Shiladitya Sengupta was on the subway in Boston when he saw someone selling balloons that contained smaller balloons inside them. If you’ve seen one of those things, you’ll know what a hideous racket they can make when some young swine with a sharp object gets close to them. But instead of exhibiting the normal adult human reflex of covering up both ears in anticipation, Shiladitya dug into his roots and exhibited the normal desi reflex: He started thinking about work.
Sengupta, luckily for us, was a postdoctoral associate at one of the biology labs at MIT, and was part of a team that was working on a treatment for cancer. The double balloon thing eventually led his team to develop something called nanocell cancer treatment.
The January edition of India New England carries a profile of Sengupta, who was one of the five desis on TR35 – the list of top young technology innovators last year.
Sengupta, an assistant professor for Harvard Medical School and MIT, came to the United States in 2001 after receiving his doctorate in pharmacology from the University of Cambridge in the United Kingdom. He is originally from New Delhi, India, and he earned his bachelor’s and master’s degrees at the All India Institute of Medical Sciences in New Delhi. Sengupta now lives in Waltham, Mass., with his wife, Shivani, who also teaches at MIT.
What Sengupta developed for cancer treatment stems from the idea of a balloon within a balloon. One balloon carries a drug to shut down the blood supply, and the second, smaller balloon carries a drug to kill the cancer. [Link]
Conventional treatments for cancer have used chemotherapy, and the biggest problem with chemotherapy is its egalitarian nature: it destroys without discriminating between healthy and cancerous cells. One of the most promising alternatives to chemotherapy is antiangiogenesis therapy:
Angiogenesis is the creation of tiny new blood vessels. The term comes from the 2 Greek words: angio, meaning “blood vessel,” and genesis, meaning “beginning.”
Normally, this is a healthy process. As the human body grows and develops, it needs to create new blood vessels to reach all of its cells. As adults, we don’t have quite the same need for making new blood vessels, but there are times when angiogenesis is still important. New blood vessels, for instance, help the body heal wounds and repair damaged body tissues.
But in a person with cancer, this same process creates new, very small blood vessels that provide a tumor with its own blood supply and allow it to grow.
Antiangiogenesis treatment is the use of drugs or other substances to stop tumors from developing new blood vessels. Without a blood supply, tumors can’t grow much larger than the eye of a needle [Link]
But the problem with this is that it could sometimes deprive tumors of oxygen as well and encourage tumors to develop more blood vessels because they want their oxygen. A possible solution would be to combine chemotherapy and antiangiogenesis drugs, and Sengupta’s idea was to create a dual layer balloon, the outer one carrying anti-angiogenesis drugs and the inner one chemotherapy drugs. The nanocells only penetrate tumors, because they are too large for normal blood vessels. Once the cell is inside, it explodes (there is no mention of noise levels when this happens) and the chemotherapy drug then kills the tumor. After all this effort that was presumably aimed at saving mankind, Sengupta and his professor then used it to make mice live longer. Now, why did they think more rats would help mankind? Whatever.
The team tested this model in mice. The double-loaded nanocell shrank the tumor, stopped angiogenesis and avoided systemic toxicity much better than other treatment and delivery variations.
Eighty percent of the nanocell mice survived beyond 65 days, while mice treated with the best current therapy survived 30 days. Untreated animals died at 20. [Link]
And here is my obligatory bad metaphor for the post. Whereas the nanocells pack cancer cures, Sengupta packs a deadly dose of winning humility.
“It’s a very simple thing — I mean, nothing great, but it has implications,” he says.
“It’s very logical, but nobody thought of this before. I mean, in fact I was thinking about this, like ‘Why didn’t it strike me before, or strike anybody else before?'” Sengupta says. [Link]
It is a widely held belief that – with all the advances being made in cancer care – in the next decade or so, scientists would be able to find a “cure” for cancer – a combination of drugs that can turn most types of cancer into chronic illnesses that can inconvenience but not kill. And when that happens, I’m sure some of the drugs will be double bagged, Shiladitya style.
