#3d Tissue Printing Using a DNA Guidance System Researchers at UCSF have developed a method called DNA Programmed Assembly of Cells (DPAC) that brings us one step closer to being able to print fully functional living organs.
The new approach includes incubating cells with small single stranded snippets of DNA that have been modified to attach to the cellsouter membranes.
and successfully did a small cancer gene study using this technique. The group was able to add a few modified cells with the Rasg12v cancer gene in a printed organoid array
and observed how the few mutated cells were able to induce a response from its surrounding tissue.
Zev Gartner, Phd, the paper senior author, stated that he hopes to use this technology to study how changes in the structure of mammary glands can cause the destruction of tissue structure that is associated with tumors that metastasize.
DNA-Guided 3-D Printing of Human Tissue is Unveile s
#Brain-Machine Interface Learns to Control Robot Arm Based on User Error Brain signals Brain-machine interfaces (BMIS) restore
or replace motor or sensory function in individuals who are disabled by neuromuscular disorders, stroke, or spinal cord injury.
Electrical signals, acquired through either invasive or noninvasive neural interfaces, are decoded to subsequently control external devices.
thus decreasing patient training time. The technology is based on the error-related potential (Errp) measured non-invasively using electroencephalographic (EEG) electrode arrays.
The Errp is elicited when an error is made, or when the action does not match the user expectation.
The user error signal is integrated into the neuroprosthetic controller, enabling the neuroprosthetic device to learn incorrect movements
and modify its behavior. Twelve subjects trained the Errp decoder to detect their individual Errp signals by observing 350 robot movements where 20%of the movements were incorrect (robot arm moved away from the target.
#White blood cell Mediated Therapy for Neurons in Patients with Parkinson Disease Scientists at the University of North carolina at Chapel hill have begun researching the delivery of neurotropic factors to the brain as a potential therapeutic for Parkinson disease.
an associate professor at the UNC Eshelman School of Pharmacy Center for Nanotechnology in Drug Delivery, has developed essentially smarter immune cells.
However, one potential therapy is the development of smarter immune cells that deliver neurotropic factors to neurons damaged by the disease.
In the study, GDNF alleviated neuroinflammation and reversed neurodegeneration in Parkinson disease model mice. One suggested mechanism of activity is that these cells,
Delivering the protective proteins through immune cells is a breakthrough in GDFP therapy. This new macrophage mediated protein delivery system could potentially provide a therapy for patients who are afflicted by this debilitating disease e
#New Self-Positioning Transcatheter Mitral valve Developed by National University of Singapore Transcatheter heart valve replacements have become life savers for many frail patients who are unsuitable for open heart surgery.
While many benefit from implantation of the prosthetic valves, the anatomy of many patients doesn lend well to the procedure
Now a team at National University of Singapore has developed a prosthetic transcatheter mitral heart valve that positions itself on its own to best fit each patient anatomy.
The Velox valve works with different size mitral annuli and consists of the standard pericardial leaflets on top of a polymer coated nitinol self-expanding structure.
#Mobileodt Brings Cervical cancer Diagnostics to Developing Countries Early detection significantly improves the survival rates for cervical cancer patients.
Cervical cancer used to be one of the leading causes of cancer deaths in the US,
but mortality rates have declined significantly in the last 40 years due in part to better compliance with regular cervical cancer screening.
Mobileodt is inspired by the insight that smartphones are more readily available than physicians and has leveraged this into a new cervical cancer screening product.
Their cervical cancer screening system allows any smartphone to be turned into a colposcope, making this part of the screening process readily available for most clinics.
The hardware is equipped with a light source and magnifying lens that gives a phone camera lens excellent visualization of any abnormalities in the cervical tissue.
Once visualized, the nurse can make a diagnosis or capture photos of the patient cervix and transmit them securely to a physician for further analysis. Mobileodt smartphone application supports annotation of these images and transmission of final recommendations by the remote physicians s
#Nicotine-eating bacteria joins stop-smoking fight Why do people smoke? There's no denying that smoking is horrible for you,
yet the puffing continues. As any smoker will tell you, it's because the hardest part about quitting smoking is that few things can match the reward of nicotine hitting the brain.
It calms the nerves, makes it easier to concentrate and it even dulls pain. But researchers may have found a new tool that blocks the nicotine reward before it hits the brain,
potentially making it easier for smokers to quit. The tool is a naturally occurring enzyme called Nica2 that is found in the bacteria Pseudomonas putida.
