₦airaland Forum

Nigerian scientist wins award for developing cancer-visualising glasses


By Chuka Odittah (Abuja) on June 24, 2015





20012826


Achilefu with the glasses on
Achilefu with the glasses on

A NIGERIAN-born scientist, Dr. Samuel Achilefu, has won the prestigious St. Louis Award for 2014 for creating cancer-visualizing glasses.

Achilefu, a professor of Radiology and Biomedical Engineering, and his team developed the imaging technology in cancer diagnosis into a wearable night vision-like goggles so surgeons could see the cancer cells while operating.

“They basically have to operate in the dark,” Bloomberg Businessweek quoted Achilefu, 52, as saying.

“I thought, what if we create something that let’s you see things that aren’t available to the ordinary human eye.”

Achilefu won a scholarship from the French government to study at the University of Nancy, according to St. Louis Post-Dispatch, a regional newspaper in St. Louis, U.S., and is the 87th person to receive the annual award since it was established in 1931.

Meanwhile, a Nigerian woman based in the United Kingdom, Nina Ndubuisi has invented a lifestyle programme that has successfully cut back excess weight in women and children in Nigeria, Canada, and elsewhere, raising hopes of containment of obesity especially among the rich.

Ndubuisi, who is a paramedic, while speaking in Abuja at the inauguration of ‘Slim With Ease,’ a global forum for reaching out to those affected by excess weight, stressed that her unique formula in cutting unwanted weight thrives on healthy lifestyle and determination.

Addressing hundreds of women and children, mostly those affected by excess weight gain, Nina said her priority is to help Nigerian women, children and men curb excess weight gain, noting that her goal is to eradicate obesity from the childhood of African children as well as other races around the world. Her programme, which has impacted women in Canada, UK and a number of African countries, has huge following on social media.

“Slim With Ease is not a revolutionary weight loss program that is sweeping across not just Nigeria but the whole world right now. It was inspired by my weight loss of 60kg in two years. I use to be very fat. People used to call me names on the street. People mocked me and I was determined to find a solution to my weight problem.

Also, the World Health Organisation (WHO) has blamed childhood obesity, especially in developing countries, on the marketing of sugar-rich non-alcoholic beverages and ultra-processed, energy-dense, nutrient-poor foods.

Director-General Margaret Chan yesterday told the Commission on Ending Childhood Obesity meeting in Hong Kong that “childhood obesity can erode the benefits that arrive with social and economic progress.’’

She said that childhood obesity must be accepted as a significant and urgent threat to health that was relevant in all countries.

Chan said that governments must take the lead and now was the time to safeguard the future of every child.

She commended the interim report on the work carried out thus far by the commission and commended the group.

Chan warned that voluntary initiatives were not likely to be sufficient. “To be successful, efforts aimed at reducing the marketing of unhealthy foods and beverages need support from regulatory and statutory approaches. Perhaps most importantly, you defined a moral responsibility and stated where it must lie.

“None of the factors that cause obesity are under the control of the child,” she said.

Chan said that the number of overweight or obese infants and young children increased from 32 million globally in 1990 to 42 million in 2013.

Chan said in Africa alone, the number of overweight or obese children increased from 4 to 9 million over the same period.

Married with two young children, Achilefu moved to St. Louis after he was hired by Mallinckrodt to start a new research department.

“Our efforts start with two words: ‘What if?’” Achilefu said during his acceptance speech.

“These words may sound simple, but they embody the belief that each person has the potential to make a difference, if only he or she can take the time to understand the problem.”

According to Bloomberg, the researchers’ technology requires two steps: First, surgeons inject a tiny quantity of an infrared fluorescent marker into the patient’s bloodstream. The peptides contained in the marker enable it to locate cancer cells and buries itself inside.

After the tracer flows through a patient’s body and clears from non-cancerous tissue – which lasts about four hours – the operation would begin. Wearing the goggle, the doctor can inspect tumours under an infrared light that reacts with the dye, causing cancer cells to glow from within.

This month, the goggles have been used on humans for the first time by surgeons at the Washington University School of Medicine.

Four patients suffering from breast cancer and over two dozen patients with melanoma or liver cancer have been operated on using the goggles since they were developed.

“The goggles function fantastically,” says Ryan Fields, a surgical oncologist who is collaborating with Achilefu to improve on the technology.

“They allow us to see the cells in real time, which is critical. Because the marker has not yet been FDA-approved, doctors are currently using a different, somewhat inferior marker that also reacts with infrared light.”

