I received (via email) a January 17, 2025 notice from Canada’s Perimeter Institute for Theoretical Physics (PI) about obtaining free tickets to their upcoming Galileo exhibition,
Explore Galileo and His Ingenious Discoveries at Perimeter Institute
Monday, February 8 – Monday, February 17, 2025
Perimeter Institute, in collaboration with the Embassy of Italy in Canada and the Galileo Museum in Florence, invites you to the exhibition “Galileo and His Ingenious Discoveries.” This celebration of Galileo’s groundbreaking inventions and writings is part of Perimeter’s 25th anniversary.
Explore replicas of historical instruments and documents, highlighting how Galileo’s work continues to influence science and technology. The exhibition is free and open to the public at Perimeter Institute.
Don’t miss out! Free tickets to attend this event in person will become available on Monday, January 20 [2025], at 9 am ET.
An October 23, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily announces a radical (by my standards) new technology for agriculture,
Photosynthesis, the chemical reaction that enables almost all life on Earth, is extremely inefficient at capturing energy — only around 1% of light energy that a plant absorbs is converted into chemical energy within the plant. Bioengineers propose a radical new method of food production that they call ‘electro-agriculture.’ The method essentially replaces photosynthesis with a solar-powered chemical reaction that more efficiently converts CO2 into an organic molecule that plants would be genetically engineered to ‘eat.’ The researchers estimate that if all food in the US were produced using electro-agriculture, it would reduce the amount of land needed for agriculture by 94%. The method could also be used to grow food in space.
“If we don’t need to grow plants with sunlight anymore, then we can decouple agriculture from the environment [emphasis mine] and grow food in indoor, controlled environments,” says corresponding author and biological engineer Robert Jinkerson (@JinkersonLab) of University of California, Riverside. “I think that we need to move agriculture into the next phase of technology, and producing it in a controlled way that is decoupled from nature has to be the next step [emphasis mine].”
Electro-agriculture would mean replacing agricultural fields with multi-story buildings. Solar panels on or near the buildings would absorb the sun’s radiation, and this energy would power a chemical reaction between CO2 and water to produce acetate—a molecule similar to acetic acid, the main component in vinegar. The acetate would then be used to feed plants that are grown hydroponically. The method could also be used to grow other food-producing organisms, since acetate is naturally used by mushrooms, yeast, and algae.
“The whole point of this new process to try to boost the efficiency of photosynthesis,” says senior author Feng Jiao (@Jiao_Lab), an electrochemist at Washington University in St. Louis. “Right now, we are at about 4% efficiency, which is already four times higher than for photosynthesis, and because everything is more efficient with this method, the CO2 footprint associated with the production of the food becomes much smaller.”
To genetically engineer acetate-eating plants, the researchers are taking advantage of a metabolic pathway that germinating plants use to break down food stored in their seeds. This pathway is switched off once plants become capable of photosynthesis, but switching it back on would enable them to use acetate as a source of energy and carbon.
“We’re trying to turn this pathway back on in adult plants and reawaken their native ability to utilize acetate,” says Jinkerson. “It’s analogous to lactose intolerance in humans—as babies we can digest lactose in milk, but for many people that pathway is turned off when they grow up. It’s kind of the same idea, only for plants.”
The team is focusing their initial research on tomatoes and lettuce but plan to move on to high-calorie staple crops such as cassava, sweet potatoes, and grain crops in future. Currently, they’ve managed to engineer plants that can use acetate in addition to photosynthesis, but they ultimately aim to engineer plants that can obtain all of their necessary energy from acetate, meaning that they would not need any light themselves.
“For plants, we’re still in the research-and-development phase of trying to get them to utilize acetate as their carbon source, because plants have not evolved to grow this way, but we’re making progress,” says Jinkerson. “Mushrooms and yeast and algae, however, can be grown like this today, so I think that those applications could be commercialized first, and plants will come later down the line.”
The researchers also plan to continue refining their method of acetate production to make the carbon-fixation system even more efficient.
“This is just the first step for this research, and I think there’s a hope that its efficiency and cost will be significantly improved in the near future,” says Jiao.
The ideal material for interfacing electronics with living tissue is soft, stretchable, and just as water-loving as the tissue itself–in short, a hydrogel. Semiconductors, the key materials for bioelectronics such as pacemakers, biosensors, and drug delivery devices, on the other hand, are rigid, brittle, and water-hating, impossible to dissolve in the way hydrogels have traditionally been built. Scientists have now solved this challenge that has long stymied researchers, reimagining the process of creating hydrogels to build a powerful semiconductor in hydrogel form. The result is a bluish gel that flutters like a sea jelly in water but retains the immense semiconductive ability needed to transmit information between living tissue and machine.
