Clancy: Nanotechnology &​ Nanomedicine

Due to last week's unconventional structure, the IP team was privileged to meet with new (albeit temporary) iPeople from grades 8 to 12.  One of the students who graced our building was sophomore Clancy.  Currently engaged in the Personal Project, Clancy approached the IP team with an interest in the ethics of technology and nanotechnology (@Nanotechnology, #nanotechnology).  Throughout the week, he proved himself an expert on the subjects and an ideal candidate for IP.

Nanotechnology, Clancy explained, is essentially the ability to engineer matter at the atomic scale.  The instruments of nanotechnology are "nano," or tiny, devices that are programmed to solve many of the world's most pressing, most flummoxing problems.  Such equipment could remedy the ozone by simply following pre-programmed directions to "seal" up its hole.  According to Clancy, however, nanotechnology is particularly promising for its medicinal applications. This fledgling field is known as "nanomedicine," and its primary focus is upon "nanoparticles":  bio machines designed to target disease and deliver cargo consisting of medicine.

Clancy taught the IP team about nanomedicine using a #TED Talk by Dr. Jamey Marth given at the American Riviera Bank in Santa Barbara, CA.  Marth, the Director of the Center for Nanomedicine, shares his groundbreaking research into the discipline:

Now, to be able to treat cancer requires the addition of nanoparticles to the patient.  And this is the future. ... These particles are emitting light, so they tell us back - in the surgical table and research - exactly where they are going.  They're not binding to anything because they only will bind to diseased tissue.  ... Again, because it's not radiation, it's not chemotherapy, there won't be any collateral damage.  We can target these particles precisely to where they are supposed to go in the body.

...So they travel through the vasculature, and now we're outside of the vasculature just watching an animation of nanoparticles.  As they come in contact with the tumors, they light up the tumors.  Scientists have now figured out how to not only attach the nanoparticles but to get the drugs to travel completely through the tumor (which is really important).  And once these nanoparticles attach to the tumor, they release their payload.  Their payload, again, which includes therapeutics.  It includes toxins that will kill the cancer, but they won't touch the other tissue.

What do you think? Do you have a comment for Clancy? If so, please post in the comments section below.

Description of 1st image:  A graphic of nanomedicine.  Image located at adigaskell.org.  Kildonan and its IP program claim no ownership over the picture above.