Sense about Science is a UK “independent charity that promotes the public interest in sound science and evidence,” according to the organization’s homepage. An October 29, 2024 Sense About Science announcement arrived in my email box (also online here),
Unfortunately, we don’t yet live in a world where it is safe for researchers to always speak out openly and honestly about research findings, even when it is important for society that they do so. We need to be able to ask difficult and sometimes uncomfortable scientific questions if we are to make decisions that affect the lives of many on the best available evidence.
Fortunately, however, there are brave researchers around the world who bringing evidence to public debate despite the potential of facing harassment or intimidation. The Maddox Prize is awarded by Springer Nature and Sense about Science to individuals who have shown courage and integrity in standing up for sound science and evidence and encourages others to do the same.
This year the judges have shortlisted 8 inspiring individuals from all the nominations received. They are:
Patrick Ball for his rigorous statistical work identifying, cataloguing and prosecuting war crimes. Patrick founded the Human Rights Data Analyst Group (HRDAG) and has spent over thirty years producing analysis for truth commissions, non-governmental organisations, international criminal tribunals and United Nations missions.
Kelly Cobey for her work implementing open science and championing the need to reform research assessment. Kelly is an Associate Professor at the University of Ottawa, where she is also director of the Metaresearch and Open Science programme.
Sholto David for his active role in identifying fabricated studies and results and protecting the integrity of science. Sholto is an analytical scientist with a PhD in cell and molecular biology from Newcastle University.
Ann McNeill for her work on studying interventions to reduce threats posed by cigarette smoking. Ann is a Professor of Tobacco Addiction in the National Addiction Centre at the Institute of Psychiatry, Psychology and Neuroscience, King’s College London.
Ben Mol for his work exposing scientific fraud in obstetrics and gynaecology research and removing fabricated papers from the literature. Ben is a Professor of obstetrics/gynaecology at Monash University in Australia.
John Nkengasong for conducting epidemiological studies of the COVID-19 virus in Africa whilst he was the director of the Africa Centres for Disease Control and Prevention. His efforts played a huge part in protecting the African population from COVID-19 despite challenges such as testing in regions of conflict. John is a virologist currently serving as the Global AIDS Coordinator in the Biden administration.
Shiba Subedi for his dedication campaigning in Nepali society for better awareness and preparedness for earthquakes. Shiba currently works as a seismologist at the Nepal Academy of Science and Technology.
Carola Vinuesa for her work using genetic sequencing to prevent unwarranted accusation of parents that they have harmed their children. Carola is internationally renowned for her discoveries in genetic causes of autoimmunity, and currently works at the Francis Crick Institute in London.
In the last week or so I’d been wondering what happened to the space elevators (it’s exactly what it sounds like, an elevator that takes you into space) and then this September 23, 2024 essay by Stephen Lyn (Strathclyde Chancellor’s Fellow, Chemical and Process Engineering, University of Strathclyde) on The Conversation popped up, Note: Links have been removed,
Graphene at 20: still no sign of the promised space elevator, but here’s how this wonder material is quietly changing the world
Twenty years ago [2004] this October , two physicists at the University of Manchester, Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov, published a groundbreaking paper on the “electric field effect in atomically thin carbon films”. Their work described the extraordinary electronic properties of graphene, a crystalline form of carbon equivalent to a single layer of graphite, just one atom thick.
Around that time, I started my doctorate at the University of Surrey. Our team specialised in the electronic properties of carbon. Carbon nanotubes were the latest craze, which I was happily following. One day, my professor encouraged a group of us to travel to London to attend a talk by a well-known science communicator from the University of Manchester. This was Andre Geim.
We were not disappointed. He was inspiring for us fresh-faced PhD students, incorporating talk of wacky Friday afternoon experiments with levitating frogs, before getting on to atomically thin carbon. All the same, we were sceptical about this carbon concept. We couldn’t quite believe that a material effectively obtained from pencil lead with sticky tape was really what it claimed to be. But we were wrong.
The work was quickly copied and reproduced by scientists across the globe. New methods for making this material were devised. Incredible claims about its properties made it sound like something out of a Stan Lee comic. Stronger than steel, highly flexible, super-slippery and impermeable to gases. A better electronic conductor than copper and a better thermal conductor than diamond, as well as practically invisible and displaying a host of exotic quantum properties.
