This Article  • Full text  • PDF  • Send to a friend  • Save in My Folder  • Save to citation manager  • Permissions  Citing Articles  • Contact me when this article is cited  Related Content  • Similar articles in JAMA  Topic Collections  • Oncology  • Lung Cancer  • Pulmonary Diseases  • Pulmonary Diseases, Other  • Diagnosis  • Alert me on articles by topic  Social Bookmarking   What's this?

Joan Stephenson, PhD

JAMA. 2009;302(15):1640.

	Since this article does not have an abstract, we have provided the first 150 words of the full text and any section headings.

A portable sensor that uses gold nanoparticles coated with specific organic compounds to detect levels of certain exhaled volatile substances can distinguish between the breath of patients with lung cancer and that of healthy controls, report scientists from Israel (Peng G et al. Nat Nanotechnol. doi: 10.1038/nnano.209.235 [published online ahead of print August 30, 2009]).

Using gas chromatography and mass spectroscopy to analyze breath samples from 56 patients with lung cancer and 40 healthy controls, the researchers identified "signature" biomarkers for the malignancy. They then made artificial mixtures of the 4 most influential of these biomarkers to "train" and optimize the sensors, and found the patient and simulated breath samples produced consistent results in distinguishing the cancer vs noncancer samples.

Other methods exist for detecting exhaled cancer biomarkers but use techniques that are expensive and slow and require concentrating these compounds before they can be measured. . . . [Full Text of this Article]

CiteULike    Connotea    Del.icio.us    Digg    Reddit    Technorati    Twitter     What's this?