Slashdot Mirror
X-rays For Stargazing Turn Into Cancer Treatment
derGoldstein writes "Discovery posted an interesting story of how X-rays that are used by astronomers for determining the various chemical abundances inside stars could also potentially be used for more effective radiation therapy: 'Radiation treatment is a coarse instrument at best, since it destroys surrounding healthy cells as well as cancerous tumors. Much research is underway for targeted methods to reduce the collateral damage and attack just the cancer cells, including embedding nanoparticles inside tumors ... Nahar and Pradham envision a prototype device capable of generating x-rays (gzipped PDF) at the key frequencies to trigger a flood of low-energy electrons in platinum and gold, based on their computer simulations. Gold or platinum nanoparticles would amass naturally in cancerous tumors in the body, and could then be zapped with the focused x-ray beam.'"
Question is do the cancer cells naturally accumulate gold and platinum when other cells do not, and if so, why?
They scientists discovered a unique property of certain x-rays that will cause metals like gold and platinum to emit electrons that can kill cancer but the electrons aren't powerful enough to damage neighboring cells. This discovery was made by astrophysicists who were doing computer simulation of emission spectrum of all the different elements so they could get a better understanding of the composition of stars. Now if you actually read the article you would have known this, it isn't very long and is a fairly easy read even for someone who isn't in the field.
Time to offend someone
Are you sure that subluxations aren't somehow involved? You remind me of somebody...
The purpose is to surround the metals with a small layer of plasma. This plasma is what kills the cancer cells.
This plasma will only occur where
a) there is gold/platinum
b) where they focus the X-rays. Focusing the X-rays is done just like your gamma knife: multiple beams from different directions, converging on the tumor.
Since liver and kidneys are not radiated, you get no plasma there...
So it's more precise than only using converging beams of X-rays.
They're not oblivious to that fact. That's the whole point. The aim is to get more effective therapy with lower doses of X-rays.
If this plasma method only requires half the X-rays for the same effect, you will affect the healthy tissue 50% less.
Cancer treatment already isn't cheap. The small amount of gold an platinum this would require will be swamped by the rounding error on the bill.
It's actually in the summary as well:
"...X-rays that are used by astronomers for determining the various chemical abundances inside stars..."
So he complained after reading the headline, and part of the summary. In true Slashdot fashion.
Entomologically speaking, the spider is not a bug, it's a feature.