Julie Margenthaler, a breast cancer surgeon, says tens of thousands of women who had had breast cancer lumpectomies go back for second operations every year because of the inability to see the microscopic extent of the tumours

http://www.ngrguardiannews.com/2015/06/nigerian-scientist-wins-award-for-developing-cancer-visualising-glasses/

Dr. Achilefu with his glasses on, looking ''microscopically''. Hahahaha

Nigerian scientist and inventor, Dr Samuel Achilefu, is still making news months after he broke new ground in surgical treatments of cancer by inventing cancer-visualising glasses, now commonly known as ‘cancer goggles’

http://www.risingafrica.org/success-stories/science_technology/meet-dr-samuel-achilefu-award-winning-nigerian-scientist-and-inventor-of-cancer-goggles/

Some goats will come here to Capitalize on how he's ibo just wait and see

Proudly Igbo

DaBullIT:
Some goats will come here to Capitalize on how he's ibo just wait and see

Its better to capitalize on how he is not Ibo but Igbo

See patents everywhere for one man!

One year after “cancer goggles” were first used in a successful breast cancer operation, Dr. Samuel Achilefu is still getting emails from surgeons all over the world, hoping for a chance to use them.

“We’ve been inundated,” he said from his desk in Washington University’s Mallinckrodt Institute, hours before receiving the 2014 St. Louis Award for his invention.

Achilefu counts 27 surgeries where his technology has been worn by doctors operating on patients with breast cancer, liver cancer and melanoma. An injected dye reacts with infrared light to make cancerous tissue light up, helping surgeons locate the tumor and separate it from healthy tissue.

He said he hopes the device becomes a cheaper, easier way for doctors to “see” tumors here and in the developing world. Because the goggles also project the surgeon’s view onto a computer screen, they could be adapted for use as a teaching tool.

Achilefu said the idea for the goggles was borrowed from other medical disciplines and born out of a need to reduce the number of instruments in a surgery room.

“Ophthalmologists use glasses. Neurosurgeons do the same thing, but with large microscopes,” Achilefu said. “The idea was what is the simplest device to create that is easy to use but still effective.”

Developing the goggles became a three year collaboration between radiologists, optical and sensory engineers, and surgeons — a tting development for the same radiology institute that invented the PET scan.

The St. Louis Award is given each year to honor a resident who has made an “outstanding contribution” to the community. Achilefu accepted his during a ceremony Wednesday evening in St. Louis.

Speaking by phone with St. Louis Public Radio, award committee president David Kemper said, “It just seemed natural,” to choose Achilefu for the honor.

“None of us knew him, but we knew of what was going on. We thought, ‘Well, isn’t this fascinating, what a great contribution to society,’” Kemper said.

Achilefu grew up in the city of Aba, in southeastern Nigeria. After winning a government scholarship to study in France, he completed his studies at Oxford University before following a longtime mentor to the Mallinckrodt lab in 1993. He lives in the St. Louis area with his wife and two teenage children.

“I’m a good example that if you place anybody in a place and ask them to survive, they will. They will adapt to that language,” Achilefu joked. He speaks three languages uently: Igbo, English and French.

As for the future of the goggles, Achilefu said he’d like to see them become easily accessible to low-resource areas, such as urban centers and rural hospitals. He and his colleagues are gathering data to apply for FDA approval.

“I hope that in other developing parts of the world that can’t afford imaging technologies, this becomes affordable and useful for them,” he said.

Another step will be adapting the goggles to magnify the surgeon’s view to streamline brain surgeries. Achilefu said that ideally, the image would be sharp enough to be magnified so that even a single cell could be identified by a neurosurgeon.

“Medicine becomes more objective if you can see what you are treating.” Achilefu said. “You have the confidence you are doing the right thing to the patient.”

achilefu 1Other patents (inventions) owned by the same Samuel Achilefu (St. Louis, MO)

1 8,658,433 Dye compounds as photoactive agents

2 8,344,158 Fluorescent polymethine cyanine dyes

3 8,318,133 Macrocyclic cyanine and indocyanine bioconjugates provide improved biomedical applications

4 8,053,415 Compounds having RD targeting motifs

5 7,850,946 Macrocyclic cyanine and indocyanine bioconjugates provide improved biomedical applications

6 7,790,144 Receptor-avid exogenous optical contrast and therapeutic agents

7 7,767,194 Optical diagnostic and therapeutic agents and compositions

8 7,758,861 Dye-sulfenates for dual phototherapy

9 7,608,244 Hydrophilic light absorbing compositions for determination of physiological function in critically ill patients

10 7,566,444 Versatile hydrophilic dyes

11 7,556,797 Minimally invasive physiological function monitoring agents

12 7,514,069 Tumor-targeted optical contrast agents

13 7,510,700 Pathological tissue detection and treatment employing targeted benzoindole optical agents

