January 29, 2010
Researchers in Bioengineering Professor Luke Lee’s lab have created smart nanoprobes that may one day be used in the battle against cancer to selectively seek out and destroy tumor cells, as well as report back on the mission’s status.
Lee, along with Applied Science and Technology graduate students Benjamin Ross and Liz Wu and Bioengineering graduate student SoonGweon Hong, has developed nanoprobes that can not only find a cancer cell, but also relay information once they have latched onto the target. The tiny probes measure a few hundred nanometers in diameter — one-thousandth the width of a human hair, and one-hundredth the size of most cancer cells. The team’s insight was to combine different materials — roughened gold on one side, and smooth polystyrene on the other — onto a single probe, dubbed a nanocoral.
The development is the cover story for the February 22 print issue of the peer-reviewed journal Small.
Read the full story at the UC Berkeley News Center.