Whenever the subject of cancer is brought up, I feel it quite strongly. My mother died of cancer, and later my grandfather also suffered from it. He fought it off, only to have it come back a year later. It is a sad fact that it is an incurable disease that afflicts many people and makes life difficult for the loved ones of those affected. That is why I am always pleased when science makes some progress in this regard. And that is what is happening now.

Researchers from Texas and Portugal have recently developed a technology that makes it possible to treat cancer cells with LED light. Although it is only testing for now, laboratory conditions have already produced very interesting results that could mean a major innovation in the future for the treatment of this disease.

Without chemotherapy or surgery

Cancer cannot be cured. On the other hand, however, there is, for example, the possibility of surgery in which cancer cells are removed from the body. This can help stop or slow down the spread of the disease. Then there are chemotherapy treatments, which may get rid of the cancer, but no one knows when it will come back again. In addition, this process also strips a person of their hair, immunity and in a way I would say their dignity. That’s how I feel after my grandfather went through it.

“Chemotherapy normally targets rapidly proliferating cancer cells, but it can also affect healthy cells, leading to various complications. The complications of chemotherapy are numerous, vary greatly in severity and are influenced by the patient’s underlying medical history,” explains Dr. B. Barrie Bostick.

If it were indeed possible to use LED light to treat cancer cells, it would be a huge revolution, as many patients could undergo non-invasive procedures that would help them while not harming them in any way.

Cancer is treated with radiation and chemotherapy. However, this case is different. ━━ Cancer is treated with radiation and chemotherapy. However, this case is different. ( Source: Lucas Vasques /  Unsplash+ )

When the LED light turns into a gun

It works in a seemingly simple way: the light hits tiny particles of tin oxide and heats them so intensely that they kill cancer cells. In laboratory tests, this method has been shown to destroy up to 92% of skin cancers. For colon cancer, the results were lower, but still quite high, with LED light destroying 50% of the cells.

“Our goal was a treatment that was safe, effective and affordable,” explains project leader Jean Anne Incorvia from the University of Texas. Light-based cancer therapies already exist. It’s just that they currently require expensive lasers and specialised laboratories. If LED light could be used to treat disease in the future, diodes could replace lasers costing hundreds of thousands. “By combining LED light and nanoparticles, we can precisely target cancer cells without damaging the surrounding tissue,” Incorvia concludes.