Research shows how used coffee grounds help cancer treatement

Michael Bolton

According to new research from Dublin City University, leftover coffee grounds have the potential to deliver anti-cancer drugs to the body.

The study, published in the journal Nanoscale, took used coffee grounds and generated tiny ‘carbon dots’ from them, using relatively gentle chemical processes.

The scientists then explored their properties, finding signs that these materials could hold promise for future biomedical applications, including drug delivery.

To carry out the study, the team used two widely available brands of coffee and treated the spent coffee grounds to create carbon dots.

The team then analysed the resulting carbon dots using spectroscopy and microscopy, confirming their high quality and uniformity.

“Cancer treatment is advancing all the time, but challenges still remain, including the side-effects of chemotherapy,” explains Prof. Silvia Giordani, whose lab at DCU School of Chemical Sciences led the research.

“This is where we believe that nanomedicine, or using tiny nanoparticles such as carbon dots, could help improve treatment effectiveness and potentially reduce side-effects for patients.”

“There was nothing special about the coffee we used, we just went out and bought it off the shelves in shops in Dublin.

“We were pleased to see that we could upcycle the used coffee grounds into these carbon dots, which hold great potential for many different applications, including drug delivery in the body.

“Treating coffee leftovers in this low-cost way eliminates the need for highly toxic heavy metals and reduces energy-intensive reaction times, and it offers a sustainable route to landfill disposal, helping to reduce environmental harm.”