Nanotechnology offers new way of treating heart disease

HEART patients may in future be injected with microscopic drug-releasing particles that cling to the inside walls of diseased arteries.

Scientists in the US have successfully tested the so-called "nanoburrs" in rats.

The particles consist of spheres just 60 nanometres across, more than 100 times smaller than a red blood cell. Each one is coated with tiny protein fragments that allow it to stick to the broken surface of damaged artery walls.

At its core the particle has a drug designed to combat narrowing of blood vessels bound to a chain-like polymer molecule.

Over a period of days, the drug is slowly released and gets to work treating the artery.

Professor Robert Langer, one of the scientists from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Boston, said: "This is a very exciting example of nanotechnology and cell targeting in action, which I hope will have broad ramifications."

Work is continuing to determine the most effective dose of the drug for treating damaged arteries.