PS: By the way, just to show off how well I researched this post, previous winners of the TR35 award include Jonathan Abrams, the founder of Friendster and the ubiquitous Google guys. You are most welcome.
karthik: thanks for this fabulous post.. i’m currently doing my residency in a cancer subspecialty, and this ‘invention’ could completley alter the way chemotherapeutics and other drugs are given to not only cancer patients but other people as well who are suffering from other conditions… kudos to this guy! i don’t know (but hope) that cancer will be cured in the upcoming years…but these new ideas/innovations make it a step closer…
cancer sucks.
Sweet – this guy was at Cambridge during the time I was there. Don’t remember him from any of the Desi/Commonwealth parties, although I think one of my friends might have been on his team that won the 50k Entrepeneurship prize.
Btw, the caliber of the desi scientists/techies at Cambridge is phenomenal – they consistently top the scholarship/prize categories and most go on to exceptional careers. The Kolkota native who lived two doors down my corridor in College was the senior wrangler for mathematics for his year.
(for the record, I was merely a lowly Arts student…)
Btw, the caliber of the desi scientists/techies at Cambridge is phenomenal – they consistently top the scholarship/prize categories and most go on to exceptional careers.
What is it with this phenomenal desi brain? Has anyone thought about it? Can’t just be the genes, imo. Could it be related to desi attitude or upbringing? If so, will third-genners lose it I wonder.
Legislative selection (by immigration law, as opposed to natural selection).
True Manish. And to be fair, Cambridge gets to pick from the cream of the crop of students from India’s top institutions – as do many grad programs across Canada/UK/USA. The skewed perception definitely has its benefits, but also its disadvantages.
Oh Yeah! Tell me about it. 😉
Cambridge gets to pick from the cream of the crop of students from India’s top institutions
Shouldn’t that be Cambridge gets to pick from the cream of the crop of students from all over the world (and of course the U.S.). Legislative selection cant account for all of this phenomenon only a part of it, imo. Besides, I meant to ask this question generally not just with regard to Cambridge. Desi students from ordinary public schools end up winning the spelling bees and the Intel competitions disproportionately enough to be noticeable. (Could be I notice precisely because they’re desi, not sure).
Besides, I meant to ask this question generally not just with regard to Cambridge. Desi students from ordinary public schools end up winning the spelling bees and the Intel competitions disproportionately enough to be noticeable
Yes, but the quality of their parents is a result of the legislative selection that Manish was alluding to (the parents are more educated, driven etc.,)
“(Could be I notice precisely because they’re desi, not sure).”
That is more the case, that is OK and very understandable.
However, @ Cambridge or Intel competition winners, there are people from all races and background.
It used to be disproportionally Nobel Prize winners were Jews, and still East coast intellectual elite are full of them.
Hungary as a country has the highest per capita Nobel Prize and Olympic winners (if one counts the expats).
PS: There is no desi gene
Divya, I see your point – these students still compete exceptionally even in an environment with students from elite insitutions from all over the world. I think that a number of factors must be taken into consideration to account for this – 1) exceptional training from the top Indian schools 2) generous support that is earmarked for Indian students through the various University trusts 3) The advantage of speaking English fluently 4) a generally larger Indian presence (than any other nationality except EU) across a number of departments 5) a supportive network of Indian fellows and alumni.
“(Could be I notice precisely because they’re desi, not sure).”
That is more the case, that is OK and very understandable.
That is more the case, that is OK and very understandable.
I disagree Kush. Indian kids are overrepresented among Intel finalists. (The total Indian population in the US is something like 0.7%, remember.) They are VASTLY overrrepresnted among spelling bee winners (something like 3 of the last 5 national winners), and also in medical schools and in elite colleges.
I attribute most of this to the natural talents of the parents–as Manish suggests.
Divya,
I do not want to go comment marathon. I am an Indian, not Hunagrian and not a Jew. I do not want to mythmaking either for Indians or Jews or Hungarians, Period.
