Sound waves could provide a "liquid biopsy"
Link to the article: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2018/07/180703084124.htm
Summary: Cancer is an abnormal growth of cells that claims the lives of many people throughout the world. Therefore, researchers are still searching for better tools to help diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment since there are over a hundred different types of cancer. CTCs are circulating tumor cells that are small pieces of a tumor that break away and float around in the blood. They are very difficult to catch since there's only a few of them running through a patient's bloodstream. However, researchers from Duke University, MIT, and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore conducted a new study that focused on separating CTCs from a 7.5 mL vial of blood, with at least 86% efficiency, by the use of sound waves. Biopsys are used for cancer diagnosis. They are usually painful and is not used until later in the cancer's development. By using the tumor cell separation technology, it could help find out whether the patient has cancer just by using a small sample of blood drawn. It is less painful and faster at detecting cancer cells than regular biopsys. It works by setting up a standing sound wave at an angle to a fluid flowing through a small channel. The force of the sound waves acts more strongly on the large CTCs than normal blood cells which helps push them into a separate channel. Scientists hope to move forward on this technology by increasing its speed and efficiency.
Reflection: Sensory function is how we interact and understand the world, and auditory/sound is one of our senses that helps us interact with each other. This article is very significant because it provides us with new information and new technology on detecting cancer cells just by the use of sound vibrations. This new finding relates back to what we learned in class about audition. In class, we learned that the adequate simulus for audition is vibrations. Frequencies are the number of cycles of compressions and decompressions, and we know that the intensity of the sound is perceived by how loud the sound is. The frequency and intensity of the sound wave in this technology are similar to the ones used in ultrasonic imaging. Even though sound is just a pressure wave, it is able to be used to push on larger particles, such as the CTCs, into a separate channel for collection. CTCs are very difficult to find but by using a sound wave, the risk of damage to the cancer cells is reduced because each cell only experiences the acoustic wave for a fraction of a second. We are then able to use that CTC for further study. We do not realize how important a sound wave is and this article provides us with information on just how significant a sound wave can really be on improving diagnosis and treatment of cancer.
Summary: Cancer is an abnormal growth of cells that claims the lives of many people throughout the world. Therefore, researchers are still searching for better tools to help diagnosis, prognosis, and treatment since there are over a hundred different types of cancer. CTCs are circulating tumor cells that are small pieces of a tumor that break away and float around in the blood. They are very difficult to catch since there's only a few of them running through a patient's bloodstream. However, researchers from Duke University, MIT, and Nanyang Technological University in Singapore conducted a new study that focused on separating CTCs from a 7.5 mL vial of blood, with at least 86% efficiency, by the use of sound waves. Biopsys are used for cancer diagnosis. They are usually painful and is not used until later in the cancer's development. By using the tumor cell separation technology, it could help find out whether the patient has cancer just by using a small sample of blood drawn. It is less painful and faster at detecting cancer cells than regular biopsys. It works by setting up a standing sound wave at an angle to a fluid flowing through a small channel. The force of the sound waves acts more strongly on the large CTCs than normal blood cells which helps push them into a separate channel. Scientists hope to move forward on this technology by increasing its speed and efficiency.
Reflection: Sensory function is how we interact and understand the world, and auditory/sound is one of our senses that helps us interact with each other. This article is very significant because it provides us with new information and new technology on detecting cancer cells just by the use of sound vibrations. This new finding relates back to what we learned in class about audition. In class, we learned that the adequate simulus for audition is vibrations. Frequencies are the number of cycles of compressions and decompressions, and we know that the intensity of the sound is perceived by how loud the sound is. The frequency and intensity of the sound wave in this technology are similar to the ones used in ultrasonic imaging. Even though sound is just a pressure wave, it is able to be used to push on larger particles, such as the CTCs, into a separate channel for collection. CTCs are very difficult to find but by using a sound wave, the risk of damage to the cancer cells is reduced because each cell only experiences the acoustic wave for a fraction of a second. We are then able to use that CTC for further study. We do not realize how important a sound wave is and this article provides us with information on just how significant a sound wave can really be on improving diagnosis and treatment of cancer.
I think this is such an interesting concept and discovery. The idea of minimally invasive procedures that assist in collecting tumor material will be so beneficial to future cancer patients. Since sound is just a pressure wave, I would be curious to know how large of a tumor particle the pressure from the sound wave would be able to carry. Since the vibrations in a sound wave are so sensitive to frequency and pitch, I'm interested to know how hearing would be impacted and received throughout the middle and inner ear after having a tumor particle interacting with a sound wave.
ReplyDeleteThis is a valuable discovery because not only could it a provide a safer and easier way to treat and detect cancer cells. It can also be more efficient. It provides one more set of "eyes" so to speak when dealing with cancer. As there is much to learn in this field it can be useful to have a new technique to potentially gather new evidence for future treatments. It is also ingenious the way sound waves are being used to push the cells in certain directions. This method with further study can be seen to potentially slow down the spread of cancer cells. By being able to push the cells it potentially could slow down the process of the cancer spreading throughout the body. This could be a great potential alternative for individuals who view different types of cancer treatments to painful. It could avoid the use of the body's immune system produces painful side effects from the chemo treatments and other drugs to fight off the cancer. However, being able to use sound waves to manipulate the cell can at the very least provide new ways to gather evidence on how to combat cancer. By pushing the cells in a certain direction, treating and providing drugs to help the process of treating the cancer can drastically help. With this comes new risks as well. How loud and how much intensity can be harmful rather then beneficial to other the nearby cells? It often raises the question of there being different parts of the body where this method will be more efficient compared to others?
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