Graphene was hailed as a revolutionary material, promising ultra-fast electronics, supercomputers and super-strong materials. More fantastical claims have included space elevators, solar sails, artificial retinas, even invisibility cloaks. [emphasis mine]
In terms of public perception, it’s fair to say that graphene has been held to an impossible standard. The popular media can certainly exaggerate science stories for clicks, but academics – including myself – are not immune from over-egging or speculating about their pet projects either. I’d argue this can even be useful, helping to drive new technologies forward. Equally, though, there can be a backlash when progress looks disappointing.
Having said that, disruptive technologies such as cars, television or plastic all required decades of development. Graphene is still a newcomer in the grand scheme of things, so it’s far too early to reach any conclusions about its impact.
Lyn goes on to point out where graphene has made inroads, from the September 23, 2024 essay, Note: Links have been removed
What has quietly occurred is a steady integration of graphene into numerous practical applications. Much of this is thanks to the Graphene Flagship, a major European research initiative coordinated by Chalmers University of Technology in Sweden. This aims to bring graphene and related materials from academic research to real-world commercial applications, and more than 90 products have been developed over the past decade as a result.
These include blended plastics for high-performance sports equipment, more durable racing tyres for bicycles, motorcycle helmets that better distribute impact forces, thermally conductive coatings for motorcycle components, and lubricants for reducing friction and wear between mechanical parts.
Graphene is finding its way into batteries and supercapacitors, enabling faster charging times and longer life spans. Conductive graphene inks are now used to manufacture sensors, wireless tracking tags, heating elements, and electromagnetic shielding for protecting sensitive electronics. Graphene is even used in headphones to improve the sound quality, and as a more efficient means of transmitting heat in air-conditioning units.
Graphene oxide products are being used for desalination, wastewater treatment and purification of drinking water. Meanwhile, a range of graphene materials can be bought off the shelf for use in countless other products, and major corporations including SpaceX, Tesla, Panasonic, Samsung, Sony and Apple are all rumoured or known to be using them to develop new products.
I am thankful for Lyn’s September 23, 2024 essay, which answers my question about space elevators and offers a good update on graphene’s integration and impact on society. If you have an interest in hearing the Sir Andre Geim talk “Random Walk to Graphene,” Lyn has embedded the almost 38 minutes talk in his essay. Finally, h/t to phys.org’s Sept. 23, 2024 news item.
I haven’t featured one of these ‘fun’ (world’s smallest xxx) announcements in a long time. An August 14, 2024 news item on phys.org announces the world’s smallest disco party and a step towards exploring quantum gravity, Note: Links have been removed,
Physicists at Purdue [Purdue University, Indiana, US] are throwing the world’s smallest disco party. The disco ball itself is a fluorescent nanodiamond, which they have levitated and spun at incredibly high speeds. The fluorescent diamond emits and scatters multicolor lights in different directions as it rotates. The party continues as they study the effects of fast rotation on the spin qubits within their system and are able to observe the Berry phase.
The team, led by Tongcang Li, professor of Physics and Astronomy and Electrical and Computer Engineering at Purdue University, published their results in Nature Communications. Reviewers of the publication described this work as “arguably a groundbreaking moment for the study of rotating quantum systems and levitodynamics” and “a new milestone for the levitated optomechanics community.”
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This graph illustrates a diamond particle levitated above a surface ion trap. The fluorescent diamond nanoparticle is driven to rotate at a high speed (up to 1.2 billion rpm) by alternating voltages applied to the four corner electrodes. This rapid rotation induces a phase in the nitrogen-vacancy electron spins inside the diamond. The diagram in the top left corner depicts the atomic structure of a nitrogen-vacancy spin defect inside the diamond. Graphic provided by Kunhong Shen.
An August 13, 2024 Purdue University news release (also on EurekAlert but published August 14, 2024) by Cheryl Pierce, which originated the news item, explains what makes this work so exciting (!), Note: Links have been removed,
“Imagine tiny diamonds floating in an empty space or vacuum. Inside these diamonds, there are spin qubits that scientists can use to make precise measurements and explore the mysterious relationship between quantum mechanics and gravity,” explains Li, who is also a member of the Purdue Quantum Science and Engineering Institute. “In the past, experiments with these floating diamonds had trouble in preventing their loss in vacuum and reading out the spin qubits. However, in our work, we successfully levitated a diamond in a high vacuum using a special ion trap. For the first time, we could observe and control the behavior of the spin qubits inside the levitated diamond in high vacuum.”
The team made the diamonds rotate incredibly fast—up to 1.2 billion times per minute! By doing this, they were able to observe how the rotation affected the spin qubits in a unique way known as the Berry phase.
“This breakthrough helps us better understand and study the fascinating world of quantum physics,” he says.
