Gizmorama - October 7, 2013

Good Morning,

This is why I love technology - U.S. scientists say that Nanomaterial chip technology can help early-stage cancer patients detect cancer-spreading cells for better diagnosis and treatment.

Learn about this and other interesting stories from the scientific community in today's issue.

Until Next Time,
Erin

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*-- Cassini finds ingredient of household plastic on Saturn moon --*
PASADENA, Calif. - The Cassini spacecraft has detected propylene, an ingredient in household plastics, on Saturn's moon, Titan, the U.S. space said Monday. The detection of the chemical used to make food-storage containers, car bumpers and other products is the first discovery of the plastic ingredient on any moon or planet other than Earth, NASA said in a release. Cassini's Composite Infrared Spectrometer identified a small amount of propylene in Titan's lower atmosphere, NASA said. The instrument measures the infrared light emitted from Saturn and its moons much the same way human hands feel the warmth of a fire. Propylene is the first molecule to be discovered on Titan using the spectrometer. "This chemical is all around us in everyday life, strung together in long chains to form a plastic called polypropylene," said Conor Nixon, a planetary scientist at NASA's Goddard Space Flight Center in Greenbelt, Md. "That plastic container at the grocery store with the recycling code 5 on the bottom -- that's polypropylene." Cassini's mass spectrometer had suggested earlier that propylene may be present in the upper atmosphere but a positive identification wasn't made until now, NASA said. "This new piece of the puzzle will provide an additional test of how well we understand the chemical zoo that makes up Titan's atmosphere," said Scott Edgington, Cassini's deputy project scientist at NASA's Jet Propulsion Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif. The Cassini-Huygens mission is a cooperative project of NASA, the European Space Agency and the Italian Space Agency.


*-- Nanomaterial chip tracks cancerous cells through bloodstream --*
ANN ARBOR, Mich. - Cells that help the spread of cancer throughout the body can be detected in early-stage cancer patients using a nanomaterial-based chip, U.S. scientists say. The findings suggest that the isolation and recovery of these cells could better inform diagnosis and treatment of cancer patients, team lead Sunitha Nagrath of the University of Michigan in Ann Arbor said Monday in a release. Nagrath and colleagues developed a graphene, oxide-based chip that can capture rare circulating tumor cells detached from an existing tumor and could be carried in the bloodstream to other tissues, spreading cancer. By using their nanoscale device, the researchers said they could, among other things, select and analyze cancerous cells for cancer-related biomarkers. The team said it believes the biomarkers will offer insights into the character of the cancer and potentially influence how the disease is managed. The findings were reported online this week in Nature Nanotechnology.

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