hello everyone we hear a lot about
nanotechnology it’s become a buzzword in
last few years maybe about 15 years or
so the question is where is taro
technology do we see in our everyday
life do we experience this do we have
this technology at our disposal the
answer is yes this is something that has
changed how we do everyday thing
starting from waking up to an alarm
clock bang times it’s iPhone where we
put like three o’clock three alarms and
our spouses don’t like it or for storage
they put on those Gong sound on their
iPads making our coffee’s switching on
your TV all the way to the time that we
go to sleep and we have to check our
Facebook feed once again the it’s
everywhere
and something that has made this to work
is it took over about 40 50 years so the
third Industrial Revolution as we call
it micro electronics or electronics
especially integrated circuits when we
brought all those components resistors
capacitors inductors and we put them on
what we call silicon so silicon based
electronics is everywhere we used to
have television sets where we had vacuum
tube many of millennium kids they have
no idea what I just said but older folks
would know that we had to return those
TV sets on and we had to
wait for few minutes maybe a couple of
minutes before we could see the the
screen pop up and they’re changed once
we had electronics in the form of
solid-state electronics which
essentially changed or revolutionized
our lives and that has helped us develop
systems to allow the mediums where we
can control things at nano scale and
when I say nano scale I literally mean
at atomic scale now we can control
material we can control material
properties we can handle material at
nano scale an example is Braille code we
all know what is Braille code those
risen dots if you haven’t ever seen a
Braille code I would say next time when
you are you push button for an elevator
you will see there’ll be dots next to
that number of the floor that’s
basically Braille we feel Braille with
our bare fingers but think if you live
in North or in coal areas and we use
mittens or gloves if you try to feel
those thoughts we cannot feel it so
essentially the point is that to work at
nano scale we need to have tools and we
do have means to deal with those things
at nano scale and now we have those
things which is what has brought
nanotechnology in our everyday life when
I say in every aspect of her life here
is an example this looks like people in
developing countries or in developed
world especially this fit this picture
is from Europe from a friend of mine who
showed at a conference but this is not
so different than any developing country
as well where do we see nanotechnology
we may not be able to comprehend but
essentially
it is everywhere starting from our cell
phones our computers the frames of our
of our bikes again older folks would
know the bikes we used to write they
were like a ton heavy but now we have
those bikes that we can lift just with
one hand the frames the material of
those bikes the tires even cosmetics we
have nanoparticles and in Sun blocks it
is already everywhere
now speaking of this picture and
thinking about poor areas of the world I
I remember I landed in Dhaka Bangladesh
a few years ago my first time and I
could see the cycle rickshaws the the
it’s a it’s a thing where people drive
those things and you say that the back
they would have to self numbers written
or they’re on their cycle rickshaws
which means they would have to sell
phones even the cycle rickshaw so that
error technology is everywhere all
around the world in slums in all
segments of our economy what does that
mean how does that help us if we talk
about health care how does that help us
if we talk about different aspects of
our body or specifically medicine we can
now interface living systems at smaller
scales and and knowing that many of the
diseases especially cancer which is the
topic today as well has its origin at
genes at mutations so now we have
developed tools or we have developed
devices nano pores cantilevers we have
nano wires nanotubes quantum dots
nanoparticles so many things at that
skill which possibly we can interface
the living things at that scale going
back to that example of of Braille and
bare fingers now we have tools
that we can do something about it and of
course at larger scale we have had so
many ways of medical interventions
medical diagnostics and therapy at an
organ scale at a skeletal scale but now
we need to do something about our
diseases which have their known roots at
molecular scale and that’s where the
technology what we call narrow
technology or micro electronics can help
us and think about it think about the
growths or the control that we have
seven billion people or so on the face
of this earth
and seven billion components that I be M
made on a computer chip last year which
is 1 centimeter by 1 centimeter so if we
can make 7 billion devices we can really
interface life at really small scale and
that is something which should give us
motivation to do something about human
mortality very interestingly for last 50
60 years probably that’s when we have
started gathering data or at least
started classifying the causes of death
human mortality from cancer has not gone
down think about it we are still dying
at the same rate
although now we have known toxic effects
of so many things we have so many
regulations we don’t have leaded gas
