Written on Saturday, December 02, 2006 by Gemini
Micro robot that swims up your spine to take pictures of fractures and deliver drugs
A tiny scanning robot that can swim through the body and beam images back to a TV monitor might sound like the plot of a science fiction film.
But such a robot is being developed and researchers hope to inject it into the body through the spinal canal where it will use its inbuilt camera to take images of patients who have suffered trauma, such as a fracture of the spine, or who have tumours. It will also be able to deliver drugs.
The robot will help surgeons plan operations more accurately because they will have a clear image of what is happening in the spinal canal. The device may also be able to take biopsies or tissue samples.
“In the future, micro-robots similar to this will be permanently implanted in our bodies,” says Professor Moshe Shoham, director of the Robotics Laboratory at the Technion-Israel Institute of Technology, where it is being developed. The device – “a swimming endoscope” – is a major advance on what is currently available to examine the spinal canal. Other devices have been developed to examine the colon, including the Pilcam, another Israeli invention, which is a mini camera in a capsule that is swallowed. The images it produces are being used to detect early signs of colon cancer.
The Pilcam travels with the flow of food and waste and does not need a propulsion system. To travel in other parts of the body, however, both propulsion and steering are needed. The new robot has two thin tails or wires protruding from its rear to propel it through the body. Low power electric current from a battery is used to send a travelling wave, like a mini Mexican wave, down the wires.
The movement of the tails makes the capsule ‘swim’. Power to each tail can be varied by remote control so the device can be steered. In the spinal canal – the first target for the device – it will travel through the cerebral spinal fluid, a clear liquid, and send back images in real time for the surgeon to view. “The robot’s propulsion system allows us to go into the spinal canal, blood vessels, etc. The space in the canal is big enough for the device and the fluid is clear like water, which makes it easier to take images,” says Prof Shoham.
The new robot is about 2mm in diameter with a 15mm long micro camera and mini loading bay for drugs, plus a battery and transmitter which can beam the images to a TV screen. Unlike the colon cancer capsule, the new device – which doctors hope to use in two years time – will be injected with special equipment under local anaesthetic into whatever part of the body needs to be inspected.
“It will first be used to transmit images and will help in investigating into patients who have had trauma to the spine, or who have cancer in that area,” says Prof Shoham. “The next stage will be to use the robot to deliver drugs to specific sites of the spinal canal, and in the future it will also be able to perform biopsies and release medications for treatment. “We are also working on modifying the propulsion technology so we can use the device in blood vessels where the fluid velocity is much greater than in the canal,” Shoham said. “When we get it into blood vessels the range of uses will be very great.”
Written on Friday, December 01, 2006 by Gemini
SCIENTISTS HAVE combined two molecules that occur naturally in blood to engineer a new molecule that uses solar energy to split water into hydrogen and oxygen, says research published in the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
The breakthrough may pave the way for the development of novel ways of creating hydrogen gas for use as fuel in the future. Professors Tsuchida and Komatsu from Waseda University, Japan, in collaboration with Imperial College London, synthesised a large molecular complex from albumin, a protein molecule that is found at high levels in blood, and porphyrin, a molecule which is used to carry oxygen around the body and gives blood its deep red colour. Porphyrin molecules are normally found combined with metals, and in their natural state in the blood they have an iron atom at their centre. The scientists modified the porphyrin molecule to swap the iron for a zinc atom in the middle, which completely changed the characteristics of the molecule.
This modified porphyrin molecule was then combined with albumin and the resulting molecular complex could capture light energy in a way that allows water molecules to be split into molecules of hydrogen and oxygen.
Dr Stephen Curry, a structural biologist from Imperial College London, who participated in the research explains: “This work has shown that it is possible to manipulate molecules and proteins that occur naturally in the human body by changing one small detail of their make-up, such as the type of metal at the heart of a porphyrin molecule, as we did in this study.”
“It’s very exciting to prove that we can use these biological structures to harness solar energy to separate water out into hydrogen and oxygen. In the long term, these synthetic molecules may provide a more environmentally friendly way of producing hydrogen, which can be used as a ‘green’ fuel.”
Written on Tuesday, November 28, 2006 by Gemini
Race Between Google & Microsoft Will Produce An Online Map Allowing Surfers To Virtually Navigate A City
Two Internet giants have embarked on a race to become the first 3D cartographers of the world. The result is expected to be an online map that allows web surfers to land in a city from the sky, walk its streets and navigate its hotels, shops and attractions without ever having to visit in person.
The rival schemes, costing hundreds of millions of pounds, are based on Google Earth, the search engine’s existing 2D photographic map of the world, and Microsoft’s Virtual Earth, a similar system. Last month, Microsoft launched Virtual Earth 3D, which has detailed three-dimensional replicas of the centres of 15 American cities, including New York and Los Angeles. There are plans to add more than a dozen in Britain over the next few years.
Both services currently rely on detailed satellite images from Nasa and other space agencies and governments, which enable users to zoom in from 200 miles in space to pictures of the roof of their own home or of elephants roaming the African plains. Microsoft is now commissioning photographers to take millions of pictures of urban landscapes from planes, vans and motorbikes. The images are patched together using digital imaging software to create 3D buildings users can enter, walk past or fly by.