This bacteria lives in the soil of tobacco fields where it thrives on nicotine as its primary source of carbon and nitrogen.
The initial study did not show that any toxic by-products were created in the blood. The hope is continued that with study,
Created by Dr. Teri Dankovich, a postdoctoral researcher at Carnegie mellon University, the Drinkable Book features pages embedded with silver or copper nanoparticles.
In 25 trials at contaminated drinking sites in Ghana and Bangladesh, the paper was effective at removing 99 percent of bacteria."
"There was one site where there was literally raw sewage being dumped into the stream, which had very high levels of bacteria,
"Dankovich told the BBC.""But we were impressed really with the performance of the paper; it was able to kill the bacteria almost completely in those samples.
currently a manual operation done by students in a lab, and gear it up for full-scale distribution.
#Solar Sunflower technology harnesses the power of 5, 000 suns The latest in solar power comes to us from Swiss inventors working for Airlight Energy, Dsolar (a subsidiary of Airlight),
and IBM Research in Zurich, reports Ars Technica. It's called the Solar Sunflower, and like its namesake,
it tracks the sun and cools itself by pumping water through its veins like a plant.
Aside from its aesthetically-pleasing design, the Solar Sunflower also makes use of some innovative technology.
It uses something called HCPVT (Highly Efficient Concentrated Photovoltaic/Thermal) to generate electricity and hot water from solar power.
Basically this method entails using reflectors to concentrate the sun, as well as highly efficient photovoltaic cells (known as gallium arsenide photovoltaic cells) to convert that concentrated solar energy into electricity.
Though concentrated solar thermal power and PVS are nothing new to the solar power industry, the Solar Sunflower incorporates these technologies in a novel way that represents a few ingenious engineering breakthroughs.
According to Gianluca Ambrosetti, Airlight's head of research, the Solar Sunflower's reflectors concentrate the sun"to about 5, 000 suns."
"In other words, the difference between this technology being classified as a death ray as opposed to a solar array is merely a matter of how the reflectors are angled.
For instance, during one test, Airlight used the reflectors to melt a hole in a lump of iron.
and dealing with those high temperatures is how the Solar Sunflower really sets itself apart. Photovoltaic cells used by the Sunflower have a max operating temperature of around 105 degrees Celsius,
which is significantly less than the melting temperature of iron, let alone the heat of 5, 000 suns.
To counteract this, the Sunflower makes use of a hot water cooling system invented by the project's IBM collaborators.
rather than piping all that scorching-hot water through a radiator to dissipate the heat
The end result is a device that produces about 12kw of electricity, along with 21kw of thermal energy.
Even though that doesn't amount to a huge amount of energy (the 12kw of electricity is only enough to power a few homes, for instance),
The real obstacle to the implementation of the Solar Sunflower is its cost. Its gallium arsenide photovoltaic cells
though more efficient than standard PV cells, are not cheap. Add up construction costs and the costs of the fancy cooling system,
At the very least, the Solar Sunflower adds to the list of highly-efficient alternatives to nonrenewables now available to consumers s
#This company grows super-metals like trees A Seattle start-up called Modumetal could soon do for metal
what 3-D printing has done for plastics, reports Fortune. The company has developed a revolutionary process for"growing"metal that can be likened to how trees grow, according to CEO and cofounder Christina Lomasney.
The method is the ideal way of making materials, she explained. It's similar to the way that other Nature has evolved growing things over eons."
"The key to the method and what makes it so innovative is the use of nanotechnology to micromanage at the tiniest of scales the construction of their metal alloys, layer by layer.
"plywood-like metals with custom-made properties that are superior to conventional materials due to their nano-level detail.
Car companies, the aviation industry as well as bridge manufacturers could be next in line. Corrosion resistance isn't the only super-trait of these metals.
They can also be made stronger and lighter than steel, and resistant to temperature changes too. For example, the Defense department has approached the company with interest in the development of new armor that is both bulletproof and light enough to wear.
Perhaps the most attractive part of Modumetal's innovative technique, though, is that it's energy-efficient and cheap.
Unlike with conventional methods for extracting and using metals like smelting, the Modumetal method requires only electricity.
The company hopes its technique will usher in a new era when historical material tradeoffs and accepted limitations are thrown out the door.
Modumetal's website showcases a number of videos that demonstrate the company's innovative method in visual detail s
#Researchers create'Terminator'marine robot that hunts starfish The robot apocalypse has arrived...if you happen to be a starfish.