However, when in doubt, always go to CIA factsheet website: http://www.cia.gov/cia/publications/factbook/geos/us.html. This is the breakup of US religions: Protestant 52%, Roman Catholic 24%, Mormon 2%, Jewish 1%, Muslim 1%, other 10%, none 10% (2002 est.)
I do not know how much you have exerience of American academics. If you went to any Department in America, disportionally (not all by any means) it has Jewish faculty (even though they are 1% of entire population). Look @ list of Nobel Prize winners and their religion. Let’s look at some of the 20th century intellectuals: Albert Einstein, Robert Oppenheimer, Richard Feynman, Saul Bellow……….the list will never stops. I bet if you looked at the Intel winner’s list carefully.
They give the same reason (most of them) – upbringing and that is OK. We all should be proud of ourselves.
And the Hungary case is very well established. 18 Nobel Prize winners from Hungary (http://www.webenetics.com/hungary/nobel.htm). List cotains: Elie Wiesel, Milton Friedmen,etc. And the list does even not include “nut cases” like Edward Teller, who is originally from Hungary. It ranks 8th in olympic medals (http://www.webenetics.com/hungary/olympic.htm)
More power to India (South Asia) and Indian (South Asian) origin……but I do not think there is any special upbringing mantra. Remember, there are George Soros for every Ram Prasad.
Data, Dahlin
An excellent quote:
When Nobel Laureate Enrico Fermi was asked if he believed in extraterrestrials, he replied, “They are already here…they are called Hungarians!”
Let’s chill out…………
Sorry, Sorry, the last two comments were for Eddie not Divya.
Very sorry, Divya.
What exactly is your point Kush? That Jews are more overrepresented than Indians in certain areas? I don’t doubt it. But Indians are CLEARLY overrepresented in the categories I mentioned. I’m sorry if that offends you.
Kush, it’s not about myth making. I saw the documentary about the spelling bee and the parents spend an unbelieveble amount of time prepping the kids. If not for that, the kids would not win. I find factors of this kind to be of interest and am wondering about the whole cluster of such factors in general. The genetic angle is not of interest to me.
“I’m sorry if that offends you.”
Eddie, I am not at all offended. Indians/ South Asians have more barriers to cross in present day climate and should be celebrated.
I just wanted to highlight the myth. Also, I am having fun too.
I once had a similar discussion with a Turkish guy (he went on Turkish glory, blah, blah), I have been on this line of arguement before. Somebody, had pointed me the Hungarian phenomena, was not a Hungarian.
Peace
whatever you say Kush. Desises are genetically superior, just ask razib. 😉
omg…..i KNOW this guy!(though i am not sure if he knows me now)……heheeeheeh,we were at the same undergradutae college in india…….he was pretty academic even back then but unlike other academic types,i actually got along well with him….but yeah,he wasnt the partying types so definitely wasnt in my inner circle(which incidentally was a sureshot way to gain supreme notoriety in the ladies hostel)……
well done shiladitya but i’d rather still be a slacker…..as one of the latest bolly song goes…”apni to paathshaala masti ki paathshaala….”
Manish – you make it simplistic -almost equating legislation to eugenics. There is something to be said about the raw confidence of the sliver of smart people who decide to migrate, esp. from a completely different society like that of India or China. Its probably this nerdy traits of their parents that makes these kids study obscurantist words instead of chasing girls- which I would want my kids to do. And I agree, I don’t think there is any brown, brainy gene.
Eugenics? I call Godwin’s Law!
Smart guy……lunched with him when he came here to interview for a faculty position. But (being in academia, and surrounded by academics) he seemed different in that he really, really was a go getter. Always dreaming very big…..and going for broke. He’s likely to be very successful, but with the kind of science he’s working in, there isn’t much room for error, so i hope he’s careful enough with his work.
Vipender seems like a loser to me! You talk about Indians being hardly comprehensible- perhaps you are talking about yourself. Look at your english and the way you are rambling on!
Excellent story but I never saw anybody in MBTA selling or carrying baloon, I think it is made up story without taking care of fact.