Cancer therapy takes next step
John Kanzius Cancer Research Foundation
Millcreek inventor's method shown effective against malignant cells
An experimental treatment that couples directed radio waves with microscopic carbon nanoparticles has proved powerful enough to kill human cancer cells.
Stephen A. Curley, professor of surgical oncology at the University of Texas' MD Anderson Cancer Center in Houston, said early research shows the treatment conceived by Erie entrepreneur John Kanzius and nanotechnology researchers at Rice University has the potential to produce similar results in live patients.
"This proves (the) principle that we can kill (cancer cells) with this kind of technique," said Curley, who is leading experiments to test the theory.
Curley's team plans to begin testing the treatment in live animals by the end of the month.
But as the team prepares for what is expected to be an intense three months of animal tests, Curley said they are encouraged by the early results.
MD Anderson researchers began the tests earlier this year after combining technology developed by Kanzius -- a former Erie radio and television station owner -- with carbon nanoparticles developed by Rice chemist Richard Smalley.
Kanzius developed his part of the radiowave-nanoparticle theory while undergoing treatments for non-Hodgkin's lymphoma in 2003 and 2004.
While battling his own disease, he engineered equipment that would generate high-powered, directed radio waves and direct those waves into a patient's body.
In theory, the radio waves heat up cancer cells enhanced with minerals. The heat kills the cancer cells without harming the neighboring healthy cells.
Kanzius filed a patent outlining the procedure in May 2004. The claim is pending.
Since then, he has been working with researchers in Pittsburgh and Houston who are interested in researching whether the technology could be used as part of a new treatment protocol.
The University of Pittsburgh Medical Center began testing Kanzius' theory in the spring of 2005. Its tests have used radio waves in conjunction with minerals to test their effects on liver tumors in rats.
The work in Houston has paired Kanzius' theory with the use of carbon nanoparticles.
Rice University chemist Richard Smalley learned of Kanzius' radio wave idea through fellow scientists in Houston in 2005 and began talking with the Millcreek inventor about the possibility of marrying radio waves with carbon nanoparticles.
Smalley, who died in October after his own battle with cancer, is widely credited with creating the buckyball -- a carbon-based, soccer-ball-shaped molecule that helped give birth to nanotechnology. The research won him the Nobel Prize in chemistry in 1996.
He believed if carbon nanoparticles could be attached to cancer cells, the nanoparticles would be able to destroy the cells if exposed to Kanzius' directed radio waves.
Smalley's research team partnered with Curley's group at the MD Anderson Center to begin testing whether the combination would work.
Under the partnership, Rice researchers are working on creating the proper physical and chemical composition of nanoparticles for use in human patients. Curley's team, meanwhile, is conducting the medical research.
Kanzius, for his part, has been consulting with both groups on how to properly generate and monitor radio waves.
He said he has been "blown away" by the early progress of the Rice and MD Anderson researchers.
"To move now into large animals down there in a couple of weeks is extremely exciting,"Kanzius said. "It's going to be hard to wait to see how the results work. But it's very exciting to see it go this far."
The move into animals is the next step in what will likely be a lengthy process for researchers hopeful that they can turn the early test-tube success into an effective treatment for human patients.
Curley said scientists must develop an effective mechanism for attaching the nanoparticles to cancer cells.
They must also come up with a cost-effective way to produce the nanoparticles that are needed to make the treatment work.
"This is going to end up to be a very expensive project -- especially the nanoparticle part of it," Curley said. "How to convert this from hard-core science into something that is technologically and economically feasible, that's at least a few years away."
But while the hurdles are numerous, Kanzius said he is confident researchers are motivated to clear them quickly.
"It can't go fast enough for people who have cancer," said Kanzius, who is in remission. "They are on a timeline, and that's where Dr. Curley comes from. He sees cancer on a day-to-day basis."
PETER PANEPENTO can be reached at 870-1707 or by e-mail
