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Newswise Almost five years ago, a seven-year old Labrador Retriever was operated on, using a technique eventually patented by Virginia Tech biomedical engineering faculty member Rafael Davalos. The beloved family pet was suffering from a cancerous mass in the brain, and all other forms of medical treatment had been exhausted. The operation completely eradicated the malignant tumor, and follow up examinations of the canine proved the procedures success.

The teams findings were reported in the February 14, 2011 issue of the Journal of Technology Cancer Research and Treatment and, since this surgery, the investigators have continued experiments and mathematical modeling techniques that are leading towards effective treatments for humans affected with glioblastoma, the most common and deadly malignant brain tumor.

Today, the National Cancer Institute (NCI) has awarded one of Davalos colleagues, Scott Verbridge, an assistant professor of biomedical engineering and mechanics at Virginia Tech, a $386,149 research grant to take a related medical procedure a step closer to using on humans. Verbridge will lead a team that includes Davalos and focus on targeting and destroying the most therapy-resistant infiltrative cells in malignant glioma.

Glioblastoma is the most common and deadly malignant primary brain tumor, and it is almost universally fatal, with a five year survival rate of less than five percent, Verbridge said. This statistic has not improved significantly in decades, and there is still no treatment option to preferentially target the glioma stem cells or diffuse infiltrative cells that lead to tumor recurrence after surgery, chemo, or radiotherapy.

Davalos technique used on the canine patient is called irreversible electroporation. The investigators propose in the current project that these pulses can be tuned to target the unique physical properties of malignant cells, Verbridge said.

By contrast, chemotherapy and radiation used to reduce or eliminate cancerous cells are not discriminatory and also affect healthy cells.

Clinical trials using the irreversible electroporation procedure have occurred in the treatment of liver, kidney, pancreatic and lung cancer.

"The procedure is essentially done with two minimally invasive electrodes placed into the targeted region, delivering approximately 80 pulses to the site in about one minute. The pulses are high voltage, but low energy, so no significant heating occurs as a result of the procedure," Davalos said.

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A Dog Lives On; Now the Stage Is Being Set for Treating Humans