A paper published today in Science from the UChicago Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) has solved this challenge that has long stymied researchers, reimagining the process of creating hydrogels to build a powerful semiconductor in hydrogel form. Led by Asst. Prof. Sihong Wang’s research group, the result is a bluish gel that flutters like a sea jelly in water but retains the immense semiconductive ability needed to transmit information between living tissue and machine.
The material demonstrated tissue-level moduli as soft as 81 kPa, stretchability of 150% strain, and charge-carrier mobility up to 1.4 cm2 V-1 s-1. This means their material—both semiconductor and hydrogel at the same time—ticks all the boxes for an ideal bioelectronic interface.
“When making implantable bioelectronic devices, one challenge you must address is to make a device with tissue-like mechanical properties,” said Yahao Dai, the first author of the new paper. “That way, when it gets directly interfaced with the tissue, they can deform together and also form a very intimate bio-interface.”
Although the paper mainly focused on the challenges facing implanted medical devices such as biochemical sensors and pacemakers, Dai said the material also has many potential non-surgical applications, like better readings off the skin or improved care for wounds.
“It has very soft mechanical properties and a large degree of hydration similar to living tissue,” said UChicago PME Asst. Prof. Sihong Wang. “Hydrogel is also very porous, so it allows the efficient diffusion transport of different kinds of nutrition and chemicals. All these traits combine to make hydrogel probably the most useful material for tissue engineering and drug delivery.”
‘Let’s change our perspective’
The typical way of making a hydrogel is to take a material, dissolve it in water, and add the gelation chemicals to puff the new liquid into a gel form. Some materials simply dissolve in water, others require researchers to tinker and chemically modify the process, but the core mechanism is the same: No water, no hydrogel.
Semiconductors, however, don’t normally dissolve in water. Rather than find new, time-consuming means of trying to force the process, the UChicago PME team re-examined the question.
“We started to think, ‘Okay, let’s change our perspective,’ and we came up with a solvent exchange process,” Dai said.
Instead of dissolving the semiconductors in water, they dissolved them in an organic solvent that is miscible with water. They then prepared a gel from the dissolved semiconductors and hydrogel precursors. Their gel initially was an organogel, not a hydrogel.
“To eventually turn it into a hydrogel, we then immersed the whole material system into the water to let the organic solvent dissolve out and let the water come in,” Dai said.
An important benefit of such a solvent-exchange-based method is its broad applicability to different types of polymer semiconductors with different functions.
‘One plus one is greater than two’
The hydrogel semiconductor, which the team has patented and is commercializing through UChicago’s Polsky Center for Entrepreneurship and Innovation, is not merging a semiconductor with a hydrogel. It’s one material that is both semiconductor and hydrogel at the same time.
“It’s just one piece that has both semiconducting properties and hydrogel design, meaning that this whole piece is just like any other hydrogel,” Wang said.
Unlike any other hydrogel, however, the new material actually improved biological functions in two areas, creating better results than either hydrogel or semiconductor could accomplish on their own.
First, having a very soft material bond directly with tissue reduces the immune responses and inflammation typically triggered when a medical device is implanted.
Second, because hydrogels are so porous, the new material enables elevated biosensing response and stronger photo-modulation effects. With biomolecules being able to diffuse into the film to have volumetric interactions, the interaction sites for biomarkers-under-detection are significantly increased, which gives rise to higher sensitivity. Besides sensing, the responses to light for therapeutic functions at tissue surfaces also get increased from the more efficient transport of redox-active species. This benefits functions such as light-operated pacemakers or wound dressing that can be more efficiently heated with a flick of light to help speed healing.
“It’s a ‘one plus one is greater than two’ kind of combination,” Wang joked.
