Novel method of detecting cancer.

Cancer detection has gone for a dimensional overhaul at the U.S. department of Energy's Argonne National Laboratory. Extremely small tumours not more than a few millimetres in diametres can now be detected. Using a copper crystal lens, Argonne scientist Bob Smither and colleagues at Argonne's Advanced Photon Source have developed a sophisticated gamma-ray lens that can even detect tumors as small as a grain of rice.

The new lens technology uses gamma rays diffracted by a set of 828 copper crystal cubes arranged in 13 concentric rings in a disk slightly smaller than a dinner plate. According to Smither, the cost of commercial availability of the novel cancer detection tool would be less than $100,000, making it affordable to medical facilities. Incidentally, Smither holds the credit for building the world's first gamma-ray lens-a 20-inch lens for use in an astrophysics telescope-10 years ago at Argonne.