firefly

An oxidative enzyme derived from fireflies may help shed light on a new treatment for mesothelioma. Researchers at Memorial Sloan-Kettering in New York, one of the country’s top cancer centers, have just released their findings on the use of firefly luciferase as a guide for a heat-based treatment of  mesothelioma. Firefly luciferase is an enzyme responsible for the bioluminescence of fireflies.  When the enzyme is isolated and treated, it can be made to bind with certain biomarkers, causing cells with these markers to glow. The technique has opened the door for bioluminescence imaging, a precision imaging method that works at the molecular level. In the new study, mesothelioma cells were treated with a specially-prepared firefly luciferase gene and their level of…