Researchers at Swinburne University of Technology in Australia have shown for the first time that gold nanorods can effectively stop the growth of cervical cancer cells. The laboratory study of attaching the nanorods to their cell receptors used the famous HeLa cell lines as a cervical cancer model.
The gold nanorods, positioned where they are and with growth factors attached to their tips, stop the clustering of the cell receptors and halt the growth of the cell. This happens because apparently the cell receptors need to reach a certain density in a region for a signal from the growth factors to be passed into the cell.
From the abstract in journal Small:
Gold nanoparticles are functionalized with epidermal growth factor (EGF) molecules and incubated with HeLa cells. These new complexes mechanically interfere with the activation of EGF receptors in a length-dependent manner. Protein-functionalized gold nanoparticles hold great potential for unveiling the fundamental characteristics of cell receptors and for future pharmacological studies on receptor targeting.
Study in journal Small: Inhibiting EGFR Clustering and Cell Proliferation with Gold Nanoparticles…
Press release: Gold nanorods target cancer cells…