The fluorescent nanodiamonds, with an average diameter of about 750 nm, were produced through high-pressure, high-temperature synthesis. These diamonds were irradiated with high-energy electrons to create nitrogen-vacancy color centers, which host electron spin qubits. When illuminated by a green laser, they emitted red light, which was used to read out their electron spin states. An additional infrared laser was shone at the levitated nanodiamond to monitor its rotation. Like a disco ball, as the nanodiamond rotated, the direction of the scattered infrared light changed, carrying the rotation information of the nanodiamond.
The authors of this paper were mostly from Purdue University and are members of Li’s research group: Yuanbin Jin (postdoc), Kunhong Shen (PhD student), Xingyu Gao (PhD student) and Peng Ju (recent PhD graduate). Li, Jin, Shen, and Ju conceived and designed the project and Jin and Shen built the setup. Jin subsequently performed measurements and calculations and the team collectively discussed the results. Two non-Purdue authors are Alejandro Grine, principal member of technical staff at Sandia National Laboratories, and Chong Zu, assistant professor at Washington University in St. Louis. Li’s team discussed the experiment results with Grine and Zu who provided suggestions for improvement of the experiment and manuscript.
“For the design of our integrated surface ion trap,” explains Jin, “we used a commercial software, COMSOL Multiphysics, to perform 3D simulations. We calculate the trapping position and the microwave transmittance using different parameters to optimize the design. We added extra electrodes to conveniently control the motion of a levitated diamond. And for fabrication, the surface ion trap is fabricated on a sapphire wafer using photolithography. A 300-nm-thick gold layer is deposited on the sapphire wafer to create the electrodes of the surface ion trap.”
So which way are the diamonds spinning and can they be speed or direction manipulated? Shen says yes, they can adjust the spin direction and levitation.
“We can adjust the driving voltage to change the spinning direction,” he explains. “The levitated diamond can rotate around the z-axis (which is perpendicular to the surface of the ion trap), shown in the schematic, either clockwise or counterclockwise, depending on our driving signal. If we don’t apply the driving signal, the diamond will spin omnidirectionally, like a ball of yarn.”
Levitated nanodiamonds with embedded spin qubits have been proposed for precision measurements and creating large quantum superpositions to test the limit of quantum mechanics and the quantum nature of gravity.
“General relativity and quantum mechanics are two of the most important scientific breakthroughs in the 20th century. However, we still do not know how gravity might be quantized,” says Li. “Achieving the ability to study quantum gravity experimentally would be a tremendous breakthrough. In addition, rotating diamonds with embedded spin qubits provide a platform to study the coupling between mechanical motion and quantum spins.”
This discovery could have a ripple effect in industrial applications. Li says that levitated micro and nano-scale particles in vacuum can serve as excellent accelerometers and electric field sensors. For example, the US Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL) are using optically-levitated nanoparticles to develop solutions for critical problems in navigation and communication.
“At Purdue University, we have state-of-the-art facilities for our research in levitated optomechanics,” says Li. “We have two specialized, home-built systems dedicated to this area of study. Additionally, we have access to the shared facilities at the Birck Nanotechnology Center, which enables us to fabricate and characterize the integrated surface ion trap on campus. We are also fortunate to have talented students and postdocs capable of conducting cutting-edge research. Furthermore, my group has been working in this field for ten years, and our extensive experience has allowed us to make rapid progress.”
Quantum research is one of four key pillars of the Purdue Computes initiative, which emphasizes the university’s extensive technological and computational environment.
This research was supported by the National Science Foundation (grant number PHY-2110591), the Office of Naval Research (grant number N00014-18-1-2371), and the Gordon and Betty Moore Foundation (grant DOI 10.37807/gbmf12259). The project is also partially supported by the Laboratory Directed Research and Development program at Sandia National Laboratories.
Intriguing, eh? An August 6, 2023 news item on ScienceDaily announces an innovative approach to studying nuclear fusion energy,
Researchers are using mayonnaise to study and address the stability challenges of nuclear fusion by examining the phases of Rayleigh-Taylor instability. Their innovative approach aims to inform the design of more stable fusion capsules, contributing to the global effort to harness clean fusion energy. Their most recent paper explores the critical transitions between elastic and plastic phases in these conditions.
Mayonnaise continues to help researchers better understand the physics behind nuclear fusion.
“We’re still working on the same problem, which is the structural integrity of fusion capsules used in inertial confinement fusion, and Hellmann’s Real Mayonnaise is still helping us in the search for solutions,” says Arindam Banerjee, the Paul B. Reinhold Professor of Mechanical Engineering and Mechanics at Lehigh University and Chair of the MEM department in the P.C. Rossin College of Engineering and Applied Science.
