A device that detects cancer in 6 minutes

Cancer strikes without mercy; doesn't matter who you are and what you did - everything happens with devastating speed. The most times, it is a war with one winner: death. Each year, eight million people die of cancer in the world. More than those killed by HIV, malaria and tuberculosis combined. Annually 12 million people are stroked by this disease. In the U.S., cancer kills 1,500 people a day and is the second most prevalent disease after heart disease. In Romania, the latest statistics monitors 420,000 patients, and are diagnosed annually between 95,000 and 96,000 other people, of which more than half in an incurable phase. The number of patients increases, however, by 8-10% every year.

However, the problem has a much closer solution than we imagine. The Romanian engineer, researcher and businessman Tudor Mircea (53), owner of MB Technology, will release in 2011 the first device that will detect the predisposition for cancer in the very early stages, when treatment is more effective and easier to apply . The device identifies in a blood sample, in four to six minutes, the specific bio-markers of cancer, six months before the disease begins. The MB Technology team works with the Romanian researcher Raluca van Staden, the inventor of a revolutionary sensor for cancer detection, and the device is registered as a common patent.

In a first stage, the device may provide clues to susceptibility for four types of cancer: gastrointestinal, breast, prostate and ovarian cancer. The prototype will be validate by the end of 2010, then the device will enter clinical testing, and in mid 2011 will come into production. MB Technology is working on three versions: the simpler, for mass production (which will cost less than EUR 1,000), a medium variant, for medical offices (EUR 5000-6000) and a laboratory version, with maximum capacity of processing and entering into the detection area (EUR 20,000 to 25,000). Thus, cancer test could be done by anyone, even at home - and that could save millions of lives. Early detection of cancer is an important step in clinical diagnosis because it reduces the number of patients. There is medication for this early stage of cancer that can cure from 80% to 100% of the patients.

The device includes three components: the sensor itself (which can be used for about a hundred tests), covered by a round semi-elastic plastic hood; the input preamplifier input; the data processing unit. One drop of blood is placed on the sensor and the analysis sequence triggers automatically (it takes four to six minutes). Showing results can be achieved in three ways. The basic version offers only quantitative results (YES or NO), the medium variant displays he concentration and the type of bio-marker, while the laboratory version allows the user access to plasmograma. About 85% of production will be exported, mainly to USA, Germany and Israel.

Images from here.

A promising discovery

Two Romanian scientists coordinated the teams that discovered a very promising element in cancer detecting. A team of researchers from the Institut National de la Santé et de la Recherche Médicale (or INSERM; France), led by Dr. Nicolae Ghinea, in co-operation with a team from Mount-Sinai Medical School (New York), led by Dr. Aurelian Radu, announced the discovery of a unique biological marker for 11 different cancers, according to AFP. The marker is the FSH (Follicle-Stimulating Hormone), found in the human reproductive organs.

Analyzing 1336 biopsies performed for patients suffering from 11 various cancers, researchers have found in all tumors, the presence of a receptor of this hormone. Were studied prostate, breast, colon, pancreas, bladder, kidney, lung, liver, stomach, testicles and ovaries cancers. Other cancers have not yet been studied. The receptors were found on endothelial cells covering the inside of blood vessels at the tumor periphery. These receptors were missing completely from the body's healthy tissues, including the healthy parts of the organs affected by the tumor. It's a long way to a universal therapy, say researchers. The next steps are the extended analysis of other types of cancer, to confirm the discovery of the receptor by other procedures, to undertake studies to improve clinical procedures and possible therapies. Research results are published in The New England Journal of Medicine.

Best Woman Inventor in 2010

The Romanian Raluca-Ioana van Staden won this year the Golden Trophy of the World Intellectual Property for the Best Woman Inventor at the International Exhibition of Inventions in Geneva.

She invented a sensor that determines the existence of cancer in humans at the molecular level. Astonishing is that the sensor detects cancer in less than six minutes and the estimated cost would be less than one euro. Raluca-Ioana van Staden said that lack of funding has allowed the approach of only four types of cancer, because bio-markers are very expensive and all the tests to be made require a fairly large quantity of bio-markers. The device produced on large-scale would be very easy to use, as easy as a glucometer. "We've already done experiments on various types of cancer, as ovarian, breast, gastrointestinal and prostate cancer, as well with general markers of cancer. We make a determination before the disease is triggered in the body", she said in an interview. The device can be reused, there is no danger of contamination from one person to another, and last more than six months.

Raluca-Ioana van Staden (b. Ştefan) was born on July 16, 1969, in the city of Câmpulung, Argeş County. She obtained the baccalaureate in his hometown, then she followed the college. She has a doctorate in chemistry and a masterate in music composition. Raluca-Ioana is married with the scientist Jacobus Frederick van Staden, both working in the sole laboratory for analytical technology of processes in Romania, PATLAB, located in the Institute of Electro-Chemistry and Condensed Matter in Timişoara.

Photo: HotNews.