again older folks Ford or we used to
have all kind of emissions we would be
sending out despite all those what we
call the best the betterment in the
quality of life we are still dying at
the same rate which essentially should
motivate us that there is something that
drastically needs to change and that’s
where nanotechnology or control at micro
and nano scale is is helping us derive
and come up with new ways and
many ways how we can do it there’s many
ways how it’s been already shown we can
separate out cells based on their
electrical behavior something called dye
electrophoresis we can use magnetic
nanoparticles and coat them with certain
antibodies which would specifically bind
to cancer cells and separate them out
magnetically we can coat surfaces and
capture tumor cells from a given body
fluid which can be blood urine saliva
even human tears which carry those known
molecules which are indicated of which
are indicative of the of the of the
vertical health or a disease going on we
can look at the tumor cells and look at
their mechanical properties by by
sucking in a single cell at a time in a
in a format of what we call a capillary
capillary electrophoresis so there are
so many ways how it’s been done and
especially after human genome project we
know now many of genes and proteins
which are known to be related to cancer
much like we know cholesterol is related
to heart disease we know many of the the
proteins or molecules which are related
to two cancers we do have some tests
vertical screening tests for a few
cancers but there are so many other
types of cancers which have no screening
tools which have no way of even finding
whether a metastatic potential exists in
a given tumor or that or not so that’s
where nano scale approaches can help us
I’ll give you a couple of examples where
we can capture tumor cells and those
aggressive tumor cells show a very
distinctive dancing behavior or a nano
textured device or a narrow texture
substrate which is different than what
you would see for a non metastatic tumor
cell or
just a regular cell from that organ with
this is an approach which can help us
objectively identify whether there are
tumor cells in a given sample again
simple bodily fluids or we can
interrogate each individual cell at at
any given time much like bouncers in a
bar if you guys are young like me and
try to get into a club they would ask
for ID I also have some right here but
they would still ask for that and I feel
honored they think I’m young guy so
think about it a bouncer interrogate
send checks each individual person
before he or she goes in this is
something we can implement for for self
as well so the idea is if you can create
a small orifice micropore in a very thin
membrane a nanoscale membrane 100
nanometer or 200 nano meter 10 and let
cells flow through you can measure any
current across their channel and see
when a cell goes through in the form of
a dip in the current and that is
essentially what would turn into pulse
which would be a dip in the ionic
current and we can use those pulses to
identify those cells based on their
mechanical physical and chemical
behavior those single pulses can tell us
about not just whether a cell is normal
but even if that cell is metastatic or
non-metastatic so this is some data
which we have gathered where we can
identify between those two types of
cells why is there deported think about
a simple tumor breast cancer we we feel
or we have been given to perceive that
breast cancer is completely treatable
which is not the truth
majority of breast cancer cancer
patients died of recurrence because of
metastasis because there is no easy or
direct way to look and differentiate
between indolent cells and metastatic
cells so this might be a way where we
can look at a given sample and define
the strategy to deal with that type of
cancer instead of giving same treatment
to all patients which is essentially our
diagnosis over treatment where we might
end up giving the same chemotherapy to a
patient even though their disease is not
metastatic in nature but that’s again a
potential of nanotechnology and in
differentiating those cells or those
diseased behaviors at single-cell level
and not just that there’s there other
unknown questions questions like
micrometastases questions where we don’t
know the subpopulations within a tumor
where we might have many many different
types of cells of cancerous nature but
they exist altogether in a given lump
but we don’t have a direct way of
knowing each one of those if we can
develop technologies further and narrow
down and find and cloud them based on
their behavior we might be able to treat
each individual patient based on their
signatures which is the concept behind
what we call personal personalized
medicine or precision medicine or nano
medicine these are all buzzwords
centered around the theme that
one-size-fit-all kind of therapy is not
the way to go because each individual
person would have their own type of
micrometastases their own they may have
stem cells in their in their in their
tumor which needs to be treated
differently so nanotechnologies have
this strengths where we can look for the
behaviors of cells at cellular and
subcellular scales and look for genomic
and proteomic makeup of those cells
which would give us a complete picture
of what lies within the enemy and
knowing the enemy is the first step
towards defeating the enemy thank you
for your attention
[Applause]
