A new cancer curing technique is showing promising results – a therapy that uses magnetic pulses to heat tumor cells until they die. Scientists have found that it could be possible to heat up cancer cells using tiny particles of iron oxide that vibrate when in a magnetic field.
Test conducted on mice showed that it was possible to heat up the cells of the cancerous tumor by about 6 degrees; or to the extent that the cells began to die.
This technique that is called hyperthermia therapy is raising hopes that it will become possible to target cancer cells in the body and kill them without having undue negative impacts on the surrounding tissue.
This would also obviate the side effects that are typically caused by conventional cancer therapy such as radiation and chemotherapy.
According to Dr Sam Janes, a clinical cancer scientist at University College London, if the cancer cells are made to reach the temperature of 43 degrees C or 109.4 F (our natural body temperature is 37 degrees C or 89.6 F) they start to die.
Scientists are hopeful of being able to put iron nano particles within the stem cells, and deliver them to the cancer. “Vibrating the iron particles causes them to heat up and we can hopefully kill the cells we deliver along with the cancer surrounding it,” said Dr Janes.