In simple terms, fusion reactions are what power the sun. If the process could be harnessed on earth, scientists believe it could offer a nearly limitless and clean energy source for humanity. However, replicating the sun’s extreme conditions is an incredibly complex challenge. Researchers across science and engineering disciplines, including Banerjee and his team, are examining the problem from a multitude of perspectives.
Inertial confinement fusion is a process that initiates nuclear fusion reactions by rapidly compressing and heating capsules filled with fuel, in this case, isotopes of hydrogen. When subjected to extreme temperatures and pressure, these capsules melt and form plasma, the charged state of matter that can generate energy.
“At those extremes, you’re talking about millions of degrees Kelvin and gigapascals of pressure as you’re trying to simulate conditions in the sun,” says Banerjee. “One of the main problems associated with this process is that the plasma state forms these hydrodynamic instabilities, which can reduce the energy yield.”
In their first paper on the topic back in 2019, Banerjee and his team examined that problem, known as Rayleigh-Taylor instability. The condition occurs between materials of different densities when the density and pressure gradients are in opposite directions, creating an unstable stratification.
“We use mayonnaise because it behaves like a solid, but when subjected to a pressure gradient, it starts to flow,” he says. Using the condiment also negates the need for high temperatures and pressure conditions, which are exceedingly difficult to control.
Banerjee’s team used a custom-built, one-of-a-kind rotating wheel facility within Banerjee’s Turbulent Mixing Laboratory to mimic the flow conditions of the plasma. Once the acceleration crossed a critical value, the mayo started to flow.
One of the things they figured out during that initial research was that before the flow became unstable, the soft solid, i.e., the mayo, went through a couple of phases.
“As with a traditional molten metal, if you put a stress on mayonnaise, it will start to deform, but if you remove the stress, it goes back to its original shape,” he says. “So there’s an elastic phase followed by a stable plastic phase. The next phase is when it starts flowing, and that’s where the instability kicks in.”
Understanding this transition between the elastic phase and the stable plastic phase is critical, he says, because knowing when the plastic deformation starts might tip off researchers as to when the instability would occur, Banerjee says. Then, they’d look to control the condition in order to stay within this elastic or stable plastic phase.
Here’s a link to and a citation for the latest paper,
Jennifer Ouellette’s August 9, 2024 article for Ars Technica offers information that augments what can be learned from the news release, Note 1: For anyone who’s not a physicist is more accessible than the paper; Note 2: Links have been removed,
Inertial confinement fusion is one method for generating energy through nuclear fusion, albeit one plagued by all manner of scientific challenges (although progress is being made). Researchers at Lehigh University are attempting to overcome one specific bugbear with this approach by conducting experiments with mayonnaise placed in a rotating figure-eight contraption. They described their most recent findings in a new paper published in the journal Physical Review E with an eye toward increasing energy yields from fusion.
The work builds on prior research in the Lehigh laboratory of mechanical engineer Arindam Banerjee, who focuses on investigating the dynamics of fluids and other materials in response to extremely high acceleration and centrifugal force. In this case, his team was exploring what’s known as the “instability threshold” of elastic/plastic materials. Scientists have debated whether this comes about because of initial conditions, or whether it’s the result of “more local catastrophic processes,” according to Banerjee. The question is relevant to a variety of fields, including geophysics, astrophysics, explosive welding, and yes, inertial confinement fusion.
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If you’re interested in learning more about inertial confinement fusion, Ouellette’s August 9, 2024 article will help.
As for fusion energy, there are many articles here; just use the search engine.
Not exactly an art/science (or sciart) story. let’s call it an art/technology (or techno art) story. The SETI (Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence) Institute issued an October 22, 2024 news release (also on EurekAlert but published October 23, 2024) announcing the six nominees for SETI’s new artist in residency (AIR) program ‘Algorithmic Imaginings’,
The SETI Artist in Residency (AIR) program announced Algorithmic Imaginings, a new residency that explores how AI technologies affect science and society. The residency focuses on creative research topics such as imaginary life, human-AI collaboration, AI futures, posthumanism, AI and consciousness, and the ethics of AI data. It also connects with current SETI Institute research, including exoplanet studies, astrobiology, signal detection, and advanced computing. The two-year program offers $30,000 in funding and an exhibition at the ZKM | Center for Art and Media in Karlsruhe, Germany.
“AI is on everyone’s mind right now, be it ChatGPT4, text-to-video generators such as Sora, and discussions surrounding fake news and copyright,” said Bettina Forget, Director of the AIR program. “AI is a phenomenal tool, but it also comes with opportunities and concerns that should be addressed. This residency allows artists working at the intersection of art and technology to explore new avenues of thinking and connect them to SETI Institute research.”