ARMCHAIR TRAVEL: The result of the race is expected to allow web surfers to land in a city and tour it without having to visit in person
Google is taking the cheaper option of inviting users to create its virtual cities. In March, the company bought SketchUp, an internet tool that lets people create their own 3D images of buildings. It plans to add the best of these, which include British landmarks, to Google Earth later this year.
As the rival schemes develop, buildings will become interactive, enabling users to “enter” them, obtain information, buy goods inside and talk to other “visitors”. Eventually, landscapes such as forests and mountains could also be included. The move may bring about a transformation in how people use the Internet. Instead of relying on traditional search engines, in which they enter words into boxes on screen, users would be able to navigate the world using a virtual replica of how it appears in real life. They could, for example, “walk” the streets of Manchester online or choose items from a supermarket aisle from their living room while gossiping with fellow shoppers about the prices.
Microsoft and Google launched their online photographic mapping services at the end of 2005, since when it is estimated they have each been downloaded more than 100m times. Microsoft’s early 3D service has few extras beyond traffic information and adverts. In Britain, the company is showing 3D models only of the outsides of landmarks such as the Tower of London and the London Eye. In future features may include a route planner, which gives a virtual run-through of a journey.
Written on Monday, November 27, 2006 by Gemini
Diet and nutrition may play a key role in helping people fight depression, Australian researchers report. A number of nutrients, including polyunsaturated fatty acids, St John’s Wort and several B vitamins, have the potential to influence mood by increasing the absorption of chemical messengers in the brain, Dianne Volker of the University of Sydney in Chippendale and Jade Ng of Goodman Fielder Commercian in New South Wales note.
There is a wealth of epidemiological, experimental and circumstantial evidence to suggest fish and the oils they contain, in particular omega-3 polyunsaturated fatty acid, are protective against depression, Volker and Ng write. They point out that the balance between omega-3 and omega-6 may also be important, given that the latter can prevent the body from absorbing the former.
Another candidate for dietary prevention of depression is amino acid tryptophan, found in foods, including turkey, and is responsible for the drowsiness people feel after eating a hearty Thanksgiving dinner. The body converts tryptophan to the neurotransmitter serotonin, suggesting the amino acid may have modest effects on mood.
Written on Monday, November 27, 2006 by Gemini
Will Help Classify Agony And Its Intensity
Researchers have developed a new 3D tool to help patients explain where they are suffering pain, it was announced on Friday. The computer program, developed by experts at Brunel University, shows a rotating model, which allows patients to describe their pain and its intensity.
Doctors can collect information on the patient’s experience of pain and the way pain travels around the body. It also allows people to highlight their type of pain—such as stinging, burning, pins and needles or a numb feeling — using colour-coded markers. Doctors can use the zoom, rotate and drag functions over the 3D model and the image can be saved for later reference.
The researchers, who believe they have developed a world first, created the tool after realising doctors were having to rely on 2D pain drawings. George Ghinea, senior lecturer at Brunel University, said: “Our research identified that a more accurate method for pain visualisation was needed in order for patients to describe and record the pain that they were experiencing and for physicians to track and better understand patient pain ‘journeys’.”
“To this end, we have developed the world’s first 3D multimedia pain visualisation software that allows patients and physicians to identify and monitor pain experiences.” The Hillingdon Independent Wheelchair User Group, in London, has tested the model for experience of back pain. Though the researchers are now hoping to attract commercial interest in the model for widespread use in hospitals, it was mainly developed by them to help register how a person’s pain changed during the day, especially after medication was taken.
Patients will use a standard personal digital assistants (PDA), to log where pain is felt on a 3D body image. The PDA will store the data and future entries can be added so that doctors can see the changing of a patient’s condition.
SEARCH IS LIFE
Dr. Google can solve 60% medical cases
Net giant Google has added another string to its bow—helping doctors diagnose illnesses, according to a study. Researchers found almost 60% difficult cases can be solved by using the world wide web as a diagnostic aid. Doctors fight disease by carrying about two million facts in their heads but with medical knowledge expanding, this may not be enough.
Misdiagnosis is still a common occurrence in the medical profession despite all the tools available such as the blood tests and state of the art scanning equipment. Studies of autopsies have shown doctors misdiagnose fatal illnesses 20% of the time. So millions of patients are being treated for the wrong disease. And the more astonishing fact may be that the rate has not really changed since the 1930s.
So a team at the Princess Alexandra Hospital in Brisbane identified 26 difficult diagnostic cases published in the New England Journal of Medicine last year, including obscure conditions such as Cushing’s syndrome and Creutzfeldt-Jakob disease.
They selected three to five search terms from each case and did a Google search while blind to the correct diagnoses. Google gives users quick access to more than three billion medical articles. The researchers then selected and recorded the three diagnoses that were ranked most prominently and appeared to fit the symptoms and signs, and compared the results with the correct diagnoses as published in the journal.
Google searches found the correct diagnosis in 15 (58%) of cases. Hangwi Tang, who led the study, said: “Doctors adept at using the Net use Google to help them diagnose difficult cases.”
