An artificial scab could destroy tumours by cutting off their blood supply.
Nanoparticles have previously been used to target tumour blood vessels, but weren鈥檛 particularly effective because only a small percentage stuck in the right spot.
Now Erkki Ruoslahti and his colleagues at the Burnham Institute for Medical Research in La Jolla, California, have produced nanoparticles with a built-in 鈥渟elf-amplifying鈥� mechanism that in mice caused a three-fold increase in the number of particles that reach their target. The particles bind to the vessels and attract yet more particles and blood proteins, eventually causing a clot that blocks the vessel (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, DOI: 10.1073_pnas.0610298104).
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