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244 || AWSAR Awarded Popular Science Stories - 2019
The Nanoparticulate Beauty and the Cancerous Beast
Ms. Samipta Singh*
Email: samiptasingh@gmail.com
Achild when given a burger with a spinach patty inside would definitely eats it because the kid doesnot know what is inside. For a child it is just a burger! When nutrients are coated upon the surface of nanoparticles, the cancer cells readily engulfthem because they need these nutrients to rapidly grow and multiply. Cancer cells thus have receptors on their surface, which are like radars sourcing and attracting nutrients to enable rapid multiplication. Breast cancer cells have many folate receptors on their surface because of their enormous need for folate. The Trojan horse strategy had helped Greeks to enter the city of Troy. Hidding inside a wooden horse, so that the guards would not know, Trojans came out of the wooden horse at night and were able to win the Troy-Greek war
because of this clandestine entry. Similarly, through the coated nano carriers strategy the nanoparticles also enter the cancer cells, specifically, because the nutrients on these nanoparticles are required by the cancer cells to rapidly grow and multiply.Inside them is a drug which kills these cancerous cells and thus winningthe war against them.
These issues motivated me to work on breast cancer. However, while thinking of it as my Ph.D. topic, the issue that bothered me was how will I present such a topic at various forums because our Indian society keeps topics like menstruation and breasts under wraps? A reason why, very often breast cancers go undiagnosed aswomen are too shy to discuss it! A blogger who was diagnosed with breast cancer was embarrassed to admit
* Ms. Samipta Singh, PhD Scholar from Babasaheb Bhimrao Ambedkar University, Uttar Pradesh, is pursuing her research on “Development and Characterization of Surface Functionalized Breast Tumor Specific Nanoformulation(s)”. Her popular science story entitled “The Nanoparticulate Beauty and the Cancerous Beast” has been selected for AWSAR Award.