nanotechnology it’s become a buzzword in
last few years maybe about 15 years or
so the question is where is taro
technology do we see in our everyday
life do we experience this do we have
this technology at our disposal the
answer is yes this is something that has
changed how we do everyday thing
starting from waking up to an alarm
clock bang times it’s iPhone where we
put like three o’clock three alarms and
our spouses don’t like it or for storage
they put on those Gong sound on their
iPads making our coffee’s switching on
your TV all the way to the time that we
go to sleep and we have to check our
Facebook feed once again the it’s
everywhere
and something that has made this to work
is it took over about 40 50 years so the
third Industrial Revolution as we call
it micro electronics or electronics
especially integrated circuits when we
brought all those components resistors
capacitors inductors and we put them on
what we call silicon so silicon based
electronics is everywhere we used to
have television sets where we had vacuum
tube many of millennium kids they have
no idea what I just said but older folks
would know that we had to return those
TV sets on and we had to
wait for few minutes maybe a couple of
minutes before we could see the the
screen pop up and they’re changed once
we had electronics in the form of
solid-state electronics which
essentially changed or revolutionized
our lives and that has helped us develop
systems to allow the mediums where we
can control things at nano scale and
when I say nano scale I literally mean
at atomic scale now we can control
material we can control material
properties we can handle material at
nano scale an example is Braille code we
all know what is Braille code those
risen dots if you haven’t ever seen a
Braille code I would say next time when
you are you push button for an elevator
you will see there’ll be dots next to
that number of the floor that’s
basically Braille we feel Braille with
our bare fingers but think if you live
in North or in coal areas and we use
mittens or gloves if you try to feel
those thoughts we cannot feel it so
essentially the point is that to work at
nano scale we need to have tools and we
do have means to deal with those things
at nano scale and now we have those
things which is what has brought
nanotechnology in our everyday life when
I say in every aspect of her life here
is an example this looks like people in
developing countries or in developed
world especially this fit this picture
is from Europe from a friend of mine who
showed at a conference but this is not
so different than any developing country
as well where do we see nanotechnology
we may not be able to comprehend but
essentially
it is everywhere starting from our cell
phones our computers the frames of our
of our bikes again older folks would
know the bikes we used to write they
were like a ton heavy but now we have
those bikes that we can lift just with
one hand the frames the material of
those bikes the tires even cosmetics we
have nanoparticles and in Sun blocks it
is already everywhere
now speaking of this picture and
thinking about poor areas of the world I
I remember I landed in Dhaka Bangladesh
a few years ago my first time and I
could see the cycle rickshaws the the
it’s a it’s a thing where people drive
those things and you say that the back
they would have to self numbers written
or they’re on their cycle rickshaws
which means they would have to sell
phones even the cycle rickshaw so that
error technology is everywhere all
around the world in slums in all
segments of our economy what does that
mean how does that help us if we talk
about health care how does that help us
if we talk about different aspects of
our body or specifically medicine we can
now interface living systems at smaller
scales and and knowing that many of the
diseases especially cancer which is the
topic today as well has its origin at
genes at mutations so now we have
developed tools or we have developed
devices nano pores cantilevers we have
nano wires nanotubes quantum dots
nanoparticles so many things at that
skill which possibly we can interface
the living things at that scale going
back to that example of of Braille and
bare fingers now we have tools
that we can do something about it and of
course at larger scale we have had so
many ways of medical interventions
medical diagnostics and therapy at an
organ scale at a skeletal scale but now
we need to do something about our
diseases which have their known roots at
molecular scale and that’s where the
technology what we call narrow
technology or micro electronics can help
us and think about it think about the
growths or the control that we have
seven billion people or so on the face
of this earth
and seven billion components that I be M
made on a computer chip last year which
is 1 centimeter by 1 centimeter so if we
can make 7 billion devices we can really
interface life at really small scale and
that is something which should give us
motivation to do something about human
mortality very interestingly for last 50
60 years probably that’s when we have
started gathering data or at least
started classifying the causes of death
human mortality from cancer has not gone
down think about it we are still dying
at the same rate
although now we have known toxic effects
of so many things we have so many
regulations we don’t have leaded gas
again older folks Ford or we used to
