Could This California Teen Have Invented a Cure for Cancer?

Aimee Herd : Feb 3, 2012
Steve Hartman - CBS News.com

"I'm excited to learn just everything possible, to make new innovations possible." -Angela Zhang

(Cupertino, California)—Science projects can be a big part of high school life. But perhaps none as big as the scientific "recipe" developed by 17-year-old Angela Zhang of Cupertino, California.

Zhang, a daughter of Chinese immigrants—now looking towards her high school graduation—began working on a cure for cancer in her "spare time" during her freshman year, by "reading doctorate level papers on bio-engineering."

Daunting for a teenager?

"At first it was a little bit overwhelming," said Angela in a CBS interview, "but I found that it almost became like a puzzle, being able to decode something." (Photo: CBS News)

Her sophomore year found her in the lab at Stanford, and she was conducting her own studies by her junior year.

According to the CBS News article, Zhang's research involves mixing cancer medicine in a polymer that attach to nanoparticles, which would then attach to cancer cells and show up on an MRI, so that doctors could then see exactly where the tumors are.

At that point an infrared light is aimed at the tumors to melt the polymer and release the medicine, killing the cancer cells while leaving healthy cells completely unharmed.

The research will reportedly take years before it is known whether or not it will work for humans, but with mice, "the tumors almost completely disappeared."

The CBS report states that Angela won the $100,000 prize in the Siemens Science Contest. The teen did what any high school girl would do with money to spare...

...she bought several pair of new shoes.

Read this full report and watch the video at the CBS link provided.