Scientists develop a blood test that diagnoses cancer in just 10 minutes

Scientists have been able to develop a blood test to determine in less than 10 minutes whether a cancer type is associated with the patient.

The test is still under development, but if introduced, it will constitute a major change in cancer screening, making the diagnosis of the disease easy and inexpensive for patients and physicians alike.

The new method involves the use of a fluid that changes color to detect the presence of malignant cells throughout the body and presents the results within 10 minutes, without revealing the location or severity of the infection.

The test has a sensitivity of about 90%, which means that it will be able to detect 90 out of every 100 cancer cases, and then doctors will be able to perform additional tests to diagnose the specific type of malignant disease and its stage.

Scientists have discovered that cancer DNA and normal DNA bind differently to minerals and behave differently in water. So they added small gold particles to the water, turning the liquid pink.

If the cancer DNA falls into the water, it attaches to the metal molecules and the water stays the same color, but the normal (healthy) DNA attaches to the gold in a different way, transforming the color of the water in blue.

"We certainly do not know yet about the Holy Grail for the diagnosis of all cancers," said Matt Trouw, professor of chemistry at Queensland University in Australia. "But the test looks really interesting, as incredibly simple as possible, and as an affordable technology, and inexpensive, does not require complex equipment in the lab, such as DNA sequencing."

"Our technology can be an investigative tool to inform doctors that a patient may have cancer, but it requires further testing using other techniques to determine the type and stage of cancer." said Laura Carrascoza, a researcher at the University of Queensland.

Scientists are currently conducting clinical trials on patients with a wide range of cancers: the DNA in cancer cells can be filled with mutations that stimulate the growth of specific tumors, but these mutations tend to vary depending on the type of cancer. Enough to determine the location or size of the tumor, but will give doctors a quick answer as to whether the patient has cancer or not.

"This approach is an interesting step forward in the detection of tumor DNA in blood samples and opens the possibility of a complete blood test to detect cancer," said Ged Brady of Manchester Cancer Research Institute in the United Kingdom. But stressed the need to continue clinical studies to evaluate the potential of this method. So far, only 200 blood samples have been tested to determine healthy or cancerous DNA.

Source: the sun