British researchers have developed a new class of polymers that they say can repel bacteria, preventing medical-device-associated infections, medical device failure, and save England’s healthcare system £1 billion per year. The polymer designed by researchers at University of Nottingham can be applied to the surface of medical devices, such as catheters, and prevent them from [...]
Polymer Effectively Stores, Dries Blood
June 28, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Australian researchers have developed a synthetic polymer that can store dry blood, requiring less of it from a patient, resulting in more precise blood tests and analyses. Professor Emily Hilder from the University of Tasmania’s Australian Centre for Research and Separation Science, and her team, developed the technology, reports Kate Tilley of Plastics News. Investors [...]
IBM Turning Polymers Into Antibiotics
June 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment
IBM has developed a small, biodegradable polymer that acts like the body’s immune system to destroy bacteria. The development from an unpredictable source could be the key to controlling the so-called superbug staph bacteria that are resistant to antibiotics. Because antibiotics are pervasive and nearly omnipresent, scientists have been warning for decades that bacteria will [...]
Device Detects Cancer Early
May 21, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Purdue researchers have developed a biosensor that could detect cancer early and design personalized medicine based on a patient’s specific biochemistry. The device, called a Flexure-FET biosensor, combines a mechanical sensor that identifies a bio-molecule based on its mass and size with an electrical sensor that identifies molecules based on their electrical charge, according to [...]
User Interface Devices Go Under the Skin
May 15, 2012 By 2 Comments
Patients who have implanted medical devices, such as pacemakers, may eventually be able to recharge or reprogram them without the use of wireless transmissions — which could be vulnerable to hacking — and perhaps save a trip to the doctor’s office. Researchers say that the advantages of implanted user interfaces over mobile and wearable user [...]
Polymers Help Make New Drugs Faster, Cheaper
May 10, 2012 By 1 Comment
Researchers at Michigan State University have discovered that certain kinds of polymers can improve a protein purifier that could help pharmaceutical companies save time and money. When prescription drugs are created, desired proteins need to be isolated from the others, a process called purifying, which is time-consuming and expensive. Capturing the proteins is a necessary [...]
Wireless Defibrillator Gets Closer to Approval
May 8, 2012 By Leave a Comment
A U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) panel has backed a new type of implantable heart defibrillator, but before the medical device gets full approval, other concerns will need to be addressed. What is new about the device — developed by Cameron Health Inc. — is that it is implanted underneath the skin and does [...]
Bionic Eye May Become Reality
May 7, 2012 By 1 Comment
First, there was the $6 Million Man (as anyone over 45 can remember). Then there’s The Terminator (just about everyone else). What is one of the things that the two fictional characters have in common? A bionic eye. And as soon as next year, such a device could become a reality, or at least tested [...]
Device Makes Quick Genetic Tests
May 3, 2012 By Leave a Comment
Canadian researchers have developed a medical device the size of a toaster that can perform the same genetic tests as a fully equipped laboratory in a fraction of the time. The key to the device — developed at the University of Alberta — is a small plastic chip that can make several determinations: from whether [...]
Blood Type Identified Quickly on Paper
May 1, 2012 By Leave a Comment
For those who need to learn a person’s blood type quickly, there’s a new device that will literally spell it out for them on paper. The blood types are common knowledge: A+, AB-, O+, etc. As Bethany Halford writes in Chemical & Engineering News, Australian researchers have invented a method that makes these letters and [...]
