(Ivanhoe Newswire) -- A new non-invasive technology may soon help doctors
quickly determine if chemotherapy if effectively treating a cancer patient.
Researchers at Duke University developed a technique to examine the patterns in
which light bounces off cell surfaces, which they say may be able to assess
chemotherapy's success in inducing cancer cell death.
The researchers treated breast cancer cells in a dish with one of two standard
chemotherapeutic agents, paclitaxel and doxorubicin. They then applied light to
the cells at various time intervals and observed the way the light deviated
depending on the size and shape of the cells through which it passed.
They found that cells that were dying from chemotherapy experienced marked
changes both early in the process and then up to a day later in cellular
structure that could be captured by the light-scattering technique. In contrast,
the cells that were not being killed by chemo displayed early changes but no
later changes.
If future studies are successful, this technique could be used as a non-invasive
way to quickly determine if chemotherapy is working or not or if the patients
would benefit from an adjustment to their therapy strategy, researchers said.
SOURCE: Study presented at the 100th Annual American Association of Cancer
Research on April 21, 2009
