Portable brain tumor treatment system kills cancer while you take out the trash -- Engadget

Portable brain tumor treatment system kills cancer while you take out the trash -- Engadget

We've seen robots that perform brain surgery and lasers that cook tumors, and now a team of researchers are well on their way to bringing mobility to the battle against brain cancer. The NovoTTF-100A, which just received FDA approval, is basically a set of insulated electrodes, attached to an electronic box, that pumps low intensity electrical fields to the site of a freshly diagnosed GBM (glioblastoma multiforme) tumor. The fields, known as Tumor Treatment Fields (TTF), play off the electrically charged elements of cancer cells to stunt the tumor's growth, and may in some cases actually reverse it. A recent test of the system showed comparable results to chemotherapy, without the usual lineup of side effects, including nausea, anemia, fatigue, and infection. Given, patients using the system are expected to wear the thing continuously, but we'd say walking around with a cap full of electrodes is a small price to pay for giving cancer the boot. Full PR after the break.

he NovoTTF-100A System is made by Novocure of Portsmouth, N.H.
Source: Novocure

Real Retinas Grown in Lab Hold Eye Transplant Promise

Lab-grown human organs may seem like futuristic technology, but in a lab in Kobe, Japan, researchers are growing new retinas in a dish.

"This retina tissue made in the test tube was clearly real. It mimicked the complex structure of the retina in the eye," said Yoshiki Sasai at the RIKEN Center for Developmental Biology in Kobe, lead researcher on the study, published today (April 7) in the journal Nature.

Read more: http://www.foxnews.com/scitech/2011/04/06/real-retinas-grown-lab-hold-eye-transplant-promise/#ixzz1IoY2MupK

Real Retinas Grown in Lab Hold Eye Transplant Promise - FoxNews.com

Prosthetic arm that is controlled by brain signals

General_Public - News & Events - Ryerson University: "Two Ryerson University undergraduate biomedical engineering students are changing the world of medical prosthetics with a newly developed prosthetic arm that is controlled by brain signals."

Since the device does not include microelectronics and motors, it costs one-quarter of other functional prosthetic arms, which can run users more than $80,000, depending on the complexity of the prosthesis. Other prosthetic arms with a similar degree of control require patients to undergo a complex muscle re-innervation surgery – a complicated procedure that costs about $300,000 and is not available in Canada and not covered by the provincial health plan. As the AMO Arm is non-invasive, the period of adjustment for new users is drastically decreased. While traditional prosthetics may require weeks of learning and training, basic function with the AMO Arm can be mastered in mere minutes.

Major advance for bionic eye

UNSW: The University of New South Wales - Sydney Australia - News - Major advance for bionic eye

UNSW researchers have unveiled the microchip which is expected to power Australia’s first bionic eye.


The microchip is performing well in preliminary lab testing. It will be at the core of the Wide-View neurostimulator device being developed by BVA, with the first full implant of the system in a patient planned for 2013.

The bionic eye technology being developed by UNSW and its partners in BVA – the Bionic Ear Institute, Centre for Eye Research Australia, NICTA and University of Melbourne – aims to help people who have experienced vision loss due to retinitis pigmentosa (RP) and age-related macular degeneration (AMD).

'Artificial leaf' makes cheap and clean energy from water

'Artificial leaf' makes hydrogen from solar cell | Green Tech - CNET News
Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor Daniel Nocera thinks he can draw cheap and clean energy from water.
At the National Meeting of the American Chemical Society, Nocera yesterday presented results from research on making an "artificial leaf" to split water to get hydrogen fuel and oxygen. The goal is to use the solar cell to make hydrogen, which would be stored and then used in a fuel cell to make electricity.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-20047814-54.html#ixzz1Hu2G2Jpq

Microrobot used to administer drugs in eyes

Microrobot used to administer drugs in eyes

Some scientists at the Institute of Robotics and Intelligent Systems in Switzerland are developing tiny, electromagnetically controlled microrobots that can swim on the surface of a patient’s eye. These robots then stay there for months, releasing drugs.
But knowing such a technology exists gives us hope that in the future we’ll have microrobots battling viruses in our bodies. What an epic battle that would be. Hit the break to watch a demonstration of the microrobot being tested on a dead pig’s eyeball: http://bcove.me/li84ci6u

A Bionic Eye Comes to Market - Technology Review

A Bionic Eye Comes to Market - Technology Review

The first retinal prosthesis has received European approval for clinical and commercial use. People blinded by degenerative eye disease will have the option of buying an implant that can restore their vision at least partially.

"It marks the beginning of an era in which sight will be restored at ever more astonishing levels," says Robert Greenberg, president and CEO of Second Sight, the California company that developed the device.

Micro-NMR for Rapid Molecular Analysis of Human Tumor Samples — Sci TM

Cancer Diagnostics

Greate research from Havard University. 200$ tool that can spot cancer and is more accurate than current methods..

Micro-NMR for Rapid Molecular Analysis of Human Tumor Samples — Sci TM

A computer in my eye: the millimeter scale computer is here

The University of Michigan has announced that it has built a computer so small that it can be implanted in (or around?) the eye of Glaucoma patients to monitor eye pressure. If you’re not familiar with Glaucoma, it’s a disease that causes the pressure in the eye to damage the optic nerve.

A computer in my eye: the millimeter scale computer is here

Watch your video on paper

Promise of low-cost paper-based EW devices for video rate flexible e-paper on paper.

Electrowetting on Paper for Electronic Paper Display - ACS Applied Materials & Interfaces (ACS Publications)

The use of paper as a material for various device applications (such as microfluidics and energy storage) is very attractive given its flexibility, versatility, and low cost. Here we demonstrate that electrowetting (EW) devices can be readily fabricated on paper substrates.

