Doctors Listening for Cancer?
From Reuters:WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Doctors looking to see if cancer has spread may be able to simply listen for it in the future, U.S researchers reported on Tuesday.
Researchers at the University of Missouri-Columbia said they used a technique called photoacoustic detection to pick up the characteristic vibrations of melanoma cells in the blood.
They said their method could let oncologists spot as few as 10 cancer cells in a blood sample, catching a tumor's spread before it can settle into another organ.
Writing in the journal Optics Letters, the University of Missouri team said they combined laser techniques from optics and ultrasound techniques from acoustics, using a laser to make cells vibrate and then picking up the characteristic sound of melanoma cells.
posted by nattietodd @ 3:40 AM
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