Radioactive injectable polymer safely kills tumors in mice

Posted by Leanne Kodsman on

Duke University scientists and their colleagues have concocted a new way to combat tumors. In short, they successfully tested a nontoxic injectable polymer in mice that eliminates the need for surgical implantation of radioactive seeds.

The journal Cancer Research published details of the finding. As HealthDay News and Ivanhoe Newswire report, the researchers focused their studies in mice that carried either human head and neck cancer, or prostate cancer. Simply put, they injected into the tumors a radioactive peptide polymer solution that responded to heat. Once injected, the material spontaneously assembled into radioactive seeds.


Duke University scientists and their colleagues have concocted a new way to combat tumors. In short, they successfully tested a nontoxic injectable polymer in mice that eliminates the need for surgical implantation of radioactive seeds.

The journal Cancer Research published details of the finding. As HealthDay News and Ivanhoe Newswire report, the researchers focused their studies in mice that carried either human head and neck cancer, or prostate cancer. Simply put, they injected into the tumors a radioactive peptide polymer solution that responded to heat. Once injected, the material spontaneously assembled into radioactive seeds.

The results: all of the mice experienced delayed tumor growth after the injections. For 67 of the mice, a single injection wiped their tumors out. There are high hopes for this concept, because the polymer was shown to be both effective and minimally toxic to healthy tissue in the mouse studies

Longer term, scientists hope this can be a viable option to brachytherapy, where radioactive seeds are surgically implanted into a patient's tumor, in which they emit high levels of radiation to kill the cancer. Those seeds eventually have to be removed, for example, and the polymer is both nontoxic and biodegradable. This therapy--which PhaseBio Pharmaceuticals licensed for further development, according to HealthDay News --is a long way from human trials, and likely several years from reaching patients. And the research team must prove that it will behave the same way in people as it did in mice. But it offers encouragement and a possible cancer treatment alternative that could effectively kill tumors and also cost the healthcare system less if radioactive seed removal surgery becomes unnecessary.

Innovative Research has been providing animal plasma and serum specifically mouse serum and mouse plasma along with cancer reagents to Universities like Duke for over 14 years. Our high quality serums and plasmas are available from US Origin animal, drawn fresh per order and shipped with our guarantee that what you are getting is what we say it is. Dont risk your research on places that wont tell you its from China, get your US raised mouse serum and other reagents from Innovative Research.


    Innovative Research was established in 1998 after the realization that dependable, high-quality, and affordable research materials were hard to come by. Starting with core products like human plasma and serum, Innovative Research has grown to be a trusted supplier of all lab reagents, including human biologicals and ELISA kits. Today, we manufacture and supply thousands of high-quality human and animal biologicals including plasma, serum, tissues, and proteins.


Related Posts

Holiday and New Year Shipping Schedule
As the holiday season approaches, we want to ensure that you receive your orders on tim...
Read the Article
People Behind The Science Podcast - Dr. Liu
People Behind the Science Innovative Research is proud to be a new sponsor of the podca...
Read the Article
Interview with Innovative Research CEO Donna Schelby
Earlier this month, Innovative Research CEO Donna Schelby sat down with Life Science Ma...
Read the Article

← Older Post Newer Post →

×