Queensland University of Technology researchers have created a killer robot with the singular purpose of seeking out
and terminating crown-of-thorns starfish, reports Techie News. Why target these poor, innocent starfish? Well, the truth is that they aren't so innocent.
But when their population booms, they can quickly become a plague, consuming coral reefs--their favorite food--with a frenzied fervor.
and inject them with a lethal brew of bile salts. It is capable of diving for up to 8 hours
Equipped with stereoscopic cameras for depth perception, five thrusters for stability, GPS and pitch-and-roll sensors,
as well as a unique pneumatic injection arm, it is an efficient executioner. The only thing missing is an audio track proclaiming"Hasta la vista
Researchers hope that by releasing a fleet of COTSBOTS they might restore some balance to the fragile ecology of the Great barrier reef,
which is already under threat from pollution, tourism, coastal development and global warming. The bots are autonomous,
So COTSBOT's advanced computer vision and learning algorithm allow it to learn to target crown-of-thorns starfish more accurately.
"Wee engineered a#Spaceglass that works in microgravity to ensure the spirit of whisky lives on into the future https://t. co/Ykpe2lsl0qballatine's poured an incredibly amount of time
and taste with the same intensity as you do on earth, Sandy Hyslop, Ballantine Master Blender,
Ballantine's added a Rose gold mouthpiece to retain what it describes as"that evocative, cold touch on your lip as you drink."
In order to walk, the patient wore a cap with electrodes that detected his brain signals. These electrical signals the same as those a doctor looks at when running an electroencephalogram (EEG) test were sent to a computer,
which"decoded"the brain waves. It then used them to send instructions to another device that stimulated the nerves in the man's legs
who had been paralyzed for five years after a spinal cord injury, was able to walk about 12 feet (3. 66 meters).
"Even after years of paralysis, the brain can still generate robust brain waves that can be harnessed to enable basic walking,
"study co-author Dr. An Do, an assistant professor of neurology at the University of California, Irvine, said in a statement."
"We showed that you can restore intuitive, brain-controlled walking after a complete spinal cord injury."
Paralyzed Man Walks Again with EEG System A paralyzed man, attached to a brainwave system, walks the length of a room with the aid of a harness and walkerpreviously, people have used similar brain-controlled
systems (known as brain-computer interfaces) to move limb prostheses, such as a robotic arm. And last year, a paralyzed person used his brain to control an exoskeleton that allowed him to make the first kick of the 2014 World cup.
The researchers say the new study provides proof of concept that a person with complete paralysis of both legs can use a brain-controlled system to stimulate leg muscles
or improve walking in individuals with paraplegia due to spinal cord injury, "the researchers said. Before the man could use the system to walk,
he first underwent mental training to learn to use his brain waves to control an avatar in virtual reality.
He also underwent physical training to strengthen his leg muscles. Then the patient used the brain-controlled system to practice walking
Dr. Elizabeth Tyler-Kabara, an associate professor of neurological surgery and bioengineering at the University of Pittsburgh, who was not involved with the study,
said that the work"is another step in demonstrating the feasibility of using brain-computer interfaces to control various devices that already exist."
but in the new study, the control signal came from the EEG.""By coupling two interesting technologies, you end up with something greater than the sum of the two,
In the future, it may be possible to implant the entire system inside a patient's body using implants to the brain,
"In the future, the development of new algorithms to filter out these interference signals or the development of a fully implantable brain-computer interface system may allow us to overcome this problem,
and thereby allow a person to use the system without the partial body weight support, "do said.
Data from various probes and rovers like Curiosity and the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter have provided researchers with evidence concluding that there is flowing water on present-day Mars. Scientists understand that Mars was once Earthlike with large
"In summarizing the data presented during the news conference, Meyer confirmed, "There has been no evidence for water until for now."
However, recently scientists found a way to analyze data from the Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter by extracting data from the pictures on a per pixel level.
#New ultra-strong, lightweight aluminum-steel alloy invented that rivals titanium Old-fashioned steel has been one of the most reliable and ubiquitous building materials for centuries,
so it might seem a bit outmoded to talk of a steel breakthrough. But researchers at Pohang University of Science and Technology in South korea may have made steel cool again, not to mention stronger and lighter, reports Popular Mechanics.
The researchers have devised a method for creating an aluminum-steel alloy that is more flexible, lightweight and stronger than any kind of steel ever made before.
