New Cancer Detection Technique Uses Sugar Instead of Radioactive Substance

Cancer cells utilize more glucose than healthy cells, which could help detect tumors with greater accuracy, a study from University College London claims. The researchers have now found a way to sensitize MRI scanners to detect levels of glucose that could potentially replace the standard radioactive techniques used to detect tumors.

The latest technique is called 'glucose chemical exchange saturation transfer' (glucoCEST). In the future, patients could get their cancers detected at primary care centers instead of going to specialty clinics, researchers said.

Cancer cells use large amounts of glucose because it gives the cells both energy and other by-products that help them grow faster. Other researchers are looking at therapeutics that could specifically kill tumor cells. Also, diets that low in simple carbohydrates could stop the cancer from spreading.

"GlucoCEST uses radio waves to magnetically label glucose in the body. This can then be detected in tumours using conventional MRI techniques. The method uses an injection of normal sugar and could offer a cheap, safe alternative to existing methods for detecting tumours, which require the injection of radioactive material," Dr Simon Walker-Samuel, from the UCL Centre for Advanced Biomedical Imaging (CABI), lead author of the study said in a news release.

The technique doesn't use any radioactive substance and so can be used to detect cancers in children and pregnant women.

"We have developed a new state-of-the-art imaging technique to visualise and map the location of tumours that will hopefully enable us to assess the efficacy of novel cancer therapies." Dr Walker-Samuel added.

The study is published in the journal Nature Medicine.