University of Arizona junior Phillip Zinsli worked during the summer of 2007 with an interdisciplinary group, including researchers in the UA departments of Chemical Engineering, Aerospace and Mechanical Engineering, and Surgery trying to capture cancer cells on a smart platform modified with antibodies to detect breast cancer. The research is in its early stages, and the group is working with a simple model for cells in a fluid. When the project is completed it will give scientists a quick and simple way to screen patients for potential cancer.

Recent research has shown that detection of metastasized cancer cells can be done before a secondary tumor itself is found. Metastasized cancer cells are cells, which have detached from the tumor and circulate in the blood with the potential to infect other areas of the body. The cells detach because of changes in surface proteins called cadherins. Metastasized breast cancer cells all have certain N-cadherin proteins, which distinguishes them from other cells found in the blood stream. Specifically targeting these N-cadherin proteins on the cancer cells is how the group hopes to capture cells on the smart surfaces. "Right now we are working with small antigen-modified micro particles that resemble cancer cells, which we detect," says Zinsli. "It is a relatively simple system compared to cells, but it will make working with the cells easier."

Zinsli's research is being supported through the use of equipment and facilities in the College of Engineering and the College of Medicine, with support in part from the BIO5 Initiative at the University of Arizona and grants to the UA from the National Institutes of Health Interdisciplinary Grant (#1 R25 GM072733), and the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (#52005889).

Phillip Zinsli, UBRPer in Dr. Roberto Guzman's lab, Chemical Engineering and Dr. Ronald Heimark's lab, Surgery