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Archive for the ‘engineering’ category: Page 130

Nov 12, 2019

Breakthrough as scientists create a new cowpox-style virus that can kill EVERY type of cancer

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering

Scientists have created a new cowpox-style virus in a bid to cure cancer.

The treatment, called CF33, can kill every type of cancer in a petrie dish and has shrunk tumours in mice, The Daily Telegraph reported.

US cancer expert Professor Yuman Fong is engineering the treatment, which is being developed by Australia biotech company Imugene.

Nov 12, 2019

Specific neurons that map memories now identified in the human brain

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering, neuroscience, virtual reality

An important aspect of human memory is our ability to conjure specific moments from the vast array of experiences that have occurred in any given setting. For example, if asked to recommend a tourist itinerary for a city you have visited many times, your brain somehow enables you to selectively recall and distinguish specific memories from your different trips to provide an answer.

Studies have shown that —the kind of you can consciously recall like your home address or your mother’s name—relies on healthy medial temporal lobe structures in the , including the hippocampus and entorhinal cortex (EC). These regions are also important for spatial cognition, demonstrated by the Nobel-Prize-winning discovery of “place cells” and “grid cells” in these regions— that activate to represent specific locations in the environment during navigation (akin to a GPS). However, it has not been clear if or how this “spatial map” in the brain relates to a person’s memory of events at those locations, and how in these regions enables us to target a particular memory for retrieval among related experiences.

A team led by neuroengineers at Columbia Engineering has found the first evidence that in the human brain target specific memories during recall. They studied recordings in neurosurgical patients who had electrodes implanted in their brains and examined how the patients’ brain signals corresponded to their behavior while performing a virtual-reality (VR) object-location memory task. The researchers identified “memory-trace cells” whose activity was spatially tuned to the location where subjects remembered encountering specific objects. The study is published today in Nature Neuroscience.

Nov 10, 2019

Healing Value Of Magnets Demonstrated In Biomedical Engineering Study

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering, neuroscience

Circa 2008


A recent study demonstrates that the use of an acute, localized static magnetic field of moderate strength can result in significant reduction of swelling when applied immediately after an inflammatory injury. Magnets have been touted for their healing properties since ancient Greece. Magnetic therapy is still widely used today as an alternative method for treating a number of conditions, from arthritis to depression, but there hasn’t been scientific proof that magnets can heal.

Lack of regulation and widespread public acceptance have turned magnetic therapy into a $5 billion world market. Hopeful consumers buy bracelets, knee braces, shoe inserts, mattresses, and other products that are embedded with magnets based on anecdotal evidence, hoping for a non-invasive and drug-free cure to what ails them.

“The FDA regulates specific claims of medical efficacy, but in general static magnetic fields are viewed as safe,” notes Thomas Skalak, professor and chair of biomedical engineering at U.Va.

Nov 5, 2019

Researchers design ‘intelligent’ metamaterial to make MRIs affordable and accessible

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering

Boston University researchers have developed a new, “intelligent” metamaterial—which costs less than ten bucks to build—that could revolutionize magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), making the entire MRI process faster, safer, and more accessible to patients around the world. The technology, which builds on previous metamaterial work by the team, was described in a new paper in Advanced Materials.

MRI is used by clinicians to diagnose by spotting abnormalities that could indicate anything from a torn meniscus to muscular dystrophy. But MRIs are expensive, expose patients to radiation, and they take a long time—often the greater part of an hour for a single scan. Finding enough MRI time for waiting patients can be a problem, even in US hospitals, but in hospitals in countries like India, waiting periods of a year or more can put patients’ lives at risk.

So how do we speed up the MRI process without jeopardizing the quality of imaging? Xin Zhang, a BU College of Engineering professor of mechanical engineering and a Photonics Center professor, and a team of researchers that includes Stephan Anderson, a Boston Medical Center radiologist and BU School of Medicine professor of radiology, and Xiaoguang Zhao, a MED assistant research professor of radiology, are getting creative with metamaterials to solve the problem.

