MELBOURNE, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- Researchers have developed microscopic metal particles that can kill cancer cells while sparing healthy tissue, offering a potential new direction for more targeted and less toxic cancer treatments.

This work remains at the cell-culture stage and has not been tested in animals or humans, but it suggests a new strategy for designing cancer treatments that exploit cancer's own weaknesses, said a statement released Friday by Australia's Royal Melbourne Institute of Technology (RMIT).

The international team led by RMIT researchers created the tiny particles, known as nanodots, from molybdenum oxide, a compound based on a rare metal called molybdenum, often used in electronics and alloys, it said.

By tweaking their chemical composition, the scientists enabled the particles to release reactive oxygen molecules -- unstable forms of oxygen that damage cancer cells and trigger their self-destruction, it added.

In tests, the particles killed three times more cervical cancer cells than healthy cells within 24 hours, without needing light, unusual for technologies that rely on oxidative stress, according to the study published in Advanced Science.

"Cancer cells already live under higher stress than healthy ones. Our particles push that stress a little further, enough to trigger self-destruction in cancer cells, while healthy cells cope just fine," said Zhang Baoyue, the study's first author from the RMIT School of Engineering.

"The result was particles that generate oxidative stress selectively in cancer cells under lab conditions," Zhang said.

Most cancer treatments affect both cancerous and healthy tissue, but technologies that selectively stress cancer cells could enable gentler, more targeted therapies, researchers said, adding that these particles are made from common metal oxide instead of costly or toxic noble metals like gold or silver, making them likely cheaper and safer to develop. Enditem