While surgery is the mainstay of cancer treatment, not all tumours can be removed in this way – such as when they have spread to many sites throughout the body or are hard to define.

Chemo- and radiotherapy drugs are able to destroy such diffuse cancers, but can have serious side effects. Instead Balaji Panchapakesan at the University of Delaware, Newark, suggests destroying cancers in situ using exploding nanotubes.

His idea is to fill carbon nanotubes with water before injecting them into a tumour. The area is then zapped with laser light which causes the water inside the nanotubes to boil. The tremendous pressure created by the heating causes the “nanobombs” to burst apart, killing nearby cells.

Using the correct wavelength and intensity of the laser light makes it possible to ensure only the “nanobombs” absorb significant amounts of energy, and that they explode well before other tissue is damaged.


Panchapakesan has already used the technique to kill BT474 cells – a cell line originating from a breast tumour.

The exploding nanotubes could be made to target tumours by labelling them with an antibody specific to the cancer cell receptors, he says, and adding a chemotherapy drug to the water could wipe out any cells that survive or escape a blast.

Nanobomb treatments would be minimally invasive, meaning fast recovery times and fewer side effects, says Panchapakesan.

Read the full carbon nanobomb patent application.

Since the 1970s, New Scientist has run a column uncovering the most exciting, bizarre or even terrifying new patented ideas – find the latest stories in our continually updated special report.

Read past Inventions: Self-diagnosing aircraft, Self-replicating materials, Treatment for fragile X, Dust buster, Birthing computer, Eyeball stiffener, Hurricane pacifier, Natural colour underwater photos, Billboards that know you at a touch, Green technology patents special, Universal detector, Bat-style footstep detector, and Infrared lie detector.