14 7,504,087 Receptor-avid exogenous optical contrast and therapeutic agents

15 7,468,177 Hydrophilic light absorbing compositions for determination of physiological function in critically ill patients

16 7,438,894 Dyes for organ function monitoring

17 7,431,925 Internal image antibodies for optical imaging and therapy

18 7,427,657 Aromatic sulfenates for type 1 phototherapy

19 7,351,807 Cyanine-sulfenates for dual phototherapy

20 7,303,926 Methods and compositions for dual phototherapy

21 7,297,325 Hydrophilic light absorbing compositions for determination of physiological function

22 7,252,815 Pathological tissue detection and treatment employing targeted benzoindole optical agents

23 7,235,685 Aromatic sulfenates for type I phototherapy

24 7,230,088 Compounds for dual photodiagnosis and therapy

25 7,201,892 Pathological tissue detection and treatment employing targeted optical agents

26 7,198,778 Tumor-targeted optical contrast agents

27 7,175,831 Light sensitive compounds for instant determination of organ function

28 7,128,896 Pathological tissue detection and treatment employing targeted benzoindole optical agents

29 7,011,817 Hydrophilic cyanine dyes

30 6,939,532 Versatile hydrophilic dyes

31 6,887,854 Compounds as dynamic organ function monitoring agents

32 6,761,878 Pathological tissue detection and treatment employing targeted benzoindole optical agents

33 6,747,151 Azo compounds for type I phototherapy

34 6,733,744 Indole compounds as minimally invasive physiological function monitoring agents

35 6,716,413 Indole compounds as tissue-specific exogenous optical agents

36 6,706,254 Receptor-avid exogenous optical contrast and therapeutic agents

37 6,673,334 Light sensitive compounds for instant determination of organ function

38 6,669,926 Hydrophilic light absorbing indole compounds for determination of physiological function in critically ill patients

39 6,663,847 Dynamic organ function monitoring agents

40 6,656,451 Indole compounds as novel dyes for organ function monitoring

41 6,641,798 Tumor-targeted optical contrast agents

42 6,485,704 Azo compound for type I pototherapy

43 6,423,547 Non-covalent bioconjugates useful for diagnosis and therapy

44 6,395,257 Dendrimer precursor dyes for imaging

45 6,280,703 Simultaneous multimodal measurement of physiological function

46 6,277,841 Quinoline ligands and metal complexes for diagnosis and therapy

47 6,264,920 Tunable indocyanine dyes for biomedical applications

48 6,264,919 Indocyanine dyes

49 6,228,344 Method of measuring physiological function

50 6,217,848 Cyanine and indocyanine dye bioconjugates for biomedical applications

51 6,190,641 Indocyanine dyes

52 6,183,726 Versatile hydrophilic dyes

53 6,180,087 Tunable indocyanine dyes for biomedical applications

54 6,180,086 Hydrophilic cyanine dyes

55 6,180,085 Dyes

56 6,013,243 Gaseous inhalable ultrasound contrast agents and method therefore

49 6,228,344 Method of measuring physiological function

50 6,217,848 Cyanine and indocyanine dye bioconjugates for biomedical applications

51 6,190,641 Indocyanine dyes

52 6,183,726 Versatile hydrophilic dyes

53 6,180,087 Tunable indocyanine dyes for biomedical applications

54 6,180,086 Hydrophilic cyanine dyes

55 6,180,085 Dyes

56 6,013,243 Gaseous inhalable ultrasound contrast agents and method therefore

http://africanleadership.co.uk/a-nigerian-samuel-achilefu-awarded-in-the-u-s-for-invention-of-cancer-goggles/

I would have cared if he discovered the CURE!!!

no hommo tho!!!

Had Biafra had her way in 1967, Shanghai and HongKong would have been in for serious competition in terms of industry and innovation.

No wonder Nigeria, British, Russia and America want to exterminate us. They don't want liberation in Africa.

kamair237:
I would have cared if he discovered the CURE!!!

no hommo tho!!!

He did good
#ProudlyHuman.

Appreciate good things ny brother.

graciousolo:
He did good
#ProudlyHuman.

Appreciate good things ny brother.

He is a yoruba= hateful vermin.

a BIAFRAN scientist op respecti kwa onwe gi o. mtchhheeeewwwww when we do big things hey say nigerians when its somehing no too good they say igbo.

igbobuigbo:
He is a yoruba= hateful vermin.

You have not proven to be any better.

He is HUMAN! Before being yoruba. This hatred, bigotry, prejudice and ethnocentrism has to stop.