MedicalScience
Latest
MIT engineers use ultrasound for improved topical drug administration (video)
Ultrasound is likely most often associated with sonograms, but some MIT engineers are poised to change that. By using two separate beams of inaudible sound waves (one at low-frequency, the other high) the team were able to increase the permeability of skin, in a bid to improve the efficiency of transdermal drug delivery. The technique works thanks to the waves exciting bubbles in a fluid (such as water), forcing them to swell and move chaotically. Once the bubbles reach a certain size they implode, sucking the surrounding fluid into the void. This process creates micro-jets of liquid, which cause miniscule tears in the skin, allowing it to (painlessly) absorb chemicals more effectively. In practice, a pre-treated area of skin is then covered with a patch containing the correct dose of drugs -- but don't worry, the skin is said to grow back just a few hours later. Up until now, research into ultrasonic administration of drugs has concentrated on low-frequency waves, because the higher end of the spectrum doesn't have enough energy to pop the bubbles. Higher frequencies do, however, help create more of them and also limits their lateral movement. By using both high- and low-frequencies, the MIT engineers found this produced better over all results, by not only increasing the skin's uptake of the medicine, but also increasing the number of drugs that can be delivered this way. With pretty much anything that is usually delivered in capsule form being on the cards, this could make the administration of many popular drugs much more convenient and / or effective. Also excellent news for those who really don't like needles.
Research shows that lab-engineered muscle responds to a workout
It's fairly well known that if you want to get ripped, you gotta pump some iron. But what's more of a surprise is that lab-engineered muscle also responds to a workout. Researchers at the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Center Institute for Regenerative Medicine have been looking at a way to help the body grow new muscle, and found that cells derived from muscle tissue (on a bio-compatible material) responded to "exercise." The research also showed that when tissue was applied to mice with reduced back muscles, those which received the exercised flesh enjoyed significant recovery benefits over those that just received the "sedentary" cells. The scientists who conducted the study suggest that if this was done on an equivalent human scale, muscle would have recovered to 70 percent of the force of native tissue within two months -- what they consider a significant amount. So if you ever need a transplant, perhaps that Thighmaster in the loft will finally come to use.
Canon overhauls Mixed Reality platform with new head-mounted display
Canon's been fiddling around with augmented (or mixed) reality for some time now, but the company just took things to the next level. A new AR headset announced today is less stylish than that other soon-to-be-released wearable tech you've likely heard about, yet certainly more sophisticated than its bigger brother. The controller sees visual markers through dual on-board cameras and projects virtual objects onto two corresponding displays set right above the eyes, marrying the virtual world to the desert of the real. You can gaze from any angle and even manipulate the virtual projects with what looks to be a plastic, magic ice cream cone. The glasses are set to release next month and, while Canon hasn't assigned a price, all the planned applications are decidedly industrial, making us think they won't be cheap. So, you probably won't be using em' to scope out the various Layars around your hood.
"Brain pacemaker" could treat depression, OCD
Sending electrical shocks into the brain via a "brain pacemaker" has already led to dramatic breakthroughs like the revival of a man trapped in a vegetative state for six years, but new research may mean that the technique is soon a common treatment for disorders like depression and OCD. Researchers from the Cleveland Clinic, Mass General, Harvard Medical School and Brown Medical School implanted the Medtronics brain pacemaker into 17 people suffering from depression and tracked them for a year, finding significant improvements in mood as well as social and occupational functioning, while 26 patients suffering from OCD were followed for three years and also showed "marked improvement." Findings will be presented to the American Association of Neurological Surgeons this week in Chicago, and clinical trials are scheduled for later this year -- in other news, sales of "The Terminal Man" to neurosurgeons recently skyrocketed for unknown reasons.
