Carneggie Mellon’s NanoRobotics Laboratory is working on an adhesive that uses the same techniques that beetles use to stick to walls and other vertical surfaces. In addition to employing Van Der Waals principles (beetles have micro hairs on their legs), the team is exploring a secreted liquid that seems to enhance adhesion. At the moment, liquid delivery remains an unsolved problem. The NanoRobotics team is currently trying a design that uses passive pressure (applied when the foot hits the surface) to release the liquid through pores at the base of the hairs.
MD&DI’s October issue will feature an application for such an adhesive. In the meantime, visit http://nanolab.me.cmu.edu/projects/beetle/ to learn more about the project.
From DeviceTalk Blog:
A study funded by C.R. Bard has found that if ventilator tubes are coated with silver, the risk of gravely ill patients catching pneumonia is reduced by 36%, Reuters reports. Bacterial pneumonia is one of the most insidious hospital-acquired conditions, and patients can get it from infections caused by ventilator tubes. Half of the antibiotics used in hospital intensive care units are prescribed to help prevent bacterial pneumonia in patients put on ventilators. Silver is widely used as an antimicrobial agent and has been shown to reduce bacterial pneumonia infections in animals. So Bard wanted to see if a silver coating would help reduce the infections in humans. The study tested the coated tubes between 2002 and 2006 on 1500 patients expected to be placed on a ventilator for more than 24 hours. When all was said and done, 4.8% of those with silver-coated tubes developed ventilator-associated pneumonia, compared with 7.5% of patients who were on ventilators with uncoated tubes. The coating also appears to have delayed the onset of pneumonia in the patients who did contract it. There was no impact on death rates, however.
Kudos to Bard for stepping up to the plate to enable these findings to come to light. Ventilator makers should start using coatings on their tubes, if they haven’t already.
—Erik Swain
Reuters reports that Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute has created tiny amounts of a synthetic version of heparin. The researcher hope it will avoid the risk of contamination, blamed for the death of more than 80 U.S. patients earlier this year.Only milligram doses of the product have been made so far, but they are already working on ways to expand production to kilograms.
Bringing the production of the drug, which is currently harvested from pigs, to the pharmaceutical lab would ease fears of contamination.
From FDA News:
Watson Pharmaceuticals is voluntarily recalling one lot of 75 mcg/hr fentanyl transdermal system patches sold in the U.S. from wholesalers and pharmacies.
A small number of patches leaking fentanyl gel have been detected in this lot, which may expose people directly to the gel and lead to serious adverse events such as respiratory depression or possible overdose.
The affected patches were shipped to customers between Jan. 30 and March 19. No other strengths or lots were affected, and the company does not anticipate any product shortages as a result of this recall. The company has notified the FDA, Watson said.
Its not exactly a biomaterial, in fact, its barely even usable right now, but graphene could change the way medical implants are designed. Never heard of it, you say? Graphene is a hexagonal carbon supermaterial that makes up graphite (you know, as in pencils). It was isolated in 2004. The material is characterized by a large surface-to-volume ratio and high conductivity, suggesting it could be used in ultra-small electronics. Research has demonstrated that atom-thick transistors can be created using graphene in place of silicon.
New research has claimed it is the strongest material measured, and only a portion of its properties have been discovered. Its safe to say that graphene is a bit of the newest geek-out material.
“There is no doubt in my mind that these structures can be used for technological applications,” Antonio Castro Neto of Boston University says. “The electronic flexibility and structural stability, fundamental for modern device development, are unmatched in any other material on Earth.” But working out how to manufacture graphene devices on a practical scale remains a challenge, he concludes.
Once electronic chips can be made at nanometer scale it only a matter of time before medical implant manufacturers are using such chips in their designs. It may even change the way implants are designed, since initial research indicates graphene may raise fewer toxicity concerns than other nanomaterials.
There are a few problems with graphene. At this point, for example, it is incredibly difficult to get flakes in a workable size. In addition, graphene sheets tend to curl up and react with substances around them, making them difficult to build into devices. Stay tuned, however, as the research matures.
Great video that was posted last month about how biomaterials science is driving nanotechnology. Ogan Gurel interviews Chad Mirkin, PhD who is a professor of and Northwestern, as well as the Director of the Institute of Nanotechnology.
The main way the development is working is by focusing on interdisciplinary efforts. Its a bit like herding cats, joked Mirkin. The interview is about 15 minutes long and hass commercials, but its got some really strong information.
