Woman develops nanotech treatment that kills cancer cells

Hadiyah-Nicole was raised by her uncle and aunt, Lee Smith and Ora Lee after she was orphaned as a child. Both of her uncle and aunt died because of cancer.

After taking care of Ora, who died first, the professor tended to her uncle, having watched him suffer from the side-effects of chemotherapy and radiation, which, to her, seemed little better than what her aunt went through. The impact of chemo in the body led her to find a better treatment that would help to fight this condition.

After an internship at NASA, the expert realised that lasers were capable of so much more and could be significant to cancer research and so she set out to explore this potential.

The researcher came up with a method to inject nanoparticles into cancer cells, avoiding healthy cells in the process. This is complemented with laser therapy, which is used to heat up the nanoparticles, killing the cancer cells while avoiding the unpleasant side effects of chemotherapy and radiation. The lasers are used to "illuminate" the nanoparticles so that they luminesce in order to create an image of cancerous cells and decrease the amount of time it takes to target these cells. This can help to provide doctors with an option to destroy cancerous tumours that have previously been considered too dangerous or difficult to reach while avoiding the side and unpleasant effects of chemo and radiotherapy.

The physicist first tested her ideas with cancer cells in a petri dish, then moved on to small animal models using mice. Much more research is needed to be able to extend this nanoparticle treatment to whole animals and then humans.

After her aunt’s death, Hadiyah-Nicole founded the Ora Lee Smith Cancer Research Foundation. The foundation aims to change the pain associated with chemotherapy and radiation as a result of a treatment to fight cancer. It also works around making sure that cancer treatments were affordable to the average person, as she went through the financial strain while taking care of her aunt and uncle.

Adapted from: https://bit.ly/2lZC2tu
https://bit.ly/2lyp7i1

More info: https://oralee.org/
https://vimeo.com/343704289