Researchers in the lab of UChicago Pritzker School of Engineering Asst. Prof. Sihong Wang (right), including PhD student Yahao Dai (left), have developed a hydrogel that retains the semiconductive ability needed to transmit information between living tissue and machine, which can be used both in implantable medical devices and non-surgical applications. (Photo by John Zich)
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Soft hydrogel semiconductors with augmented biointeractive functions by Yahao Dai, Shinya Wai, Pengju Li, Naisong Shan, Zhiqiang Cao, Yang Li, Yunfei Wang, Youdi Liu, Wei Liu, Kan Tang, Yuzi Liu, Muchuan Hua, Songsong Li, Nan Li, Shivani Chatterji, H. Christopher Fry, Sean Lee, Cheng Zhang, Max Weires, Sean Sutyak, Jiuyun Shi, Chenhui Zhu, Jie Xu, Xiaodan Gu, Bozhi Tian, and Sihong Wang. Science 24 Oct 2024 Vol 386, Issue 6720 pp. 431-439 DOI: 10.1126/science.adp9314
The United Kingdom’s government announced changes to its winter fuel policy in July 2024. These changes included the decision to cut the winter fuel allowance for what amounted to millions of pensioners. (You can find out more in an October 11, 2024 Reuters Fact Check.)
Unfortunately, this October 9, 2024 news item on Azonano doesn’t point to immediate relief for those affected by the changes but it seems to give hope, Note: A link has been removed,
In light of the recent ]UK] Government announcement regarding the planned changes to the winter fuel policy, which will see a reduction in support for pensioners, Haydale is working with strategic partner Staircraft, which is owned by Travis Perkins plc, to develop a solution to help mitigate rising energy costs.
Our newly developed graphene-based underfloor heating system, has just completed initial successful trials, offering a revolutionary way for households to significantly reduce their heating bills.
With energy prices on the rise and Government support being scaled back, our innovative heating technology promises to ease the burden on household finances.
Graphene’s exceptional heat conductivity allows for a faster, more efficient distribution of warmth, using considerably less energy than traditional heating systems., Independent trials have demonstrated that our low voltage underfloor heating system can reduce energy consumption, leading to major cost savings— of up to 70% vs traditional underfloor heat systems using main power and copper wires – exactly what’s needed as heating bills increase.
“Our mission has always been to provide practical, affordable solutions to everyday problems, and the timing of this innovation couldn’t be more important,” said Keith Broadbent, CEO of Haydale. “At a time when many pensioners and vulnerable households are facing higher costs with less support, we believe our graphene heating technology can provide real relief.”
Dr Luke Whale, Technical Director at Staircraft Group said “Our initial trials on graphene underfloor heating panels bonded to our pre-cut chipboard flooring panels are demonstrating extremely efficient room heating can be achieved at much lower running costs than traditional underfloor heating methods. We will now be discussing its potential with house builders, in the hope that site trials can be undertaken as a next step.”
This cutting-edge system not only lowers heating expenses but also promotes sustainability by reducing energy consumption, making it an eco-friendly option for households concerned about their carbon footprint.
Haydale is committed to bringing this affordable and efficient technology to the market, helping consumers – especially pensioners – stay warm without breaking the bank.
No mention of when this product might come to market or what it will cost pensioners.
NeurIPS, one of the leading conferences in machine learning and artificial intelligence research, kicks off in Vancouver this week. UBC experts, including researchers presenting new papers at the conference, are available to comment on related topics.
Dr. Xiaoxiao Li, an assistant professor in the department of electrical and computer engineering, specializes in building trust in AI and advancing its use in healthcare. Dr. Li will present three papers at NeurIPS.
What does responsible AI look like?
Responsible AI is about building AI we can trust—AI that is fair, transparent and helpful. For example, a responsible healthcare app not only explains why it makes a diagnosis or treatment recommendation but also strives to minimize bias to serve diverse populations better, while keeping personal data secure. Ultimately, responsible AI serves humanity ethically, safely and inclusively.
Dr. Cong Lu, a postdoctoral fellow in the department of computer science, focuses on deep reinforcement learning, open-ended learning, and AI for science. Dr. Lu will be presenting two papers at the conference.
What role will AI play in scientific discovery?
Recent advances like ‘The AI Scientist’ have shown progress towards automating the entire scientific pipeline – generating hypotheses, conducting experiments and drafting papers. But what will it take to bridge the gap between this supporting role and groundbreaking contributions that, for now, are in the domain of human scientists?
Dr. Kwang Moo Yi, an assistant professor in the department of computer science, researches 3D computer vision.
What does AI literacy mean to the general public?
AI literacy is as essential as AI’s use and advancement are inevitable, creating a divide between those who use it effectively and those left behind. Knowledge unlocks potential, but equitable solutions ensure everyone benefits, preventing societal gaps as technology reshapes opportunities and capabilities. This answer was also written quickly given keywords via AI, much faster than what I would’ve been able to alone.
