Paper Authors: Daniel Moore-Palhares, Archya Dasgupta, Murtuza Saifuddin, Maria Lourdes Anzola Pena, Shopnil Prasla, Ling Ho, Lin Lu, Joseph Kung, Evan McNabb, Lakshmanan Sannachi, Danny Vesprini, Hanbo Chen, Irene Karam, Hany Soliman, Ewa Szumacher, Edward Chow, Sonal Gandhi, Maureen Trudeau, Belinda Curpen, Greg J Stanisz, Michael Kolios, and Gregory J Czarnota
Microbubbles are small (about the width of a fingernail), spherical bubbles that are currently being used in big ways. While they have existed in science for a long time, new avenues of use are paving the way for novel cancer treatments. Microbubbles started being used in 1968, as they were initially recognized for their strong capability to reflect ultrasound waves. This allowed them to distinguish blood flow directionality during aortic valve scanning in the heart, greatly enhancing clarity and utility in ultrasonographic imaging. Currently, microbubbles are used as contrast enhancing agents for ultrasound that are commonly used when doctors want to see blood flow or blood filled spaces in the body.
Later, an idea emerged that you may use these micron sized bubbles as a method to actually treat patients suffering from various diseases. Doctors have recently been pursuing using targeted ultrasound with microbubbles to treat breast cancer tumours. Researchers at the Sunnybrook Research Institute completed stage I clinical trials when using magnetic resonance-guided focused ultrasound and microbubble treatments to target tumours. After ultrasound and microbubble treatment, the cells were dosed with radiation, inducing rapid and increased localized tumour death. In addition to this, microbubbles may serve a future use as tools used for drug delivery, since it has been found that ultrasound and microbubble treatment can increase cell uptake of drugs within its local environment. The future of cancer research is bright, and the findings of these microbubbles keep getting bigger and bigger.
