Cancer cells can be ‘burned up’ using magnetic pulses

Scientists have developed a new technique known as hyperthermia therapy, which they hope will allow them to target cancer cells in the body and kill them without harming the surrounding tossed or causing the side effects of chemotherapy drugs and radiotherapy.

Researchers have found they can surround cancer cells with tiny particles of iron oxide that vibrate when in a magnetic field, causing the cells to heat up, reports the Telegraph.

Tests in mice have shown this can raise the temperature of the tumour cells by six degrees above body temperature, around the point when cancer cells start to die.

They say they can target the iron oxide particles to tumours by putting them inside stem cells from bone marrow that naturally home in on cancer in the body.

“If you heat cancer cells up to 43 degrees C (109.4F) they start to die. Our natural body temperature is 37 degrees C (89.6F). The technique that we are using, we are able to reach that threshold,” Sam Janes, a clinical cancer scientist at University College London, said.

Janes has been working with Professor Quentin Pankhurst, director of research at the Royal Institution, to develop the technique.

They found in the laboratory they are able to heat up cells containing the nanoparticles by around 60 degrees C. In mice with skin cancer they found that vibrating the particles could raise the temperature of the cancer cells by six degrees.

Janes said they hoped to use the technique to develop a new treatment for targeting lung cancer.

The research was presented at the British Thoracic Society”s Winter Meeting on Friday.