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Given how much money is swirling around this conference, the NeurIPS 2024 website is a very bare bones site. As for my contention regarding money, let’s take a look at the organizing committee, Note 1: GSK until 2022 was known as GlaxoSmithKline, a British multinational pharmaceutical and biotechnology company; Note 2: The Chan Zuckerberg Initiative is a philanthropic effort funded by Mark Zuckerberg and his wife Priscilla Chan
Organizing Committee
General Chairs
Amir Globerson (Google, Tel Aviv University) Lester Mackey (Microsoft Research)
Senior Program Chair
Danielle Belgrave (GSK.ai)
Program Chairs
Angela Fan (Meta) Ulrich Paquet (Google DeepMind; AIMS South Africa) Jakub Tomczak (Eindhoven Uni. of Technology & [sic]; Chan Zuckerberg Initiative) Cheng Zhang (GenAI, Meta)
Program Chair Assistants
Stefan Groha (GSK.ai) Max Horn (GSK.ai) Francois Meyer (University of Cape Town) Babak Rahmani (Microsoft Research) Caroline Weis (gsk.ai)
Workshop Chairs
Bo Han (HKBU / RIKEN) Manuel Rodriguez (Max Planck Institute for Software Systems) Adil Salim (Microsoft Research) Rose Yu (UC San Diego)
Workshop Chair Assistants
Bo Zhao (University of California San Diego) Jianing Zhu (HKBU)
Tutorial Chairs
Gal Chechik (NVIDIA, Bar-Ilan University) Irene Chen (UC Berkeley) Andrew Dai (Google)
Competition Chairs
Jake Albrecht (Bristol Myers Squibb) Tao Qin (Microsoft Research AI4Science) Megan Yates (Zindi)
Thank you to whoever wrote this headline (I love wordplay), “Fission chips – How vinegar could revolutionize sensor processing” used for an August 28, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily,
Researchers at Macquarie University [Australia] have developed a new way to produce ultraviolet (UV) light sensors, which could lead to more efficient and flexible wearable devices.
The study, published in the journal Small in July [2024], shows how acetic acid vapour — essentially vinegar fumes — can rapidly improve the performance of zinc oxide nanoparticle-based sensors without using high-temperatures for processing.
Co-author Professor Shujuan Huang, from the School of Engineering at Macquarie University, says: “We found by briefly exposing the sensor to vinegar vapour, adjoining particles of zinc oxide on the sensor’s surface would merge together, forming a bridge that could conduct energy.”
Joining zinc oxide nanoparticles together is a critical part of building tiny sensors, as it creates channels for electrons to flow through.
The research team found that their vapour method could make UV detectors 128,000 more responsive than untreated ones, and the sensors could still accurately detect UV light without interference, making them highly sensitive and reliable.
Associate Professor Noushin Nasiri, co-author on the paper and head of the Nanotech Laboratory at Macquarie University, says: “Usually, these sensors are processed in an oven, heated at high temperature for 12 hours or so, before they can operate or transmit any signal.”
But instead, the team found a simple chemical way to copy the effects of the heat process.
“We found a way to process these sensors at room temperature with a very cheap ingredient – vinegar. You just expose the sensor to vinegar vapour for five minutes, and that’s it – you have a working sensor,” she says.
To create the sensors, the researchers sprayed a zinc solution into a flame, producing a fine mist of zinc oxide nanoparticles that settled onto platinum electrodes. This formed a thin sponge-like film, which they then exposed to vinegar vapour for five to 20 minutes.
The vinegar vapour changed how the tiny particles in the film were arranged, helping the particles connect to each other, so electrons could flow through the sensor. At the same time, the particles stayed small enough to detect light effectively.
“These sensors are made of many, many tiny particles that need to be connected for the sensor to work,” says Associate Professor Nasiri.
“Until we treat them, the particles just sit next to each other, almost as if they have a wall around them, so when light creates an electrical signal in one particle, it can’t easily travel to the next particle. That’s why an untreated sensor doesn’t give us a good signal.”
The researchers went through intensive testing of different formulations before hitting on the perfect balance in their process.
“Water alone isn’t strong enough to make the particles join. But pure vinegar is too strong and destroys the whole structure,” says Professor Huang. “We had to find just the right mix.”
The study shows the best results came from sensors exposed to the vapour for around 15 minutes. Longer exposure times caused too many structural changes and worse performance.
