Pulse 2012 - (Page 22)

Powerful bubbles Targeting cancer with ultrasound Raffi Karshafian Department of Physics Michael C. Kolios Department of Physics Morbidity and mortality rates associated with many types of cancer continue to rise. Treating this highly complex disease is a major challenge, largely because success depends on killing all the cells within a cancer that are capable of regenerating it. When possible, the standard clinical approach to dealing with solid tumours is surgical excision, coupled with radiation therapy and/ or anti-cancer drugs (e.g., chemotherapy). These treatments, however, are limited by the associated – often severe – side effects on normal tissues and non-cancerous cells. Raffi Karshafian and Michael Kolios are members of a research team funded by the Terry Fox Foundation that is attempting to address these concerns through the development of a microbubble-based ultrasound system. “Microbubbles are comprised of tiny bubbles that are smaller than red blood cells,” Karshafian explains. “They are currently used in cancer detection. Our efforts, meanwhile, focus on deploying ultrasonically stimulated microbubbles in order to sensitize tumours to radiation and to improve the delivery of chemotherapeutic agents and gold nano-particles selectively to tumour tissues.” To date, Karshafian and Kolios, working with oncology partners at the University of Toronto and Sunnybrook Health Sciences Centre, have shown that the combination of ultrasound and microbubble treatment with chemotherapy and radiation therapy improves therapeutic results in both cells and tumours implanted in mice. In addition, their experiments have revealed that ultrasound imaging can guide the application of therapeutic ultrasound in order to target treatments on specific tumour tissues while sparing surrounding healthy tissues. “Our ultimate hope,” Kolios says, “is that the ultrasound therapy and imaging systems we are developing will have a major impact on patient care by improving clinical outcomes and overall well-being while undergoing treatment.” 22 Pulse Health Research and Innovation at Ryerson 

Table of Contents for the Digital Edition of Pulse 2012

Ryerson Alumni - Pulse 2012
Contents
Elizabeth McCay
Trevor A. Hart
Centre for Global Health and Health Equity
Martin M. Anthony
Thomas Tenkate
Fiona Yeudall
Sri Krishman
Ana Pejović-Milić
Victor Yang
Souraya Sidani
Colleen E. Carney
Centre for Health in At-Risk Populations
Catherine Beauchemin
Habiba Bourgherara
Raffi Karshafian and Michael C. Kolios
Jahan Tavakkoli
Russell D. Viirre
Donna Koller
Faith Donald
Judy Finlay
Janet M. Lum
Deborah Fels
Jason Nolan
Bionik Laboratories Inc.
Institute for Stress and Wellbeing Research
Ontario Multicultural Health Applied Research Network
Computational Biomedical Physics Laboratory

Pulse 2012

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