This isn't the first time anyone has thought to add aluminum to the steel mix. Back in the 1970's
Soviet scientists recognized that by blending steel and aluminum they could forge an ultra-strong, lightweight metal,
but these advantages were always superseded by one major drawback: it was incredibly brittle. When significant force was applied,
it always broke rather than bent. The problem was that when you fuse aluminum and iron atoms together,
it tends to create tough, crystalline structures called B2, which are what make the aluminum-steel alloys so brittle.
No one had ever found a way around this problem, until now. Hansoo Kim and his team at Pohang discovered that
if the B2 crystals could be dispersed properly throughout the steel, the surrounding alloy could insulate them from splintering."
"My original idea was that if I could somehow induce the formation of these B2 crystals,
I might be able to disperse them in the steel, "explained Kim. It's not as simple as it sounds.
Kim and his team spent years painstakingly heat-treating and thinly rolling their steel in repeated attempts to control
when and where B2 crystals were formed. They experimented by adding bits to the mix; nickel, it turns out,
offered the particularly important advantage of making the crystals form at a much higher temperature, for instance.
Finally, they mastered their technique. The result of all this work is a viable aluminum-steel alloy that is 13 percent less dense compared to normal steel,
and with a comparable strength-to-weight ratio compared to titanium alloys. That's significant,
and it could make aluminum-steel alloy the building material of the future.""Because of its lightness, our steel may find many applications in automotive
and aircraft manufacturing,"said Kim m
#How to save soldiers'lives with fizz One of the biggest challenges for medics on the battlefield is treating blood loss,
which is among the leading causes of death for wounded soldiers. Bandages infused with chemicals designed to assist blood clotting helps,
but applying these chemicals to the surface of wounds has its limits. To best stem blood loss, those chemicals need to be able to find their way deep into a wound.
There may now be a solution, however, and it comes in the unlikely form of fizz, reports Wired.
Researchers have developed bandages infused with a new chemical recipe that fizzes on contact with blood.
The resultant bubbles then act as transport for the clotting agents propelling them deep into a wound as they pop.
The new concoction is composed of powdered marble, tranexamic acid which blocks a clot-dissolving enzyme and the clotting enzyme thrombin.
Water from the blood is the catalysis that sets it fizzing. f you can get the particles in the general area of the wound,
they will do the work and get the drugs to the damaged vessels, explained Christian Kastrup,
a biomedical engineer at the University of British columbia. t similar to when a grenade goes off
and fragments go in all directions, Kastrup continued, using an apropos metaphor. In initial tests which so far have only been performed on pigs and mice,
the fizzy tincture was shown to propel the chemicals deep into the tissue, all the way to the damaged internal blood vessels feeding the wound.
By clotting so deep into the lesion, the clot was shown to be more stable. Right now the fizzing agent is a bit messy.
While chemicals do get deeper into the wound, they pop off in every other direction too. Eventually researchers hope to make the delivery process more efficient,
however, using an endoscope. The advance could be a legitimate lifesaver not just for soldiers,
but also for victims of all varieties of disasters. Paramedics equipped with these fizzy bandages could prolong the lives of patients during transit to the hospital, for instance
#Patch Releases Drugs When Stretched A team of investigators from North carolina State university and the University of North carolina at Chapel hill have designed a novel drug release technology that relies on a stretchable elastomer
and drug loaded nanoparticles to unload medication when the skin flexes and contracts. The idea is that this kind of approach can deliver drugs transdermally only when needed.
For example, people with arthritis may be able to get pain relieving drugs during walks in doses that are proportional to how many steps are taken.
The patches consist of an elastomer that has tiny capsules throughout its surface each filled with drug loaded nanoparticles.
The nanoparticles are designed to slowly release a medication into the capsules where they reside. The capsules themselves are not impermeable,
but will let compounds through when enough pressure is applied to them. This pressure comes from stretching of the elastomer film,
which in turn stretches the capsules and compresses them to release the drugs. Microneedles placed below each capsule allow the drugs to pass into the skin.
The combination of the mechanisms lets the nanoparticles load the capsules with a small amount of a medication and release it into the skin immediately on demand d
#Transparent Batteries That Charge In The Sun A group of Japanese researchers have managed to improve the design of a transparent lithium-ion battery
so that it now able to recharge itself when exposed to sunlight without the need for a separate solar cell.
The transparent battery was developed first by the researchers, led by Kogakuin University president and professor Mitsunobu Sato, back in 2013.