Internationally recognized media art curator Zhang Ga, SETI AIR program Director Bettina Forget, and SETI AIR program Founder and Senior Advisor Charles Lindsay lead the SETI AIR Algorithmic Imaginings residency. Andrew Siemion, the SETI Institute’s Bernard M. Oliver Chair for SETI Research, and AI researcher Robert Alvarez, who collaborates with the SETI Institute as a mentor for its Frontier Development Lab program, bring their science and technology expertise to this residency.
The residency’s team of advisors selected six outstanding media artists and invited them to submit a project proposal for the SETI AIR Algorithmic Imaginings residency.
“These artists are notable voices with a solid track record of critically and inventively confronting the pressing issues raised by a pervasively technological world,” said Zhang Ga.
“SETI AIR is uniquely poised to participate in the AI zeitgeist that is exploding in San Francisco and Silicon Valley,” said Charles Lindsay. “We will support the most innovative artists of our time. It is time. Now.”
The SETI Institute will announce the winning artist later this fall.
The six nominees of the Art and AI residency are:
Tega Brain Tega Brain’s work examines ecology, data, automation, and infrastructure. She has created projects such as digital networks controlled by environmental phenomena, schemes for obfuscating personal data, and a wildly popular online smell-based dating service.
Dominique Gonzalez Foerster An experimental artist based in Paris, Dominique Gonzalez-Foerster explores the different modalities of sensory and cognitive relationships between bodies and spaces, real or fictitious, up to the point of questioning the distance between organic and inorganic life.
Laurent Grasso French-born artist Laurent Grasso has developed a fascination with the visual possibilities related to the science of electromagnetic energy, radio waves, and naturally occurring phenomena.
HeHe (Helen Evans, Heiko Hansen) HeHe is an artist duo consisting of Helen Evans (French, British) and Heiko Hansen (German), based in Le Havre, France. Their works are about the social, industrial, and ecological paradoxes found in today’s technological landscapes. Their practice explores the relationship between art, media, and the environment.
Terike Haapoja Terike Haapoja is an interdisciplinary visual artist, writer, and researcher. Haapoja’s work investigates our world’s existential and political boundaries, specifically focusing on issues arising from the anthropocentric worldview of Western traditions. Animality, multispecies politics, cohabitation, time, loss, and repairing connections are recurring themes in Haapoja’s work.
Wang Yuyang Wang Yuyang is a renowned contemporary Chinese artist teaching at the Central Academy of Fine Arts. Focused on techno-art, his work explores the relationships between technology and art, nature and artificiality, and material and immaterial through an interdisciplinary and multimedia approach.
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About the SETI Institute
Founded in 1984, the SETI Institute is a non-profit, multi-disciplinary research and education organization whose mission is to lead humanity’s quest to understand the origins and prevalence of life and intelligence in the Universe and to share that knowledge with the world. Our research encompasses the physical and biological sciences and leverages expertise in data analytics, machine learning and advanced signal detection technologies. The SETI Institute is a distinguished research partner for industry, academia and government agencies, including NASA and NSF.
Caption: The six nominees for the SETI Institute’s Algorithmic Imaginings residency. Credit: SETI Institute [top row, left to right: Dominique Gonzalez Foerster; HeHe (Helen Evans, Heiko Hansen); Laurent Grasso; bottom row, left to the right: Tega Brain; Terike Haapoja; and Wang Yuyang]
These dressings have batteries activated by water that can then be used to heal chronic wounds. This August 7, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily introduces the research (details about the water-powered batteries and more follow in the news release),
Researchers have developed an inexpensive bandage that uses an electric field to promote healing in chronic wounds. In animal testing, wounds that were treated with these electric bandages healed 30% faster than wounds treated with conventional bandages.
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Photo of a water-powered, electronics-free dressing (WPED) for electrical stimulation of wounds. Photo credit: Rajaram Kaveti.
Chronic wounds are open wounds that heal slowly, if they heal at all. For example, sores that occur in some patients with diabetes are chronic wounds. These wounds are particularly problematic because they often recur after treatment and significantly increase the risk of amputation and death.
One of the challenges associated with chronic wounds is that existing treatment options are extremely expensive, which can create additional problems for patients.
“Our goal here was to develop a far less expensive technology that accelerates healing in patients with chronic wounds,” says Amay Bandodkar, co-corresponding author of the work and an assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at North Carolina State University. “We also wanted to make sure that the technology is easy enough for people to use at home, rather than something that patients can only receive in clinical settings.”
