Cancer cells can be destroyed using the same metal from the asteroid believed to have caused the dinosaurs' extinction. Research by the University of Warwick in the UK and Sun Yat-Sen University in China found the dense metal, iridium, can be used to kill cancer cells by directly targeting them and filling them with a deadly 'version' of oxygen. A rare metal that is found in meteoroids, iridium has been discovered in large amounts within the Earth's crust from 66 million years ago, prompting the theory that it came from the asteroid that caused the extinction of dinosaurs. "The precious metal platinum is already used in more than 50 percent of cancer chemotherapies," Professor Peter Sadler said in a press release. "The potential of other precious metals such as iridium to provide new targeted drugs which attack cancer cells in completely new ways and combat resistance, and which can be used safely with the minimum of side-effects, is now being explored." "It's certainly now time to try