This is what Sandra Kleuskens is trying to accomplish in her research at HFML-FELIX: controlling the movement of medicine particles using magnetic fields.
Tiny vehicles
Those particles are made in the lab and tiny. Somewhere between 100 and 700 nanometers. The larger ones are interesting as a vehicle, the smaller ones can even get into single cells. ‘We are mostly interested in using them as tiny vehicles for medicines’, Kleuskens explains. ‘We now use polymere spheres in our experiments, but eventually they will be biodegradable. First we want to find out how we can move them as best as possible.’
Here the shape of these particles plays a very important role. A sphere with two ears – picture a tiny rabbit – responds a lot better to powerful magnetic fields at the right speed than completely round spheres. And that speed is interesting in another way too. Will the vehicles be moving up the bloodstream, they will need more power than when they would move downstream. Additionally they have to determine how – once they have arrived at the right location – the vehicles will release the medicine. This could also be done with magnetic fields.
Why magnets
But why would you use magnetic fields? Since there are many techniques for moving tiny particles. ‘Because we can do things with magnetic fields that are not possible with other sources’, Kleuskens explains. ‘You want to be able to influence direction and speed separately. With something like light, or acoustic waves, you can’t do this. Would you be using electric fields, then the particles cluster. Something we don’t want. And particles with a chemical component react to a lot of things in there surroundings. With the magnetic fields we use you have so much more control.’
The treatment
Before the technique can be used as a treatment, there is a lot of work to be done. Can they use lower magnetic fields, is one of the questions. This will be necessary to make the treatment safe. And what about scaling up, the costs and the types of treatment it can be used for?
If they succeed in using lower magnetic fields, the treatment can possibly take place in existing MRI scanners. It will mainly be interesting for hard to cure conditions, that need treatment very locally. Hopefully with this technique getting the medicine to the right spot can be done with a lot more precision than with current approaches. Saving medicine and money while limiting the side effects profoundly.