have all kind of emissions we would be
sending out despite all those what we
call the best the betterment in the
quality of life we are still dying at
the same rate which essentially should
motivate us that there is something that
drastically needs to change and that’s
where nanotechnology or control at micro
and nano scale is is helping us derive
and come up with new ways and
many ways how we can do it there’s many
ways how it’s been already shown we can
separate out cells based on their
electrical behavior something called dye
electrophoresis we can use magnetic
nanoparticles and coat them with certain
antibodies which would specifically bind
to cancer cells and separate them out
magnetically we can coat surfaces and
capture tumor cells from a given body
fluid which can be blood urine saliva
even human tears which carry those known
molecules which are indicated of which
are indicative of the of the of the
vertical health or a disease going on we
can look at the tumor cells and look at
their mechanical properties by by
sucking in a single cell at a time in a
in a format of what we call a capillary
capillary electrophoresis so there are
so many ways how it’s been done and
especially after human genome project we
know now many of genes and proteins
which are known to be related to cancer
much like we know cholesterol is related
to heart disease we know many of the the
proteins or molecules which are related
to two cancers we do have some tests
vertical screening tests for a few
cancers but there are so many other
types of cancers which have no screening
tools which have no way of even finding
whether a metastatic potential exists in
a given tumor or that or not so that’s
where nano scale approaches can help us
I’ll give you a couple of examples where
we can capture tumor cells and those
aggressive tumor cells show a very
distinctive dancing behavior or a nano
textured device or a narrow texture
substrate which is different than what
you would see for a non metastatic tumor
cell or
just a regular cell from that organ with
this is an approach which can help us
objectively identify whether there are
tumor cells in a given sample again
simple bodily fluids or we can
interrogate each individual cell at at
any given time much like bouncers in a
bar if you guys are young like me and
try to get into a club they would ask
for ID I also have some right here but
they would still ask for that and I feel
honored they think I’m young guy so
think about it a bouncer interrogate
send checks each individual person
before he or she goes in this is
something we can implement for for self
as well so the idea is if you can create
a small orifice micropore in a very thin
membrane a nanoscale membrane 100
nanometer or 200 nano meter 10 and let
cells flow through you can measure any
current across their channel and see
when a cell goes through in the form of
a dip in the current and that is
essentially what would turn into pulse
which would be a dip in the ionic
current and we can use those pulses to
identify those cells based on their
mechanical physical and chemical
behavior those single pulses can tell us
about not just whether a cell is normal
but even if that cell is metastatic or
non-metastatic so this is some data
which we have gathered where we can
identify between those two types of
cells why is there deported think about
a simple tumor breast cancer we we feel
or we have been given to perceive that
breast cancer is completely treatable
which is not the truth
majority of breast cancer cancer
patients died of recurrence because of
metastasis because there is no easy or
direct way to look and differentiate
between indolent cells and metastatic
cells so this might be a way where we
can look at a given sample and define
the strategy to deal with that type of
cancer instead of giving same treatment
to all patients which is essentially our
diagnosis over treatment where we might
end up giving the same chemotherapy to a
patient even though their disease is not
metastatic in nature but that’s again a
potential of nanotechnology and in
differentiating those cells or those
diseased behaviors at single-cell level
and not just that there’s there other
unknown questions questions like
micrometastases questions where we don’t
know the subpopulations within a tumor
where we might have many many different
types of cells of cancerous nature but
they exist altogether in a given lump
but we don’t have a direct way of
knowing each one of those if we can
develop technologies further and narrow
down and find and cloud them based on
their behavior we might be able to treat
each individual patient based on their
signatures which is the concept behind
what we call personal personalized
medicine or precision medicine or nano
medicine these are all buzzwords
centered around the theme that
one-size-fit-all kind of therapy is not
the way to go because each individual
person would have their own type of
micrometastases their own they may have
stem cells in their in their in their
tumor which needs to be treated
differently so nanotechnologies have
this strengths where we can look for the
behaviors of cells at cellular and
subcellular scales and look for genomic
and proteomic makeup of those cells
which would give us a complete picture
of what lies within the enemy and
knowing the enemy is the first step
towards defeating the enemy thank you
for your attention
[Applause]
Please follow and like us: