Intravascular catheters are a bane of clinical medicine, being one of the chief ways people get infected inside of hospitals. They have to be replaced routinely, putting extra strain on nurses and doctors and causing discomfort to patients. There are a ways to keep catheters relatively clean with sterile technique and specialized dressings, but there’s […]
Tag: Materials
Hyperspectral Imaging Helps Spot Tumor Marking Tags Deep Within Body
Visualizing tumors deep within the body is difficult because light can only penetrate so far through tissues without losing most of the data it carries. Fluorescent markers that can highlight the existence of tumor cells have to be visible in order for them to help with diagnosis, while radioactive markers can be dangerous. MRIs and CT […]
Researchers Give Animals Infrared Vision
Even those of us with perfect vision are actually blind in some ways. Many birds can see ultraviolet light and snakes can detect infrared, something we don’t have the right retinal cells for. But now researchers at University of Massachusetts Medical School and University of Science and Technology of China have shown that it may soon be […]
Artificial Proximal Tubule Model Mimics Functionality of Real Kidneys
Our kidneys are designed to filter out all kinds of impurities from the blood stream, a process that’s not particularly selective. This is done by glomeruli, which are groups of capillaries at the end of kidney tubules. But other parts of the kidneys, the proximal tubules, are charged with returning wanted nutrients back into the body. […]
Focused Ultrasound and Microbubbles Push Drugs Across Blood-Brain Barrier
The blood-brain barrier is an important defense mechanism that prevents infections and contamination within the brain. It is also responsible for making it extremely difficult to get therapeutic drugs, including chemo agents, into the brain. Now researchers at Washington University in St. Louis have developed an innovative method for pushing drugs across the blood-brain barrier. […]
Neural Probes That Mimic Real Neurons May Revolutionize Brain-Computer Interfaces
Neural probes are some of the best tools for studying how the brain functions, and they also have great potential for therapeutic applications. Brain-computer interfaces can allow paralyzed people to regain function and even locked-in patients may soon be able to communicate with the rest of the world. Though there’s a great deal of progress […]
Microfluidic Device Pulls Exosomes from Blood to Test for Cancer
Exosomes are tiny vesicles that seemingly all the cells in our bodies produce. Initially, exosomes were thought to be a way for cells to expunge built-up trash, but over the past decade or so scientists have discovered that they seem to play an important role in regulating a variety of biochemical processes. One thing that […]
Microfluidic Device Separates Circulating Tumor Cells by Size to Help Spot Cancer
Tumors tend to shed cells that travel down the bloodstream, spreading the disease wherever they end up landing. Though these circulating tumor cells (CTCs) are the reason that cancers metastasize to distant places in the body, they’re also a great biomarker for spotting the existence of tumors. The extreme rarity of CTCs, though, makes detecting these […]
Sensor Detects Sepsis Biomarker in Less Than Three Minutes
Fulminate sepsis is a dangerous condition, usually caused by a bacterial infection. The runaway behavior of the immune system in sepsis is still poorly understood. The trick is to diagnose it early and to use antibiotics to fight it off. These days it can take up to three days to diagnose sepsis, usually via a […]
Light-Activated Tether-Free Neural Stimulation Device
Researchers at the University of Pittsburgh have developed an ultra-small implantable neural stimulation device that can be activated using a laser and which doesn’t require a cable that tethers it to a controller outside the body. The researchers hope that the device could pave the way for less invasive neural stimulation therapy in neurological disorders […]
Biowire II Allows for More Accurate Testing of Cardiac Tissue
Researchers at the University of Toronto have developed a new device to cultivate and test both atrial and ventricular cardiac tissue in the lab. The device, called Biowire II, consists of two elastic polymer wires which are positioned three millimeters apart, with a small band of cardiac tissue grown between them. A “training” regimen using […]
Microrobots Take Minutes to Detect C. diff in Stool Samples
Detecting bacterial infestations within the GI system, particularly using low cost methods, takes so much time that treatment is often administered too late. Clostridium difficile (C. diff) is a particular nasty nuisance that kills many frail patients, and even with a hospital lab it can take up to two days to get the results. Researchers at Chinese […]
Graphene Biosensors to Detect Lung Cancer
Exhaled breath is rich in biomarkers that can point to the presence of disease. In particular, ethanol, acetone, and isopropanol can point to the presence of lung cancer, so having a way of measuring these chemicals in breath might provide a way to diagnose lung cancers or to screen for them. Current methods of measuring […]
Wearable Respiration Sensors Made from Shrinky Dinks
While there are wearable monitors that measure a person’s respiration rate, they can’t track the volume of air that a patient inspires. For people with asthma and other lung conditions, this is an important indicator that can be used to assess the patient’s status. Engineers at University of California, Irvine have now developed a cheap and […]
Innovative Skin to Electrically Power Prosthetic Devices
Powered prosthetic devices need a great deal of electricity to energize them throughout the day. Researchers at the University of Glasgow in Scotland have developed a combination electronic “skin” that can generate and store electricity for prosthetic devices. The technology consists of layers of a finely tuned graphite-polyurethane composite covered by graphene, a material only […]
Electric Generator Powers Cardiac Implants from Beating Heart
Cardiac implants, such as pacemakers and cardioverter defibrillators, have limited lifetimes because they’re powered by batteries that cannot be recharged. Replacement surgeries are required roughly every ten years, creating difficulties for patients, many of whom are already fragile, and incurring a huge cost on the healthcare system. Engineers at Dartmouth, working with clinicians at University […]
Soft Robotic Micromachines Mechanically Stimulate Small Tissue Samples
Researchers at Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland have developed miniature soft robots that can mechanically stimulate tiny tissue samples when activated by near-infrared light. The tiny machines could act as medical implants with a role in on-demand drug delivery or to mechanically manipulate tissues. Other applications include medical research, as components of lab-on-a-chip […]
Soft Robotic Micromachines Mechanically Stimulate Small Tissue Samples
Researchers at Ecole polytechnique fédérale de Lausanne in Switzerland have developed miniature soft robots that can mechanically stimulate tiny tissue samples when activated by near-infrared light. The tiny machines could act as medical implants with a role in on-demand drug delivery or to mechanically manipulate tissues. Other applications include medical research, as components of lab-on-a-chip […]
Tumor Monorail Lures Brain Tumor Cells Toward Death, Now FDA Breakthrough Device
Brain tumors are extremely difficult to treat due to their hard-to-access location and because the blood-brain barrier prevents most drugs from reaching their targets. A new device called “Tumor Monorail,” which cajoles tumors to crawl into a container, just received the FDA’s “breakthrough” designation. The new designation will speed the device through the rest of the […]
Ingestible Pill Stays Inside Stomach, Monitors Digestion
There are a variety of gastrointestinal conditions that may be better treated if clinicians had an idea of what’s going on inside the stomach. But, the stomach is full of acid and it eventually expels whatever drops into it, making it difficult to have sensors operate inside for long periods of time. Researchers at MIT […]