“This project is part of a bigger DARPA [Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency] project to accelerate wound healing with personalized wound dressings,” says Sam Sia, co-corresponding author of the work and professor of biomedical engineering at Columbia University. “This collaborative project shows that these lightweight bandages, which can provide electrical stimulation simply by adding water, healed wounds faster than the control, at a similar rate as bulkier and more expensive wound treatment.”
Specifically, the research team developed water-powered, electronics-free dressings (WPEDs) [emphasis mine], which are disposable wound dressings that have electrodes on one side and a small, biocompatible battery on the other. The dressing is applied to a patient so that the electrodes come into contact with the wound. A drop of water is then applied to the battery, activating it. Once activated, the bandage produces an electric field for several hours.
“That electric field is critical, because it’s well established that electric fields accelerate healing in chronic wounds,” says Rajaram Kaveti, co-first author of the study and a post-doctoral researcher at NC State.
The electrodes are designed in a way that allows them to bend with the bandage and conform to the surface of the chronic wounds, which are often deep and irregularly shaped.
“This ability to conform is critical, because we want the electric field to be directed from the periphery of the wound toward the wound’s center,” says Kaveti. “In order to focus the electric field effectively, you want electrodes to be in contact with the patient at both the periphery and center of the wound itself. And since these wounds can be asymmetrical and deep, you need to have electrodes that can conform to a wide variety of surface features.”
“We tested the wound dressings in diabetic mice, which are a commonly used model for human wound healing,” says Maggie Jakus, co-first author of the study and a graduate student at Columbia. “We found that the electrical stimulation from the device sped up the rate of wound closure, promoted new blood vessel formation, and reduced inflammation, all of which point to overall improved wound healing.”
Specifically, the researchers found that mice who received treatment with WPEDs healed about 30% faster than mice who received conventional bandages.
“But it is equally important that these bandages can be produced at relatively low cost – we’re talking about a couple of dollars per dressing in overhead costs.” says Bandodkar.
“Diabetic foot ulceration is a serious problem that can lead to lower extremity amputations,” says Aristidis Veves, a co-author of the study and professor of surgery at Beth Israel Deaconess Center. “There is urgent need for new therapeutic approaches, as the last one that was approved by the Food and Drug Administration was developed more than 25 years ago. My team is very lucky to participate in this project that investigates innovative and efficient new techniques that have the potential to revolutionize the management of diabetic foot ulcers.”
In addition, the WPEDs can be applied quickly and easily. And once applied, patients can move around and take part in daily activities. This functionality means that patients can receive treatment at home and are more likely to comply with treatment. In other words, patients are less likely to skip treatment sessions or take shortcuts, since they aren’t required to come to a clinic or remain immobile for hours.
“Next steps for us include additional work to fine-tune our ability to reduce fluctuations in the electric field and extend the duration of the field. We are also moving forward with additional testing that will get us closer to clinical trials and – ultimately – practical use that can help people,” says Bandodkar.
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Water-powered, electronics-free dressings that electrically stimulate wounds for rapid wound closure by Rajaram Kaveti, Margaret A. Jakus, Henry Chen, Bhavya Jain, Darragh G. Kennedy, Elizabeth A. Caso, Navya Mishra, Nivesh Sharma, Baha Erim Uzunoğlu, Won Bae Han, Tae-Min Jang, Suk-Won Hwang, Georgios Theocharidis, Brandon J. Sumpio, Aristidis Veves, Samuel K. Sia, and Amay J. Bandodkar. Science Advances 7 Aug 2024 Vol 10, Issue 32 DOI: 10.1126/sciadv.ado7538
This August 7, 2024 news item on phys.org explains what it means for a microscope to have a resolution of better than five nanometers, Note: A link has been removed,
What does the inside of a cell really look like? In the past, standard microscopes were limited in how well they could answer this question. Now, researchers from the Universities of Göttingen [Netherlands] and Oxford [UK[, in collaboration with the University Medical Center Göttingen (UMG), have succeeded in developing a microscope with resolutions better than five nanometers (five billionths of a meter). This is roughly equivalent to the width of a hair split into 10,000 strands. Their new method was published in Nature Photonics.
