Humans could ‘inject nanoparticles’ to survive deadly deep-space cancer on trips to Elon Musk’s Mars colony
A BIOTECH startup believes its nanoparticle injections could be used to heal the many ails astronauts will face on deep-space missions.
Nanotics has recently been selected to participate in the SPACE-H Accelerator programme, backed by Nasa’s Human Research Program and Microsoft Federal.
The initiative is designed to advance medical capabilities that can minimise the health risks in human spaceflight.
In just a six-month space station stay, astronauts are at the mercy of cancer-causing radiation and immune system dysregulation, which can lead to sepsis.
The likelihood of succumbing to either life-threatening condition is only heightened the longer astronauts are in space.
A trip to Mars – which the likes of Nasa believe humans will be making sometime in the 2030s – takes about nine months one-way, but roughly three years for a round trip.
“Every six months, according to Nasa’s own data, astronauts are exposed to the equivalent of 1,000 chest X-rays,” Lou Hawthorne, founder and CEO of Nanotics, told The Sun.
“And on a three-year round-trip journey, you’re looking at 6,000 chest X-rays.
“That’s extremely tumorigenic, meaning it induces tumors.
“It’s also extremely pro-inflammatory, so it induces these profound inflammatory responses which can lead to sepsis.”
How does space effect the body?
Space takes a significant toll on the human body.
The usual duration of an ISS or Tiangong mission is roughly six months, which can have huge physical impacts, such as:
- Redistribution of fluid around the body due to long periods of weightlessness
- Bone density loss in critical areas such as lower limbs and spine
- Muscle atrophy
Humans in space lose between 1 and 1.5 per cent of their bone mineral density.
Although ISS astronauts spend an average of two hours a day exercising, muscle loss is unavoidable in space.
It takes several years to recover from a six-month spaceflight.
There can be ongoing health concerns long after astronauts have returned to Earth, including:
- Higher risk of bone fracture
- Increase in erectile dysfunction
- Cancer risk due to radiation exposure
“[Space] is probably the most challenging environment to be in from a health maintenance perspective,” said Hawthorne.
“We have no evolutionary context for zero gravity. It’s completely new to the human body. So the body reacts to that in unpredictable ways over time.
“It’s fun and games for a few days, but over time, the body is very confused and certain systems at an organ, tissue, cell and signal level don’t work exactly as they do in normal gravity.
“Radiation is a huge factor. It’s far beyond anything that humans are used to on Earth, and that’s going to promote all sorts of diseases.”
On a long duration space flight, all of these problems are going to be amplified.
Lou Hawthorne, founder and CEO of Nanotics
People can go to space healthy but have ‘sleeping’ diseases suddenly awake due to the environment.
“On a long duration space flight, all of these problems are going to be amplified,” he added.
‘Great potential’
Hawthorne previously worked in animal cloning after a billionaire wanted to replicate his dog.
But after losing a mentor to cancer, Hawthorne took his savings to buy him a couple of years to research how tumors work.
Nanotechnology in healthcare, also known as nanomedicine, is already being used to combat it has been used to combat common conditions like conjunctivitis and glaucoma.
But a study, published in August by Nature, argued that it shows “great potential” for cancer diagnosis and treatment.
Hawthorne’s nanomedicine, called NaNots, essentially targets signals which tumors send to the immune system that say ‘don’t kill me’ – the signals which allow it to grow.
The tech, he claims, will then allow a human’s immune system to shrink the tumour, or tackle a sepsis infection.
“We have shown that it works in various animal models of disease,” he explained, with testing done on humanised mice alongside the Mayo Clinic.
Hawthorne claims NaNots also worked against the molecules responsible for sepsis in a mouse model.
But Nanotics’ medicine is preclinical, meaning that it can’t be used on astronauts today – but possibly in the future if human trials go well.
The experimental treatment is exactly that: experimental.
The Nature study noted that the application of nano-drugs is “unhurried”, with less than 10 per cent of medicines being approved due to safety issues in preclinical and clinical studies.
But the technology, while in its early stages, gives us an insight into how future astronauts might be able to survive deep-space missions, in which they will leave Earth for several years at a time.
We don’t have large machines like MRIs, CTs, big radiation machines, cyclotrons and gamma knives and things like that… in space.
‘Incredibly compact’
The medicine comes in syringe form, making it “incredibly compact,” according to Hawthorne.
He added: “So, you could pack enough for five years for a dozen astronauts easily in a package the size of a microwave oven.
“We have a massive [amount of] infrastructure and talent available on Earth.
“We don’t have large machines like MRIs, CTs, big radiation machines, cyclotrons and gamma knives and things like that… in space.
“So, you need something that treats disease at the molecular roots and is super compact and doesn’t require returning to Earth.”
The idea is that an astronaut could take a simple finger-prick blood test, which goes into a device that spot can abnormalities like cancer.
These devices, called ELISA kits, already exist, and are currently being modified by other companies to work in space, according to Hawthorne.
Nanotics wants to make a syringe for several conditions deep-space astronauts might encounter.
Astronauts would then pull the right syringe off the shelf for whichever ailment they have, and administer it themselves through an IV.
The company, which secured $1million from one investor just weeks ago, is trying to raise $300million to fund human studies.
Should the company be successful in scraping together that much cash, Hawthorne believes it can begin human trials in 16 to 18 months.
“Anywhere people go, I think this should be in the toolkit,” said Hawthorne.