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Category: nanotechnology

Brain-penetrating nanoparticles, ultrasound and microbubbles show promise in treating glioblastoma

University of Virginia Comprehensive Cancer Center scientists have developed a promising new experimental approach to targeting glioblastoma, the most common and deadliest brain cancer. The approach could overcome many of the limitations of treatments using existing drugs.

UVA’s Roger Abounader, MD, Ph.D., and colleagues have identified “microRNAs” that can simultaneously suppress multiple malfunctioning genes responsible for glioblastoma’s formation and growth. The scientists use a combination of brain-penetrating nanoparticles, focused ultrasound waves and microbubbles to deliver the miRNAs through the brain’s natural protective barrier—a barrier that typically blocks treatments for tumors and neurodegenerative diseases. The study is published in the Journal of Clinical Investigation.

“This new approach could help target numerous molecules that promote cancer growth, including those for which no drugs exist, at the same time to achieve better therapies,” said Abounader, a professor at UVA’s School of Medicine, Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology, Comprehensive Cancer Center and Center for RNA Science and Medicine. “We are hoping to translate our findings into future clinical trials for patients with glioblastoma and other brain tumors.”

Quantum sensing microscope illuminates transistor design

Artificial intelligence faces an energy crisis stemming from a physical traffic jam inside modern computer chips. Processors must continually shuffle data, such as the billions of parameters in complex models, between separate computing and memory nodes. This traffic jam, known as the “von Neumann bottleneck,” hinders the speed and energy efficiency of advanced processors.

To tackle this problem, scientists are developing spintronics, which leverages the electron’s “spin,” or intrinsic magnetic orientation, for more efficient devices. A long-sought milestone in this field is a single device, known as a “spin transistor,” that combines a magnetic bit with a semiconducting switch, allowing it to compute and store data simultaneously.

“The major challenge is understanding how magnetism and electrical current interact in nanoscale devices,” said Boston College physics professor Brian Zhou, whose group led the study. “We developed a single-spin quantum microscope to observe magnetic states inside atomically thin devices as they actively process electrical information.”

Molecules stop carbon nanotubes clumping, unlocking record heat-to-electricity performance

QUT researchers have overcome a challenge that has limited next-generation energy-harvesting materials for more than two decades, opening the door to more powerful wearable electronics and new ways of turning wasted heat into electricity. The breakthrough centers on carbon nanotubes, which are flexible, conductive microscopic rods that have long shown promise for wearable technologies but have been difficult to control.

QUT researchers have developed a new molecular strategy that prevents the nanotubes from clumping together and losing performance, enabling a new benchmark for materials that convert heat directly into electricity.

Lead author and QUT PhD researcher Shanshan Zhou said the work established a new way of tackling one of the biggest challenges facing carbon nanotubes.

Programmable metasurface turns keyboard commands into dynamic holograms in milliseconds

Metasurfaces are ultrathin optical components engineered with arrays of nanoscale structures that can control light in ways that are difficult for conventional optics. Unlike traditional optical components, which typically rely on their shape and thickness, metasurfaces manipulate light using carefully designed nanostructures patterned on a flat surface.

“Active metasurfaces are extending the capabilities of flat optics by enabling optical functions to be dynamically reconfigured,” says Professor Laura Na Liu, director of the 2nd Physics Institute at the University of Stuttgart. “To tap into this potential, we need to learn how to address individual pixels within a two-dimensional metasurface at visible wavelengths.”

Researchers at the University of Stuttgart have developed an interactively addressable organic metadevice that uses electrically switchable organic materials to dynamically control light. The new platform enables every metasurface pixel to be electronically controlled independently, allowing user commands to be translated directly into dynamic holographic images.

How the most widespread parasite on Earth reads its genome

A parasite carried by billions of people worldwide often causes harmful infections during pregnancy and in immunocompromised individuals and is a leading infectious cause of blindness in South America. Once it enters the body, it can rapidly multiply, spreading from one cell to the next.

This single-celled organism, Toxoplasma gondii, belongs to the same group of microbes as the parasite that causes malaria and many other parasites of humans and animals. Cats are Toxoplasma’s main host, but it can infect most warm-blooded mammals, including humans, who typically become infected through contact with cat feces or by consuming undercooked meat or contaminated produce.

The parasite’s ability to survive and spread inside a host depends on its capacity to precisely control which proteins it makes and when. Proteins are the molecular machinery that carries out all of the parasite’s functions, from invading and manipulating host cells to making new copies of the pathogen that spread to other cells and hosts.

Acid-resistant nanocage shows promise for targeted gastric cancer therapy

Researchers from the Yong Loo Lin School of Medicine, National University of Singapore (NUS Medicine), have developed a swallowable nanoscale delivery platform designed to transport therapeutic enzymes through the stomach’s acidic environment and activate a cancer-killing reaction at tumor sites. Early preclinical findings suggest that the approach may offer a new strategy for treating gastric cancer more precisely while reducing damage to healthy tissue.