Many structures in cells are so small that standard microscopes can only produce fragmented images. Their resolution only begins at around 200 nanometres. However, human cells for instance contain a kind of scaffold of fine tubes that are only around seven nanometres wide. The synaptic cleft, meaning the distance between two nerve cells or between a nerve cell and a muscle cell, is just 10 to 50 nanometres – too small for conventional microscopes. The new microscope, which researchers at the University of Göttingen have helped to develop, promises much richer information. It benefits from a resolution better than five nanometres, enabling it to capture even the tiniest cell structures. It is difficult to imagine something so tiny, but if we were to compare one nanometre with one metre, it would be the equivalent of comparing the diameter of a hazelnut with the diameter of the Earth.
This type of microscope is known as a fluorescence microscope. Their function relies on “single-molecule localization microscopy”, in which individual fluorescent molecules in a sample are switched on and off and their individual positions are then determined very precisely. The entire structure of the sample can then be modelled from the positions of these molecules. The current process enables resolutions of around 10 to 20 nanometres. Professor Jörg Enderlein’s research group at the University of Göttingen’s Faculty of Physics has now been able to double this resolution again – with the help of a highly sensitive detector and special data analysis. This means that even the tiniest details of protein organization in the connecting area between two nerve cells can be very precisely revealed.
“This newly developed technology is a milestone in the field of high-resolution microscopy. It not only offers resolutions in the single-digit nanometre range, but it is also particularly cost-effective and easy to use compared to other methods,” explains Enderlein. The scientists also developed an open-source software package for data processing in the course of publishing their findings. This means that this type of microscopy will be available to a wide range of specialists in the future.
Soil with high concentrations of salt is not considered good for growing plants and that may become more of a problem as researchers seek to create greater global food security in the coming decades. From an August 7, 2024 news item on phys.org,
Soil salt concentrations above the optimal threshold for plant growth can threaten global food security by compromising agricultural productivity and crop quality. An analysis published in Physiologia Plantarum has examined the potential of nanomaterials—which have emerged over the past decade as a promising tool to mitigate such “salinity stress”—to address this challenge.
Nanomaterials, which are tiny natural or synthetic materials, can modulate a plant’s response to salinity stress through various mechanisms, for example by affecting the expression of genes related to salt tolerance or by enhancing physiological processes such as antioxidant activities.
When investigators assessed 495 experiments from 70 publications related to how different nanomaterials interact with plants under salinity stress, they found that nanomaterials enhance plant performance and mitigate salinity stress when applied at lower dosages. At higher doses, however, nanomaterials are toxic to plants and may even worsen salinity stress.
Also, plant responses to nanomaterials vary across plant species, plant families, and nanomaterial types.
“Our analysis revealed that plants respond more positively to nanomaterials under salt stress compared with non-stressed conditions, indicating the ameliorative role of nanomaterials,” said corresponding author Damiano R. Kwaslema, MSc, of Sokoine University of Agriculture, in Tanzania. “These findings pave the way for considering nanomaterials as a future option for managing salinity stress.”
Gold nanowires that are tissue-like? That’s how this nanogold composite is described in a research paper from researchers at Linköping University (Sweden). Before getting to a link and citation for the paper, here’s an announcement about the work in an August 6, 2024 news item on ScienceDaily,
Gold does not readily lend itself to being turned into long, thin threads. But researchers at Linköping University in Sweden have now managed to create gold nanowires and develop soft electrodes that can be connected to the nervous system. The electrodes are soft as nerves, stretchable and electrically conductive, and are projected to last for a long time in the body.
Some people have a “heart of gold”, so why not “nerves of gold”? In the future, it may be possible to use this precious metal in soft interfaces to connect electronics to the nervous system for medical purposes. Such technology could be used to alleviate conditions such as epilepsy, Parkinson’s disease, paralysis or chronic pain. However, creating an interface where electronics can meet the brain or other parts of the nervous system poses special challenges.
“The classical conductors used in electronics are metals, which are very hard and rigid. The mechanical properties of the nervous system are more reminiscent of soft jelly. In order to get an accurate signal transmission, we need to get very close to the nerve fibres in question, but as the body is constantly in motion, achieving close contact between something that is hard and something that is soft and fragile becomes a problem”, says Klas Tybrandt, professor of materials science at the Laboratory of Organic Electronics at Linköping University, who led the research.
Researchers therefore want to create electrodes that have good conductivity as well as mechanical properties similar to the softness of the body. In recent years, several studies have shown that soft electrodes do not damage the tissue as much as hard electrodes may do. In the current study, published in the journal Small, a group of researchers at Linköping University have developed gold nanowires – a thousand times thinner than a hair – and embedded them in an elastic material to create soft microelectrodes.
“We’ve succeeded in making a new, better nanomaterial from gold nanowires in combination with a very soft silicone rubber. Getting these to work together has resulted in a conductor that has high electrical conductivity, is very soft and made of biocompatible materials that function with the body,” says Klas Tybrandt.