Nov 2, 2019

Genius, 14, wins $25,000 for car design that would install cameras to make blind spots nonexistent

Posted by in categories: engineering, mathematics, transportation

This is amazing, it will save many lives!


A 14-year-old Pennsylvania girl has come up with an innovative way to get rid of blind spots before she can even legally get behind the wheel.

Continue reading “Genius, 14, wins $25,000 for car design that would install cameras to make blind spots nonexistent” »

Nov 2, 2019

Portland teen’s cancer detection project wins national prize; rural district wants 2020 bond, won’t say what it’s for: The week in education

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, education, engineering, habitats, information science, mathematics, robotics/AI

A Portland teen won second place in a national technology contest, taking home $2,500 that he can use to attend science camp next summer.

Rishab Jain, 14, is a freshman at Westview High School. His winning project, which he calls the Pancreas Detective, is an artificial intelligence tool that can help diagnose pancreatic cancer through gene sequencing. The algorithm helps doctors focus on the organ during examinations, which is often obscured because it moves around the abdominal area as patients breathe and other bodily functions shift other organs as well.

Last year, the same project netted $25,000 from 3M when he attended Stoller Middle School. He used that money to fund his nonprofit, Samyak Science Society, which promotes science, technology, engineering and math education for other children, Time Magazine reported.

Nov 2, 2019

Living skin can now be 3D-printed with blood vessels included

Posted by in categories: 3D printing, biotech/medical, engineering

Researchers at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute have developed a way to 3D print living skin, complete with blood vessels. The advancement, published online today in Tissue Engineering Part A, is a significant step toward creating grafts that are more like the skin our bodies produce naturally.

“Right now, whatever is available as a clinical product is more like a fancy Band-Aid,” said Pankaj Karande, an associate professor of chemical and and member of the Center for Biotechnology and Interdisciplinary Studies (CBIS), who led this research at Rensselaer. “It provides some accelerated wound healing, but eventually it just falls off; it never really integrates with the host .”

Continue reading “Living skin can now be 3D-printed with blood vessels included” »

Oct 31, 2019

Researchers discover mechanisms for the cause of the Big Bang

Posted by in categories: cosmology, engineering

The origin of the universe started with the Big Bang, but how the supernova explosion ignited has long been a mystery—until now.

In a new paper appearing today in Science magazine, researchers detailed the mechanisms that could cause the explosion, which is key for the models that scientists use to understand the origin of the universe.

“We defined the critical criteria where we can drive a flame to self-generate its own turbulence, spontaneously accelerate, and transition into detonation,” says Kareem Ahmed, an assistant professor in UCF’s Department of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering and co-author of the study.

Oct 31, 2019

Chinese scientists develop new material for treatment of liver cancer

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering, nanotechnology

Photo shows how the new nanomaterial can be used to treat liver cancer in mice. Experimental results prove that the material is efficient and safe in fighting tumors.(Photo provided to Xinhua)

Chinese scientists have invented a nanomaterial which has been proved effective in fighting liver tumors, providing new hope for cancer patients.

NANJING, Oct. 31 (Xinhua) — Chinese scientists have developed a nanometer material that can be used for liver cancer treatment, according to the Suzhou Institute of Biomedical Engineering and Technology under the Chinese Academy of Sciences Wednesday.

Oct 29, 2019

Chameleon’s tongue strike inspires fast-acting robots

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, engineering, robotics/AI

Chameleons, salamanders and many toads use stored elastic energy to launch their sticky tongues at unsuspecting insects located up to one-and-a-half body lengths away, catching them within a tenth of a second.

Ramses Martinez, an assistant professor in Purdue’s School of Industrial Engineering and in the Weldon School of Biomedical Engineering in Purdue University’s College of Engineering and other Purdue researchers at the FlexiLab have developed a new class of entirely and actuators capable of re-creating bioinspired high-powered and high-speed motions using stored elastic energy. These robots are fabricated using stretchable polymers similar to rubber bands, with internal pneumatic channels that expand upon pressurization.

Continue reading “Chameleon’s tongue strike inspires fast-acting robots” »