Medical

An integrated circuit based sensor from OSRAM that uses advanced optoelectronic technology to monitor heartrate and blood oxygen levels called BioMon, has been released by Intelligent LED Solutions.

Once adapted for humans, this type of sensor could be used to determine how aggressive a tumour is and help doctors choose the best treatment, says Sangeeta Bhatia, the John and Dorothy Wilson Professor of Health Sciences and Technology and Electrical Engineering and Computer Science and a member of MIT’s Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research.

Researchers at the Faculty of Science at Lund University in Sweden can now explain how the properties of the skin change depending on the environment. The new findings explain, among other things, why people don’t dehydrate in dry air. The research results can also be used in the cosmetic and pharmaceutical industry to make substances penetrate the skin more effectively.

Removing plaque from clogged arteries is a common procedure that can save and improve lives. This treatment approach was recently made even safer and more effective with a new, high-tech catheter that allows cardiologists to see inside the arteries for the first time, cutting out only the diseased tissue. Interventional cardiologists at Sulpizio Cardiovascular Center at UC San Diego Health are the first in the region to use this technology.

  Tau PET is a promising imaging method for Alzheimer’s disease. A case study from Lund University in Sweden now confirms that tau PET images correspond to a higher degree to actual changes in the brain. According to the researchers behind the study, this increases opportunities for developing effective drugs.

Research led by the University of Southampton, has demonstrated that a nanoscale device, called a memristor, could be the ‘missing link’ in the development of implants that use electrical signals from the brain to help treat medical conditions. Monitoring neuronal cell activity is fundamental to neuroscience and the development of neuroprosthetics – biomedically engineered devices that are driven by neural activity.

Epipole, based in Scotland, is an ethical designer and innovator of medical optical equipment that is focussed on the affordable eradication of preventable blindness. Its hand-held epiCam digital retinal fundus camera provides a low-cost solution to examine, record & store images of the internal structure of the eye - particularly for patients with diabetes where the early detection and treatment of a condition known as diabetic retinopathy c...

Osteoarthritis is a debilitating condition that affects at least 27 million people in the United States, and at least 12 percent of osteoarthritis cases stem from earlier injuries. Over-the-counter painkillers, such as anti-inflammatory drugs, help reduce pain but do not stop unrelenting cartilage destruction. Consequently, pain related to the condition only gets worse.

Nanoparticles known as Cornell dots, or C dots, have shown great promise as a therapeutic tool in the detection and treatment of cancer. Now, the ultrasmall particles – developed more than a dozen years ago by Ulrich Wiesner, the Spencer T. Olin Professor of Engineering – have shown they can do something even better: kill cancer cells without attaching a cytotoxic drug.

  Copper-based sensor capable of measuring glucose levels from body fluids other than blood. Managing complex conditions such as diabetes could be made cheaper and simpler following development of a copper film that can detect glucose from body fluids containing salt, such as sweat or tears.