Tiny pieces of gold 'could destroy tumours'

There’s a glimmer of hope to treating the most common form of brain cancer – in the form of gold dust.

Scientists from University of Cambridge have found tiny particles of gold could be the key to treating glioblastoma multiforme – the most common and aggressive brain tumour in adults which is notoriously difficult to treat.

The treatment uses the “Trojan horse” method of smuggling nano-particles of gold into the brain to wipe out tumour cells.

Gold is used in this type of treatment because it is a benign material and poses no risk to the patient (Thinkstock)

Researchers engineered nanostructures containing gold and cisplatin – a conventional chemotherapy drug.

These were then released into tumour cells that had been taken from glioblastoma patients and grown in the lab.

Once inside, these “nanospheres” were exposed to radiotherapy.

This caused the gold to release electrons which damaged the cancer cells’ DNA along with its overall structure, intensifying the impact of the chemotherapy drug in the process.

A cancer cell containing nanoparticles of gold which are coloured in green and have entered the nucleus which is the area in blue, the round-breaking technique could eventually be used to treat glioblastoma multiforme (University of Cambridge)

Apparently the technique was so effective that the cell culture showed no signs of regrowth even after 20 days, implying that the tumour cells had been destroyed.

“The combined therapy that we have devised appears to be incredibly effective in the live cell culture,” says Mark Welland, professor of nanotechnology at Cambridge’s St John’s College.

“This is not a cure, but it does demonstrate what nanotechnology can achieve in fighting these aggressive cancers.

“By combining this strategy with cancer cell-targeting materials, we should be able to develop a therapy for glioblastoma and other challenging cancers in the future.”

Glioblastoma has mostly proven to be very resistant to treatments (Thinkstock)

Glioblastoma has mostly proven to be very resistant to treatments – the reason being the tumour cells generally invade surrounding healthy brain tissue, which makes the surgical removal of the tumour virtually impossible.

Many sufferers die within a few months of diagnosis, and just six in every 100 patients with the condition managing to stay alive after five years.

Why are researchers are gunning for gold?

Size and shape of the particles can be controlled accurately – which is why gold nano-particles were used in the research (Thinkstock)

Scientists have been researching ways in which gold nano-particles might be used in treatments.

Gold was chosen because it is a benign material which in itself poses no threat to the patient, and the size and shape of the particles can be controlled accurately.

When exposed to radiotherapy, the particles emit a type of low-energy electron, known as Auger electrons, capable of damaging the diseased cell’s DNA.

This low-energy emission means that they only have an impact at short range, so they do not cause any serious damage to healthy cells that are nearby.