Molecular Jackhammers Destroy Cancer Cells with Vibration
Getting a class of fluorescent synthetic dyes used for medical imaging to embed in the membranes of cancer cells and vibrate rapidly induces necrosis.
With whole-molecule vibrations lasting for less than a picosecond, these vibrating aminocyanines can mess up how things work at low light levels or concentrations. With this “molecular jackhammer” technique, researchers from Rice University, the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center, and Texas A&M University demonstrated the complete eradication of human melanoma cells in vitro. They achieved 50% tumor-free efficacy in mouse models for melanoma.
