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Detecting Cancer Without Drawing Blood

Posted by kdawson on from the you'll-feel-a-slight-pinch dept.

An anonymous reader informs us of research out of Purdue that allows for early detection of cancer without a blood sample. The technique involves shining laser light on surface veins, such as those in the wrist or cheek.

10 of 72 comments (clear)

  1. Use a dog by jag7720 · · Score: 4, Informative

    Dogs have been used to sniff out cancer patience for a long time... plus they are a lot more friendly and playful than a laser.

    1. Re:Use a dog by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Funny

      Then I must have a lot of butt cancer.

  2. "What's your sign?"... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 3, Funny

    ...always seems to work for me! ;)

  3. Re:This was already posted ./ by GeckoX · · Score: 3, Informative

    What're you asking for exactly?
    It's very common for there to be multiple versions of the same story in the firehose, editors pick the best.

    In this case, they picked the one that linked to the actual news release, not to a secondary news source as you suggest they should have.

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    No Comment.
  4. Re:This was already posted ./ by nonsequitor · · Score: 3, Insightful

    Technically its not a dupe, its still in the firehose. Additionally this had the better of the 2 summaries. You'll notice MANY dupes on the firehose, so its not even a big deal.

    Learn how slashdot works before telling editors they're doing it wrong. Oh wait, carry on.

  5. Sample Size by the+eric+conspiracy · · Score: 4, Informative

    The real advantage of this technique is that it allows measurement of a larger size sample. There is still an injection of the florescent label, but by scanning the body surface a much larger blood sample can be monitored which makes this method more sensitive - making detection at an early stage better.

  6. Sharks by BlowHole666 · · Score: 3, Funny

    Does the Laser come with its own shark?

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  7. Re:Next step - zapping? by Maximum+Prophet · · Score: 3, Informative

    I was thinking the exact same thing, using something like a gamma knife. Gamma rays have a wavelength much smaller than cells, so you could use several beams to target individual cells. Each beam wouldn't be lethal, but when combined, they would kill the cell. There are techniques using femto-second lasers to release the laser energy at a specific depth. Now, all you need is a femto-second gamma ray laser...

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  8. my dog is better suited to detect cancer by DragonTHC · · Score: 3, Interesting

    There are people who are training hound dogs to detect cancer in people.

    The dogs are better suited to the task than some million dollar laser beam.
    http://news.nationalgeographic.com/news/2004/08/08 20_040820_detectordogs.html

    Dogs are cheaper to train and maintain. And, they provide therapy for those who are proven positive.

    It's win-win.

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    They're using their grammar skills there.
  9. Re:New? by ColdWetDog · · Score: 3, Informative
    This is not a screening test. You have to know exactly what cancer you have, make tagged cells with the correct antibodies to said cancer, inject those cells and then the Magic Machine counts them. You could conceivably use this to screen for a specific cancer if you did all that work to make the target, but I really doubt that will ever prove practical.

    This would be for evaluating treatments of known cancers.

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