Scientists Get First Look At Nanotubes Inside Living Animals

Flourescent glow of carbon nanotubes in live fruit fly. (Credit: Image courtesy of Rice University)



Researchers at Rice University used near infrared flourescence imaging to view carbon nanotubes in a living organism for the first time.

To retrieve these images, the research team mixed carbon nanotubes into the food of common fruit flies. They then used a custom microscope, by aiming a red laser beam at the flies, which illuminated the carbon nanotubes within the fly. A special camera was then used to view the excited nanotubes.

The researchers found a concentration of nanotubes in the main blood vessel of the fly, and a lesser concentration in the brain, ventral nerve cord, trachea and fat. Also the ingestion of these carbon nanotubes did not effect the normal growth and life of the fruit flies.

The reason this article is interesting is because detection of these nanotubes in living organisms is the next step to having a more accurate and less invasive method of diagnosing certain diseases. Also, due to the small scale, this method will allow the diseases to be detected much earlier than present-day diagnosis.