“The unique structure of these highly porous nanofilms enables oxygen to penetrate deeply, so that the entire film is part of the sensing mechanism,” Professor Huang says.
The new room-temperature vapour technique has many advantages over current high-temperature methods. It allows the use of heat-sensitive materials and flexible bases, and is cheaper and better for the environment.
Associate Professor Nasiri says the process can easily be scaled up commercially.
“The sensor materials could be laid out on a rolling plate, passing through an enclosed environment with vinegar vapours, and be ready to use in less than 20 minutes.”
The process will be a real advantage in creating wearable UV sensors, which need to be flexible and to use very little power.
Associate Professor Nasiri says that this method for UV sensors could be used for other types of sensors too, using simple chemical vapour treatments instead of high-temperature sensor processing across a wide range of functional materials, nanostructures and bases or substrates.
Honey is a viscous, hygroscopic liquid in nature. It has the ability to treat wounds, wrinkles, aging, and inflammation. This study’s objective was to create and characterize a nanoemulsion containing honey and evaluate its stability.
Methods
A pseudo-ternary phase diagram was retraced with several concentrations of the Smix, water, and liquid paraffin oil to formulate nanoemulsions containing honey. From the results of pre-formulation stability studies, formulation HNE-19, with a hydrophilic lipophilic balance value of 10, and a surfactant and oil ratio of 1:1, was selected as the most stable formulation. HNE-19 and base (B-19) were further subjected to thermodynamic studies of heating and cooling cycles and centrifugation. HNE-19 and its respective base B-19 were characterized for physical changes, droplet size analysis, pH measurements, turbidity, viscosity, and rheological parameters for a period of 90 days.
Results
Results showed that the nanoemulsion containing honey was clear and milky white. There was no evidence of phase separation in HNE-19 and B-19 after the thermodynamic study. The droplet size of fresh HNE-19 was 91.07 nm with a zeta potential of −38.5 mV. After three months, the droplet size and zeta potential were 197.06 nm and −32.5 mV respectively. The observed pH was between 5.8 and 6.7, which corresponds with the pH of the skin. HNE-19 showed non-Newtonian flow and pseudo-plastic behaviour.
Conclusions
A honey-loaded nanoemulsion (HNE-19) was successfully developed and characterized for stability. The nanoemulsion was thermodynamically stable. With the good rheology and stability of honey, the size of the nanodroplets was below 200 nm. Throughout the 90-day testing period, the nanoemulsion maintained normal pH values that corresponded to skin pH. The emulsion also showed non-Newtonian flow and pseudo-plastic behaviour, which are required for ideal topical formulation. In conclusion, stability studies and characterization showed that nanoemulsions containing honey are exceptional topical delivery formulations.
A theoretical possibility has been proven by an international team including researchers from the Université de Montréal (University of Montreal) according to a March 27, 2024 news item on phys.org,
For years, C130 fullertubes—molecules made up of 130 carbon atoms—have existed only in theory. Now, leading an international team of scientists, a UdeM doctoral student in physics has successfully shown them in real life—and even managed to capture some in a photograph.
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Illustration of the discovery of the C130-D5h molecule, published on the cover page of the prestigious “Journal of the American Chemical Society” last December. Credit: JACS
This feat in the realm of basic research has led Emmanuel Bourret to have a cover-page illustration of his discovery in a prestigious scientific journal, the Journal of the American Chemical Society.
First published online last October [2023], the discovery was made by Bourret as lead scientist of an inter-university team that also included researchers from Purdue University, Virginia Tech and the Oak Ridge National Laboratory, in Tennessee.
A fullertube is basically an assembly of carbon atoms arranged to form a closed tubular cage. It is related to fullerenes, molecules that are represented as cages of interconnected hexagons and pentagons, and come in a wide variety of sizes and shapes.
For example, a C60 fullerene is made up of 60 carbon atoms and is shaped like a soccer ball. It is relatively small, spherical and very abundant. C120 fullerenes are less common. They are longer and shaped like a tube capped at either ends with the two halves of a C60 fullerene.
Found in soot
The C130 fullertube (or C130-D5h, its full scientific name) is more elongated than the C120 and even rarer. To isolate it, Bourret and his team generated an electric arc between two graphite electrodes to produce soot containing fullerene and fullertube molecules. The electronic structure of these molecules was then calculated using density functional theory (DFT).
