
Oh great! Not only has my Nano been cursed with a delicate screen that invites scratches, now it seems it's capable of succumbing to cancer as well.
So, where do all the waste products go after the cells are exploded or rendered sterile? Out via #1 and #2?
They've developed this cool new super-accurate test. Great. But they're probably not going to make the test free -- so not everyone will be able to afford it.
Without this test, rich and poor will have a more equal chance of dieing of undiagnosed cancers. Therefore, they shouldn't have developed this test.
My leftist friends told me inequality is bad.
"It is a most extraordinary thing, but I never read a patent medicine advertisement without being impelled to the conclusion that I am suffering from the particular disease therein dealt with in its most virulent form. The diagnosis seems in every case to correspond exactly with all the sensations that I have ever felt.
I remember going to the British Museum one day to read up the treatment for some slight ailment of which I had a touch--hay fever, I fancy it was. I got down the book, and read all I came to read; and then, in an unthinking moment, I idly turned the leaves, and began to indolently study diseases, generally. I forget which was the first distemper I plunged into--some fearful, devastating scourge, I know--and, before I had glanced half down the list of "premonitory symptoms," it was borne in upon me that I had fairly got it.
I sat for awhile, frozen with horror; and then, in the listlessness of despair, I again turned over the pages. I came to typhoid fever--read the symptoms--discovered that I had typhoid fever, must have had it for months without knowing it--wondered what else I had got; turned up St. Vitus's Dance--found, as I expected, that I had that too,--began to get interested in my case, and determined to sift it to the bottom, and so started alphabetically--read up ague, and learnt that I was sickening for it, and that the acute stage would commence in about another fortnight. Bright's disease, I was relieved to find, I had only in a modified form, and, so far as that was concerned, I might live for years. Cholera I had, with severe complications; and diphtheria I seemed to have been born with. I plodded conscientiously through the twenty-six letters, and the only malady I could conclude I had not got was housemaid's knee.
I felt rather hurt about this at first; it seemed somehow to be a sort of slight. Why hadn't I got housemaid's knee? Why this invidious reservation? After a while, however, less grasping feelings prevailed. I reflected that I had every other known malady in the pharmacology, and I grew less selfish, and determined to do without housemaid's knee. Gout, in its most malignant stage, it would appear, had seized me without my being aware of it; and zymosis I had evidently been suffering with from boyhood. There were no more diseases after zymosis, so I concluded there was nothing else the matter with me.
I sat and pondered. I thought what an interesting case I must be from a medical point of view, what an acquisition I should be to a class! Students would have no need to "walk the hospitals," if they had me. I was a hospital in myself. All they need do would be to walk round me, and, after that, take their diploma.
Then I wondered how long I had to live. I tried to examine myself. I felt my pulse. I could not at first feel any pulse at all. Then, all of a sudden, it seemed to start off. I pulled out my watch and timed it. I made it a hundred and forty-seven to the minute. I tried to feel my heart. I could not feel my heart. It had stopped beating. I have since been induced to come to the opinion that it must have been there all the time, and must have been beating, but I cannot account for it. I patted myself all over my front, from what I call my waist up to my head, and I went a bit round each side, and a little way up the back. But I could not feel or hear anything. I tried to look at my tongue. I stuck it out as far as ever it would go, and I shut one eye, and tried to examine it with the other. I could only see the tip, and the only thing that I could gain from that was
As a state gets corrupt, its laws multiply; the most corrupt states have the most numerous laws. (Tacitus, Annales 3:27)
I was actually curious. :P
30 years later...
Welcome to Gattaca.
It takes a man to suffer ignorance and smile
Be yourself no matter what they say
If we could detect those cells or other cells influenced by their passing we could find the cancer and irradicate it (Perhaps through microwaves?)
Thanks to this new test we will be able to detect *and* eradicate cancer without leaving the kitchen!
P.S. Is it ok to assume that "irradicate" means "eradicate by irradiation"?
Wonder if they can adapt this to be an accurate test for prion related disease like BSE (mad cow disiease). If it could be used for both humans AND other animals, the food supply could become safer.
Personally, I have no plans to eat humans, whether they have BSE or not ;)
Be relentless!