The preclinical study, published in the Journal of Nanobiotechnology, was led by associate professor Chester Lee Drum, Department of Medicine and the Cardiovascular-Metabolic Disease Translational Research Program (TRP), NUS Medicine, together with co-first authors Dr. Muthu Kumaraswamy Shanmugam and Dr. Girish Vallerinteavide Mavelli, both senior research fellows at the Department of Medicine, NUS Medicine.

Scientists map how the flu virus rewires the human cell from the inside

Researchers at EMBL Hamburg and collaborators at the Leibniz Research Institute for Molecular Pharmacology (FMP) have mapped how the influenza A virus rewires infected human cells in unprecedented detail. To do this, the researchers used a customized experimental workflow to directly observe how proteins interact inside intact infected cells.

Every year, seasonal influenza kills up to 650,000 people globally and causes serious illness for 3–5 million individuals. The influenza A virus, in particular, has been responsible for several pandemics, including the 1918 Spanish flu pandemic. When this virus infects cells, it releases its genetic material, called RNA, which contains blueprints for a handful of proteins. These proteins then spread throughout the host cell and repurpose its molecular machinery to make more viruses.

Scientists want to understand this process in detail because it would help in designing better drug therapies and vaccines against the flu virus. That’s why it’s crucial to figure out how proteins of the flu virus interact with proteins of host cells and subvert them to meet the virus’s needs. This is the first time scientists have mapped direct virus-host protein contacts at scale inside intact influenza-infected cells, with enough structural detail to model how the proteins fit together.

Nanoparticles could remove harmful immune molecules from blood

The immune system, the body’s defense network against infections and injuries, can sometimes become too active. In these cases, it can produce too many immune mediators, fragments of genetic material or proteins that regulate immune responses.

An excess of these molecules in the bloodstream can cause severe inflammation, sometimes leading to life-threatening medical conditions such as sepsis and acute lung injury. Sepsis is an extreme and life-threatening response to a bacterial, viral or fungal infection. Acute lung injury, on the other hand, occurs when inflammation causes fluid to leak into the lungs, impairing breathing and potentially leading to respiratory failure.

Some biomedical scientists and engineers have been trying to identify promising solutions to remove these excess immune mediators from the bloodstream. Some proposed approaches rely on lysosome-targeting chimeras (LYTACs), molecules that could remove proteins outside or on the surface of cells, directing them to lysosomes (i.e., organelles that dispose of or recycle food particles and other cell waste).

Thinner wires, faster electrons: Quantum material challenges copper at chip scale

Electrical interconnects may very well be the unsung heroes of modern microchips. These tiny wires—typically made of copper due to its high conductivity—string together the billions of transistors that drive our computers and electronic devices. But as the technology advances and additional transistors are piled on, the components must shrink to the nanoscale. And that’s when copper begins to fail.

Cornell researchers have developed a potential replacement for copper interconnects: single-crystal nanowires of niobium arsenide. This topological semimetal paradoxically becomes a better conductor the thinner it gets, boosting electronic performance.

The findings were published July 16 in Science. The lead author is doctoral student Yeryun Cheon. Judy Cha, the Rick and Betty Tsai Ph.D. 1981 Professor in Materials Science and Engineering in the Cornell Duffield College of Engineering, is the paper’s senior author.

Sugarcoated nanoparticles show promise for treating most aggressive form of brain cancer

Sugar-coated nanoparticles show promise against glioblastoma.

Researchers have developed mannose-coated lipid nanoparticles capable of crossing the blood-brain barrier and delivering therapeutic PTEN mRNA directly to glioblastoma cells, one of the deadliest forms of brain cancer.

Glioblastoma cells have an exceptionally high demand for glucose. By coating the nanoparticles with a sugar molecule called mannose, the researchers took advantage of this metabolic feature, allowing the particles to enter the brain more efficiently and accumulate within tumors.

Once inside the cancer cells, the nanoparticles restored production of PTEN, a critical tumor-suppressor protein that is frequently lost or dysfunctional in glioblastoma. In mouse models, this approach significantly slowed tumor growth, increased median survival by approximately 50%, and showed no measurable toxicity in major organs.

Although these findings are still preclinical and have not yet been tested in humans, they represent an exciting advance in overcoming one of neuro-oncology’s greatest challenges: safely delivering targeted therapies across the blood-brain barrier.

PORTLAND, Ore. – Researchers at Oregon State University have potentially found a new way to treat the most aggressive form of brain cancer, glioblastoma, whose two-year survival rate is less than 30%.

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