“Drawing on principles of quantum mechanics, DFT enables us to calculate electronic structures and predict the properties of a molecule using the fundamental rules of physics,” explained Bourret’s thesis supervisor, UdeM physics professor Michel Côté, a researcher at the university’s Institut Courtois.
Using special software, Bourret was able to describe the structure of the C130 molecule: it is a tube with two hemispheres at the ends, making it look like a microscopic capsule. It measures just under 2 nanometres long by 1 nm wide (a nanometre is one billionth of a metre).
“The structure of the tube is basically made up of atoms arranged in hexagons,” said Bourret. “At the two ends, these hexagons are linked by pentagons, giving them their rounded shape.”
Bourret began doing theoretical work on fullertubes in 2014 under his then-supervisor Jiri Patera, an UdeM mathematics professor. After Patera passed away in January 2022, Bourret then approached Côté, who became his new supervisor.
Existence shown in 2020
Two years before that, Bourret had read an article by Purdue University at Fort Wayne professor Steven Stevenson, who described the experimental isolation of certain fullertubes, demonstrating their existence but not identifying all of them.
Under Côté’s guidance, Bourret set to work advancing knowledge on the topic.
“Emmanuel had a strong background in abstract mathematics,” Bourret recalled, “and he added an interesting dimension to my research group, which focuses on more computational approaches.”
Are any possible future applications in the offing?
“It’s hard to say at this stage, but one possibility might be the production of hydrogen,” said Côté. “Currently, what’s used is a catalyst made of platinum and rubidium, both of which are rare and expensive. Replacing them with carbon structures such as C130 would make it possible to produce hydrogen in a ‘greener’ way.”
Last year, Bourret’s groundbreaking work earned him an invitation to deliver a paper at the annual meeting of the U.S. Electrochemical Society (ECS), in Boston. This May [2024], he’ll chair a panel on fullerenes and fullertubes at the ECS annual meeting in San Francisco.
After posting about a bioenergy harvesting battery for implants such as pacemakers and deep brain stimulators (see my May 17, 2024 posting), it seems like a good time to highlight another such device, in this case, contact lenses.
From an April 1, 2024 article by Julianne Pepitone for IEEE (Institute for Electrical and Electronics Engineers) Spectrum,
The potential use cases for smart contacts are compelling and varied. Pop a lens on your eye and monitor health metrics like glucose levels; receive targeted drug delivery for ocular diseases; experience augmented reality and read news updates with displays of information literally in your face.
But the eye is quite a challenge for electronics design: With one of the highest nerve densities of any human tissue, the cornea is 300 to 600 times as sensitive as our skin. Researchers have developed small, flexible chips, but power sources have proved more difficult, as big batteries and wires clearly won’t do here. Existing applications offer less-than-ideal solutions like overnight induction charging and other designs that rely on some type of external battery.
Now, a team from the University of Utah says they’ve developed a better solution: an all-in-one hybrid energy-generation unit specifically designed for eye-based tech.
In a paper published in the journal Small on 13 March [2024], the researchers describe how they built the device, combining a flexible silicon solar cell with a new device that converts tears to energy. The system can reliably supply enough electricity to operate smart contacts and other ocular devices.This is a major improvement over wireless power transfer from separate batteries, says Erfan Pourshaban, who worked on the system while a doctoral student at University of Utah.
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Researchers tested a contact-lens power system on a fake eye.
ERFAN POURSHABAN [downloaded from https://spectrum.ieee.org/power-smart-contact-lenses]
Here’s an excerpt from the explanation for how this system works, from the April 1, 2024 article,
To create the power pack, Pourshaban and his colleagues fabricated custom pieces. The first step was miniaturized, flexible silicon solar cells that can capture light from the sun as well as from artificial sources like lamps. The team connected eight tiny (1.5 by 1.5 by 0.1 millimeters) rigid crystalline cells and encapsulated them in a polymer to make a flexible photovoltaic system.
The second half is an eye-blinking-activated system that functions like a metal-air battery. The wearer’s natural tears—more specifically the electrolytes within them—serve as a biofuel to generate power.
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The harvesting occurs literally in the blink of an eye: When the eye is completely open, the harvester is off. Then when the eye starts to blink, the tear electrolytes meet the magnesium anode, causing an oxidation reaction and the generation of electrons. …
Applications for the technology were also discussed, from the April 1, 2024 article,
“The reliable power output from this device can fuel a broad spectrum of applications, including wearable biosensors and electrically responsive drug-delivery systems, directly within the eye’s environment,” Gao adds.[Wei Gao, a biosensors expert and assistant professor of medical engineering at Caltech, who was not involved in the research.