The electrolyte used for the battery positive electrode is made mostly from lithium iron phosphate, while the electrolytes used for the negative electrode include lithium titanate,
and lithium hexafluorophosphate. Those are all common ingredients used in Li-ion rechargeable batteries but the thickness of these electrodes are just 80 to 90 nanometers,
which allows a lot of light to pass through and makes these batteries almost completely transparent. But by changing the chemical makeup of the negative electrode,
the Japanese researchers have found a way to make these transparent batteries now recharge themselves in the presence of sunlight,
or other bright sources of illumination. The group hopes the improved transparent batteries could one day be used to make smarter windows for buildings
and vehicles that can auto-dim when it bright out, but also store power as theye recharged by the sun. And as an extension of that idea,
one day your smartphone display might even serve as an additional battery, harvesting sunlight to charge the device whenever youe outside t
#Light-Powered Contact lenses In a patent granted this month, Google shows off plans to build contact lenses that are powered by
and communicate through light pulses. The patent, numbered 9158133, gives a peek on the role contact lenses can play in the future.
Google contact lenses will be light-powered. Using embedded cells that turn light into an electronic current,
these contact lenses don need wired charging. They can use solar power or harvest energy from a beam of light.
The patent does not mention batteries so these contacts have to constantly generate power. In the patent
the ability to measure body heat and blood alcohol content are mentioned as possible new features for the Google lenses.
However, unlike the ones that measure blood sugar levels, these lenses can communicate with an external device.
The patent proposes using pulses of light invisible to the human eye which another device can read.
Through photodectors installed, they can receive data or special instructions, too. This ability can play a key role in many fields.
For example, if a display item has embedded an LED light pulsing a signal at a specific frequency,
the contact lens can pick it up and forward this detection to a mobile device. This can mean targeted campaigns
and even let makers know how long a person is staring at a specific thing. Also, it can be a way to authenticate payments as a biometric.
Instead of a fingerprint, it can scan eye topography and verify transactions in a blink. Of course, a patent is only the beginning to a long process of making a product.
However, it clear that Google believes that future hardware shouldn be confined to wraps around the wrist or the body.
The eyeball might be an odd choice but Google has tried it before (remember Glass?)and maybe, the second time the charm c
#Device can measure the distribution of tiny particles as they flow through a microfluidic channel A new technique can measure the relative positions of tiny particles as they flow through a fluidic channel,
potentially offering an easy way to monitor the assembly of nanoparticles, or to study how mass is distributed within a cell.
With further advancements, this technology has the potential to resolve the shape of objects in flow as small as viruses,
known as a suspended microchannel resonator (SMR), measures particlesmasses as they flow through a narrow channel.
The original mass sensor consists of a fluid-filled microchannel etched in a tiny silicon cantilever that vibrates inside a vacuum cavity.
or spherical, says grad student Nathan Cermak, one of the paper lead authors. Postdoc Selim Olcum is also a lead author of the paper;
Manalis, the Andrew and Erna Viterbi Professor in MIT departments of Biological engineering and Mechanical engineering, and a member of MIT Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research, is the paper senior author.
Many frequencies To obtain information about the mass distribution, the researchers took advantage of the fact that each cantilever,
and to measure how each particle affects the vibration frequency of each mode at each point along the resonator.
This has an internal oscillator that adjusts its own frequency to correspond to the frequency of a resonator mode,
the device can attain a resolution of about 150 nanometers. The researchers also calculated that
they could improve the resolution to about 4 nanometers. High-resolution mass imaging This advance could help spur the development of a technique known as inertial imaging,
which makes use of several vibration modes to image an object as it sits on a nanomechanical resonator.
such as viruses or single molecules. ultimode mass sensing has previously been limited to air or vacuum environments,
where objects must be attached to the resonator. The ability to achieve this dynamically in flow opens up exciting possibilities,
The new MIT technology could enable very high-speed inertial imaging as cells flow through a channel. he suspended nanochannel technology pioneered by the Manalis group is remarkable
says Michael Roukes, a professor of physics, applied physics, and bioengineering at Caltech, who is pioneering the development of inertial imaging
but was not part of this study. heir application of our approach for simultaneous monitoring position
as they flow through the nanochannels. Manalislab is also using the new technique to study how cellsdensities change as they pass through constrictions.
They are also using the PLL approach to increase throughput by operating many cantilevers on a single chip m
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