Smart nanoparticles filmed destroying a blood clot

Sandrine Ceurstemont, editor, New Scientist TV

Life-threatening blood clots could now be destroyed more effectively thanks to smart nanoparticles that deliver drugs directly to an obstructed vessel. The therapy, developed by Netanel Korin and a team from Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University, uses a biologically-inspired approach to achieve the task.

In this time-lapse, you can watch a blocked mouse artery clear up in about five minutes after the injection of drug-coated nanoparticles. When a blood vessel narrows, the resulting high shear stress is a signal for circulating blood platelets to stick to the wall, forming a clot. Similarly, the therapy is activated by the shearing strain - but in this case it breaks up a collection of nanoparticles to allow individual carriers to bind to platelets and deliver clot-busting drugs.

The new approach should be a more effective way of treating heart attacks, strokes and pulmonary embolisms using a fraction of the current drug dose. Using current methods, a larger amount is required since drugs circulate freely without targeting a specific site, which can cause bleeding side effects.

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Source: http://feeds.newscientist.com/c/749/f/10897/s/213f1267/l/0L0Snewscientist0N0Cblogs0Cnstv0C20A120C0A70Csmart0Enanoparticles0Ecaught0Edestroying0Ea0Eblood0Eclot0Bhtml0DDCMP0FOTC0Erss0Gnsref0Fonline0Enews/story01.htm

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