Results indicate the promise of low-cost paper-based EW devices for video rate flexible e-paper on paper.

BBC News - Large Hadron Collider (LHC) generates a 'mini-Big Bang'

BBC News - Large Hadron Collider (LHC) generates a 'mini-Big Bang'

The Large Hadron Collider has successfully created a "mini-Big Bang" by smashing together lead ions instead of protons.
The scientists working at the enormous machine on Franco-Swiss border achieved the unique conditions on 7 November.
The experiment created temperatures a million times hotter than the centre of the Sun.

BBC News - Hologram messaging coming of age

BBC News - Hologram messaging coming of age

STREAMING HOLOGRAPHIC IMAGES IN NEAR-REALTIME

A University of Arizona team says it has devised a system that can make a holographic display appear in another place and update it in near real-time.

It's a good start now let's see how long it takes before (if ever) it becomes mainstream.

Related link: Magazine Nature

BBC News - Miniature livers 'grown in lab'

BBC News - Miniature livers 'grown in lab'

Scientists have managed to produce a small-scale version of a human liver in the laboratory using stem cells.

The success increases hope that new transplant livers could be manufactured, although experts say that this is still many years away.

The team from Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center presented its findings at a conference in Boston.

MIT's new paper chase: Cheap solar cells | Green Tech - CNET News

MIT's new paper chase: Cheap solar cells | Green Tech - CNET News

MIT showed prototypes of paper solar cells able to generate enough current to light a small LED display. A commercial solar paper device could be available in five years, said chemical engineering professor Karen Gleason, whose lab is doing the work.

Read more: http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-20019885-54.html#ixzz12oep383v

World's first pedal-powered ornithopter takes flight in Canada • The Register

World's first pedal-powered ornithopter takes flight in Canada • The Register

Canadian enthusiasts have finally achieved a feat that has eluded humanity's finest engineers since the time of Leonardo da Vinci - to build a machine, powered by a human pilot's muscles, which flies by flapping its wings: an ornithopter.

The ornithopter is the culmination of decades of effort at the University of Toronto Institute for Aerospace Studies (UTIAS) which has long studied flapping-wing flight and encouraged many of its students to work towards a human-powered example. The Institute's Professor James DeLaurier won an FAI “Diplôme d’Honneur” as long ago as 1991 for developing the world's first remotely-piloted, engined ornithopter.

Links: http://hpo.ornithopter.net/

New Supercomputer 'Sees' Well Enough to Drive a Car Someday

Navigating our way down the street is something most of us take for granted; we seem to recognize cars, other people, trees and lampposts instantaneously and without much thought. In fact, visually interpreting our environment as quickly as we do is an astonishing feat requiring an enormous number of computations -- which is just one reason that coming up with a computer-driven system that can mimic the human brain in visually recognizing objects has proven so difficult.

Link: Eugenio Culurciello's e-Lab
Link: http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/09/100915171544.htm

Cisco wil realtime-vertaling tijdens videobellen mogelijk maken | Electronics | Tweakers.net Nieuws

Cisco werkt aan technologie die het mogelijk moet maken om gesproken woord tijdens een videoconferentie in realtime te vertalen. In het lab zijn de eerste proeven geslaagd. De fabrikant probeert nu het achterliggende systeem te verfijnen.

Cisco wil realtime-vertaling tijdens videobellen mogelijk maken | Electronics | Tweakers.net Nieuws

Fibers That Can Hear and Sing: Fibers Created That Detect and Produce Sound

ScienceDaily (July 12, 2010) — For centuries, "man-made fibers" meant the raw stuff of clothes and ropes; in the information age, it's come to mean the filaments of glass that carry data in communications networks. But to Yoel Fink, an Associate professor of Materials Science and principal investigator at MIT's Research Lab of Electronics, the threads used in textiles and even optical fibers are much too passive. For the past decade, his lab has been working to develop fibers with ever more sophisticated properties, to enable fabrics that can interact with their environment.

Source: SienceDaily http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100712115106.htm

Geordi LaForge video-to-brain rig built at MIT

Development and Implantation of a Minimally Invasive Wireless Subretinal Neurostimulator

MIT boffins have devised a method of fitting a chip on the end of the optical nerve which can be used to input electronic images directly into the brain without any need for an eyeball. The technique could offer blind people a degree of vision using head-mounted camera/sensor equipment, in the style of Geordi LaForge from Star Trek: The Next Generation

Once the implant is in place, wireless transmissions are made from outside the head. These induce currents in the receiving coils of the nerve chip, meaning that it needs no battery or other power supply. The electrode array stimulates the nerves feeding the optic nerve, so generating a image in the brain.

Read more:
http://www.theregister.co.uk/2009/09/24/geordi_laforge_mit_nerve_chip/
http://ieeexplore.ieee.org/xpl/freeabs_all.jsp?isnumber=5238786&arnumber=4895304&count=24&index=17

Capsules for Self-Healing Circuits

Nanotube-filled capsules could restore conductivity to damaged electronics.

Dropping a cell phone or laptop can, of course, cause irreparable damage. Now researchers are developing a material that could let a circuit self-repair small but critical damage caused by such an impact.

Capsules, filled with conductive nanotubes, that rip open under mechanical stress could be placed on circuit boards in failure-prone areas. When stress causes a crack in the circuit, some of the capsules would also rupture and release nanotubes to bridge the break. The researchers, from the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, are also working on capsule additives designed to heal failures in lithium-ion battery electrodes, to prevent the short-circuiting that can sometimes cause a fire.

Previous research into self-healing materials has mostly focused on restoring mechanical properties after a damaging event. The University of Illinois researchers have, for example, already made self-healing coatings that can repair scratches and prevent corrosion on boats or car chassis. Now the group has brought the same techniques to the problem of restoring electronic properties.

Source: Technology review