Inside liver cancer cells, Egyptian physicist Dr. Ahmed El-Gendy and his team tested a different method for killing cancer cells, using magnetic nanoparticles moved by a magnetic field to generate mechanical force inside the cell instead of heating it.
Hot Topics
About half of Libyans drink contaminated water What is the scientific reason?
Mauritania's blue treasure is in danger Will the map of fish in the Atlantic be redrawn?
The Citrus Secret Everyone's Talking About: Burn More, Crave Less & Feel Great Naturally
This is the first practical application of his new technology, which was recently honored by the International Society for Advanced Materials in Sweden with the 2026 Marie Curie Award in the field of nanomedicine for cancer treatment.
The hypothesis tested by Ahmed – a physics professor at the University of Texas at El Paso – is different from the traditional method of magnetic therapy. Instead of using the magnetic field to heat the particles, it was used to move them mechanically inside the cell. In this case, it does not act as a heat generator, but rather as a microscopic motor inside the cancer cell.
In the new study, Ahmed and his research team used iron carbide nanoparticles and tested them on HBG2 cells, a laboratory model used to study liver cancer. The particles varied in size, ranging from 35 to 154 nanometers, and using imaging and cell measurement techniques, the researchers confirmed that these particles were able to enter the cells.
He adds, "When these particles move within the limited space of the cell, the resulting forces and moments can cause disturbances in its structure."
The study results indicate that this disruption caused severe damage that led to the death of cancer cells, either in an organized manner known as "apoptosis," or as a result of direct damage to the cell known as "necrosis." That is, the particles do not try to kill the cell by heating it, but rather by creating a mechanical effect inside it.
Regarding how to confirm that the damage to the cell was caused by movement and not heat, Ahmed says, "We tested the ability of the particles to produce heat, and we found that the heating values were low, and the experiments did not show a significant increase in temperature under the conditions used."
He adds, "In contrast, cell images showed a clear disturbance in the membrane after applying the magnetic field while the particles were inside the cells, which confirms the idea we have been betting on for years, which is to eliminate cells by force and not heat."
Because the idea is based on the response of particles to a magnetic field, the choice of material was a key element. Ahmed and his research team chose "iron carbide" because of its high magnetic properties. They also made the particles in different crystalline phases and sizes to study their relationship to magnetic behavior and their ability to affect cells.
Ahmed explains, "Our ultimate goal was not to create a better magnetic particle, but to find out how its physical properties could be converted into a force inside a cancer cell."
Ahmed has been working on magnetic nanoparticles and their medical applications for more than 20 years, and in previous research he tested the idea on other tumors, including prostate and breast cancer in animal models.
Tags:
science