UT Arlington physicist discovers possible new cancer therapy

Wei Chen, a professor of physics and researcher at the University of Texas at Arlington, has created a new nanoparticle for cancer therapy. Chen, co-director of the university’s Center for Security Advances Via Applied Nanotechnology, was working to create a luminescent nanoparticle to use in security-related radiation detection when he discovered that the nanoparticles he was working with, when combined with X-ray exposure, significantly slowed tumor growth in lab studies.

“This new idea is simpler and better than previous photodynamic therapy methods. You don’t need as many steps. This material alone can do the job,” Chen said. “It is the most promising thing we have found in these cancer studies and we’ve been looking at this for a long time.” Chen’s research will be published in the August edition of the Journal of Biomedical Nanotechnology. Co-authors are Lun Ma, a research assistant professor, and Xiaoju Zou, a research associate. The university also has filed a patent application for the new complex.

Betty Dillard bdillard@bizpress.net