Biotech

Everyday office paper tests for pregnancy, medical conditions

Researchers are developing a special process meant to replace the custom "paper" found in home pregnancy and other tests with plain old office paper -- a way of creating ultracheap methods of medical testing that could quickly diagnose pregnancy, malaria, diabetes, and more.

Ultimately, the idea is to replace the current standard, which relies on a membrane called nitrocellulose that sticks to molecules of interest, with cheap and ubiquitous paper that can stick to a whole fleet of chemicals, including DNA, antibodies, and sugars. And a University of Washington researcher wants to make the already cheap tests even … Read more

Engineers hope to upload bees' brains into robots

Sometimes real science sounds more like science fiction. Just the phrase "bionic bees" sounds like something out of an old paperback.

But that's the goal of a new project from two U.K. universities, the University of Sheffield and the University of Sussex. Engineers from the schools are planning to scan the brains of bees and upload the data into flying robots with the hope that the machines will fly and act like the real thing.

The goal of the project is to create the first robots able to act on instinct. Researchers hope to implant a honey bee's sense of smell and sight into the flying machines, allowing the robots to act as autonomously as an insect rather than relying on preprogrammed instructions.… Read more

Cows' lady parts text farmers when it's time for a booty call

Old McDonald had a farm. E-I-E-I-O. And on his farm he had a cow with a wireless intravaginal temperature sensor. E-I-E-I-O.

Swiss farmers are helping to test a new system that sends them alerts when their dairy cows are in heat. Stresses and supplements have led to cows showing fewer visual signs of being in heat. That's where technology is stepping in.

The system from Swiss company Anemon consists of a wireless sensor (installed where the sun don't shine) and a transmitter box that attaches to the cow's collar. An accelerometer in the transmitter collects activity data.

When the cow reaches an optimal temperature (also know as "feeling frisky"), the transmitter text messages the farmer to arrange for a bull rendezvous or artificial insemination. … Read more

Researchers unveil ultra-thin electronics that dissolve in body

The same researchers who last year developed "electronic tattoos" that bend and stretch on skin are now unveiling similar ultra-thin electronics, only these dissolve when their job is done.

Made of silicon, magnesium, and magnesium oxide and surrounded by a protective layer of silk, these "transient" electronics aren't built to last but rather to melt away and, in the process, reduce the need to pass or surgically remove tiny medical implants, researchers from Tufts and the University of Illinois write in the current issue of Science.

The researchers -- who have begun using their devices … Read more

See how healthy your lungs are -- just blow into your phone

Today, patients with chronic lung conditions such as cystic fibrosis or asthma can't easily monitor how their airways are doing. Instead, they have to go to the doctor's office and blow into a special device called a spirometer as hard and fast as they can.

So for the past two-plus years, grad students at the University of Washington in Seattle have been working to develop an app that can measure lung function just as accurately but without the need for additional hardware. (Existing apps either require hardware or are for entertainment purposes only.)

In other words, they've been trying to turn a smartphone into a spirometer.… Read more

Your sleep patterns, now in soundtrack form

I had that dream again the other night. The one where I (oops!) forgot to go to class all semester and it's time for the final, and OMG, but wait, maybe somehow I can fake my way through it?

Apparently, this dream plans to dog me no matter how far away from college I get. I've had it so many times it deserves its own soundtrack. And now, it turns out, it can get one.

Computer scientists from Finland's University of Helsinki have developed software that makes music out of sleep patterns. … Read more

The pacemaker is about to get a whole lot smaller

A team of engineers out of Stanford is introducing a truly tiny wireless cardiac device to demonstrate that, thanks to a little ingenuity and impressive math, all medical implants may soon be powered wirelessly.

Which means that devices such as pacemakers, which owe the majority of their bulk to the battery, are about to get a whole lot smaller.

Head researcher Ada Poon, who earlier this year showed off a proof-of-concept, wirelessly powered device small enough to propel itself through the bloodstream, says the main achievement with the cardiac device is that it can be implanted on the surface of … Read more

Outperform steroids with this body-cooling glove

It looks like a hockey goalie's blocker glove, and indeed this mitt might help stop more pucks when fatigue takes its toll.

Stanford University researchers are working to improve a device that can rapidly cool the body after an intense workout, allowing faster recovery and performance enhancement that's "substantially better" than steroids.

The $3,000 CoreControl Glove has been on the market for some time. It uses a low-tech blood-cooling method to allow athletes to perform better and longer. Basically, cool water flows into a vacuum around the hand, cooling blood in the palm. … Read more

Donate organs? No, grow them from scratch

BERLIN -- Medical science, boosted by manufacturing and information technology, is on the cusp of being able to grow human tissue.

So believes Nina Tandon, a senior fellow at Columbia University's Lab for Stem Cells and Tissue Engineering, who for her Ph.D. thesis grew cardiac cells that beat like tiny hearts.

A third age of medicine is beginning, she said in a speech here at the TEDx Berlin conference held in conjunction with IFA consumer-electronics show. The first age, most of human history, had only a primitive understanding of the body. The second age ran from the first … Read more

First wireless back pain devices approved in U.S.

If you're in need of a little back pain relief and have $149 to spare, keep an eye out for the newly approved WiTouch by medical device developer Hollywog.

Putting a fresh spin on old tech, the device employs electrical stimulation (called transcutaneous electrical nerve stimulation -- aka TENS) to ease back pain. But unlike its predecessors, this one is wirelessly remote controlled.… Read more