Immune Cells Get Cancer-Fighting Boost from Nanoparticles

August 19, 2014

(Phys.org) – Scientists at Yale University have developed a novel cancer immunotherapy that rapidly grows and enhances a patient’s immune cells outside the body using carbon nanotube-polymer composites; the immune cells can then be injected back into a patient’s blood to boost the immune response or fight cancer. As reported Aug. 3 in Nature Nanotechnology, the researchers used bundled carbon nanotubes (CNTs) to incubate cytotoxic T cells, a type of white blood cell that is important to immune system functions.