Way back in the 20th century, a movie called Fantastic Voyage created quite a stir. It envisioned a future in which miniaturized vehicles would travel inside the human body.

While we can’t miniaturize people in that way, thanks to nanotechnology the vehicles are at hand. Through teleoperation and telepresence, people may soon be able to virtually experience such a voyage. Meanwhile, it has tremendous therapeutic applications.

Xinhuanet reports that Chinese scientists have developed a unique drug delivery system. It moves within the bloodstream and delivers drugs with pinpoint accuracy.

The Chinese Academy of Sciences in Shanghai invented the device. According to Dr. Shi Jianlin of the Academy, it will have the twin advantages of both greatly reducing side effects from drugs and also allowing them to operate with maximum efficiency so the minimum dosage can be used to affect a cure.

A mere 200 nanometers in size, the empty vehicle is simply excreted when no longer useful. Thousands of such vehicles would be needed to deliver a single gram of medication.

Preliminary tests have already been conducted with analgesic and cancer drugs.

A unique material called mesoporous silica is the primary ingredient. It is formed into a hollow container for the drug of choice, whose molecules are then released when the target is reached.

Published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society, the research is reportedly attracting a lot of interest.

Though Xinhuanet did not disclose the precise method of delivery, it is probable that the method uses a kind of “chemical lock and key” technique in which each vessel is configured to lock onto a molecular receptor unique to the particular target. This would allow these special transport vessels to simply be soaked in a solution of the target drug, then injected into the bloodstream where they would travel until they found the appropriate target. Upon reaching that target, they would lock on and gradually release their medicine through osmosis.

By being released in the proximity of cancer or other targeted cells, a medicine would have maximum effect where it’s needed and minimum effect elsewhere.

As the disease cells are killed, they will be released and excreted along with the attached delivery vessels.

There’s another important implication here. We’ve already seen that nanotechnology research has become an international race. Both Europe and the United States have committed billions of dollars. It’s reasonable to expect that significant advances will come from this investment. However, it would be foolish to discount other players who are also eager to participate.

While some believe that China and India are racing us to the bottom by offering far cheaper labor, the reality is that they are also racing us to the top. For example, the Indian Institute of Technology is now the world’s most competitive university. Its computer science education ranks on a par with the finest schools in America.

China intends to create the equivalent of a dozen Harvards in the next few years, and given time there’s no reason why they can’t accomplish this.

China’s elite already has educations, laboratories and intellects comparable to the best elsewhere. While it remains a far smaller percentage of their total population, their absolute numbers are already in the millions and rising rapidly.

I predict that we will see many more important nanotechnology advances from Chinese laboratories in the next several years. Just as our AMEX-listed Transformational Technologies Portfolio holding Sinovac hails from China, we will find Chinese startup companies offering similar upside in other fields, including nanotechnology.

I am widening my network to include more opportunities in these emerging markets. My intent is to identify such companies early so we can invest and participate in their growth.

To your profitable future,
Jonathan Kolber
November 8, 2006

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