Improved detection and treatment of cancer using magnetic nanostructures

本项目旨在提高肾癌(肾癌)的诊断和预后。在英国，RCC每年影响1.3万人，由于没有诊断性测试，因此具有挑战性。一个特别的问题是过度治疗：许多肿瘤在手术时被发现是良性的。这一问题的出现是因为在手术前难以获得可靠的肿瘤活检数据。核心活检(CB)是一种手术方法，但存在危险的副作用风险，并不总是产生可靠的数据。本项目旨在探讨细针抽吸(FNA)手术创伤较小的技术是否可以用于肾癌的更准确的诊断和预后。FNA使用针头从肿瘤中提取少量细胞。我们建议将FNA与一种新的高灵敏度分析技术相结合，该技术基于微电子工业中使用光刻方法制作的条形码纳米磁性异质结构-由于可以通过针头采集的细胞数量相对较少，因此需要高灵敏度。据预测，开发和采用一种准确的、微创的FNA诊断方法，每年将节省约800名因良性肿瘤而进行不必要手术的患者。

This project aims to improve the diagnosis and prognosis of kidney cancer (Renal Cell Carcinoma - RCC). RCC affects 13,000 people per year in the UK and is challenging because there is no diagnostic test. A particular problem is overtreatment: many tumours are found to be benign when operated on. This problem arises because of the difficulty in obtaining reliable biopsy data from tumours prior to surgery. Core Biopsy (CB) is one surgical method but carries risks of dangerous side effects and does not always yield reliable data. This project seeks to investigate whether the surgically less invasive technique of Fine Needle Aspirate (FNA) could be used for more accurate diagnosis and prognosis of kidney cancer. FNA uses a needle to extract a small number of cells from a tumour. We propose to combine FNA with a new, high sensitivity assay technique based on barcoded nanomagnetic heterostructures made using lithography methods from the microelectronics industry - high sensitivity is needed because of the relatively small number of cells which can be harvested through a needle. It is predicted that development and uptake of an accurate, minimally invasive FNA diagnostic approach would save ~800 patients per year having unnecessary surgery for benign tumours.