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Pourshaban agrees, adding that there are obvious consumer applications, such as lenses that display to a runner the heart rate, pace, and calorie burn during a workout. Retailers could glean valuable insights from tracking how a shopper scans shelves and selects items. [emphases mine] Commercialization potential is significant and varied, he says.
However, Pourshaban is perhaps most excited about potential applications in monitoring eye health, from prosaic conditions like presbyopia—age-related farsightedness, which can begin in the mid-40s—to more insidious diseases including glaucoma.
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If you have the time, Pepitone’s April 1, 2024 article is an engaging and accessible read.
Here’s a link to and a citation for the team’s research paper,
Power Scavenging Microsystem for Smart Contact Lenses by Erfan Pourshaban, Mohit U. Karkhanis, Adwait Deshpande, Aishwaryadev Banerjee, Md Rabiul Hasan, Amirali Nikeghbal, Chayanjit Ghosh, Hanseup Kim, Carlos H. Mastrangelo. Small DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202401068 First published: 13 March 2024
Caption: Nanogel – Scheme of selective drug treatment in the central nervous system. Credit Politecnico di Milano – Istituto Mario Negri
A February 14, 2024 news item on Nanowerk provides some context for the image in the above, Note: A link has been removed,
In a study published in Advanced Materials (“Synergistic Pharmacological Therapy to Modulate Glial Cells in Spinal Cord Injury”), researchers Pietro Veglianese, Valeria Veneruso and Emilia Petillo from Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri IRCCS in collaboration with Filippo Rossi of the Politecnico di Milano have demonstrated that an innovative nanovector (nanogel), which they developed, is able to deliver anti-inflammatory drugs in a targeted manner into glial cells actively involved in the evolution of spinal cord injury, a condition that leads to paraplegia or quadriplegia [also known as tetraplegia].
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A February 20, 2024 Politecnico di Milano press release (also on EurekAlert but published February 14, 2024) which originated the news item, provides a bit more information about the difficulties with current treatments and the advantages of the new approach,
Treatments currently available to modulate the inflammatory response mediated by the component that controls the brain’s internal environment after acute spinal cord injury showed limited efficacy. This is also due to the lack of a therapeutic approach that can selectively act on microglial and astrocytic cells.
The nanovectors developed by Politecnico di Milano, called nanogels, consist of polymers that can bind to specific target molecules. In this case, the nanogels were designed to bind to glial cells, which are crucial in the inflammatory response following acute spinal cord injury. The collaboration between Istituto di Ricerche Farmacologiche Mario Negri IRCCS and Politecnico di Milano showed that nanogels, loaded with a drug with anti-inflammatory action (rolipram), were able to convert glial cells from a damaging to a protective state, actively contributing to the recovery of injured tissue. Nanogels showed to have a selective effect on glial cells, releasing the drug in a targeted manner, maximising its effect and reducing possible side effects.
“The key to the research was understanding the functional groups that can selectively target nanogels within specific cell populations”, explains Filippo Rossi, professor at the Department of Chemistry, Materials and Chemical Engineering ‘Giulio Natta’ at Politecnico di Milano – This makes it possible to optimise drug treatments by reducing unwanted effects”.
“The results of the study”, continues Pietro Veglianese, Head of the Acute Spinal Trauma and Regeneration Unit, Department of Neuroscience at Istituto Mario Negri, “show that nanogels reduced inflammation and improved recovery capacity in animal models with spinal cord injury, partially restoring motor function. These results open the way to new therapeutic possibilities for myelolysis patients. Moreover, this approach may also be beneficial for treating neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer’s, in which inflammation and glial cells play a significant role”.
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Synergistic Pharmacological Therapy to Modulate Glial Cells in Spinal Cord Injury by Valeria Veneruso, Emilia Petillo, Fabio Pizzetti, Alessandro Orro, Davide Comolli, Massimiliano De Paola, Antonietta Verrillo, Arianna Baggiolini, Simona Votano, Franca Castiglione, Mattia Sponchioni, Gianluigi Forloni, Filippo Rossi, Pietro Veglianese. Advanced Materials Volume 36, Issue 3 January 18, 2024 2307747 DOOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/adma.202307747 First published: 22 November 2023