Silicone rubber is used in medical implants, such as breast implants. The soft electrodes also include gold and platinum, metals that are common in medical devices for clinical use. However, making long, narrow gold nanostructures is very difficult. This has so far been a major obstacle, but the researchers have now come up with a new way to manufacture gold nanowires. And they do it by using silver nanowires.
As silver has unique properties that make it a very good material to create the kind of nanowires that the researchers are after, it is used in some stretchable nanomaterials. The problem with silver is that it is chemically reactive. In the same way that silver cutlery will discolour over time when chemical reactions occur on the surface, silver in nanowires breaks down so that silver ions leak out. In a high enough concentration, silver ions can be toxic to us.
It was when Laura Seufert, a doctoral student in Klas Tybrandt’s research group, was working on finding a way to synthesize, or “grow”, gold nanowires that she came up with a new approach that opened up new possibilities. At first, it was difficult to control the shape of the nanowires. But then she discovered a way that resulted in very smooth wires. Instead of trying to grow gold nanowires from the beginning, she started with a thin nanowire made of pure silver.
“As it’s possible to make silver nanowires, we take advantage of this and use the silver nanowire as a kind of template on which we grow gold. The next step in the process is to remove the silver. Once that’s done, we have a material that has over 99 per cent gold in it. So it’s a bit of a trick to get around the problem of making long narrow gold nanostructures,” says Klas Tybrandt.
In collaboration with Professor Simon Farnebo at the Department of Biomedical and Clinical Sciences at Linköping University, the researchers behind the study have shown that the soft and elastic microelectrodes can stimulate a rat nerve as well capture signals from the nerve.
In applications where the soft electronics are to be embedded in the body, the material must last for a long time, preferably for life. The researchers have tested the stability of the new material and concluded that it will last for at least three years, which is better than many of the nanomaterials developed so far.
The research team is now working on refining the material and creating different types of electrodes that are even smaller and can come into closer contact with nerve cells.
The research has been funded with support from, among others, the Swedish Foundation for Strategic Research, the Swedish Research Council, the Knut and Alice Wallenberg Foundation and through the Swedish Government’s strategic research area in advanced functional materials, AFM, at Linköping University.
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Stretchable Tissue-Like Gold Nanowire Composites with Long-Term Stability for Neural Interfaces by Laura Seufert, Mohammed Elmahmoudy, Charlotte Theunis, Samuel Lienemann, Yuyang Li, Mohsen Mohammadi, Ulrika Boda, Alejandro Carnicer-Lombarte, Renee Kroon, Per O.Å. Persson, Aiman Rahmanudin, Mary J. Donahue, Simon Farnebo, Klas Tybrandt. Small DOI: https://doi.org/10.1002/smll.202402214 First published: 30 June 2024
Matthew Davidson, a Research Associate with the University of Colorado demonstrates a 3D printed biomaterials for use inside the body including bandages that could be put on a beating human heart in Jason Burdick’s lab. (Photo by Casey A. Cass/University of Colorado)
Soft, strong, and flexible, that’s what you need if you’re going to apply a bandage to a heart and according to an August 1, 2024 news item on phys.org, researchers have developed a promising new material,
In the quest to develop life-like materials to replace and repair human body parts, scientists face a formidable challenge: Real tissues are often both strong and stretchable and vary in shape and size.
A CU [Colorado University] Boulder-led team, in collaboration with researchers at the University of Pennsylvania, has taken a critical step toward cracking that code. They’ve developed a new way to 3D print material that is at once elastic enough to withstand a heart’s persistent beating, tough enough to endure the crushing load placed on joints, and easily shapable to fit a patient’s unique defects.
Better yet, it sticks easily to wet tissue.
Their breakthrough, described in the Aug. 2 [2024] edition of the journal Science, helps pave the way toward a new generation of biomaterials, from internal bandages that deliver drugs directly to the heart to cartilage patches and needle-free sutures.
“Cardiac and cartilage tissues are similar in that they have very limited capacity to repair themselves. When they’re damaged, there is no turning back,” said senior author Jason Burdick, a professor of chemical and biological engineering at CU Boulder’s BioFrontiers Institute. “By developing new, more resilient materials to enhance that repair process, we can have a big impact on patients.”
Worm ‘blobs’ as inspiration
Historically, biomedical devices have been created via molding or casting, techniques which work well for mass production of identical implants but aren’t practical when it comes to personalizing those implants for specific patients. In recent years, 3D printing has opened a world of new possibilities for medical applications by allowing researchers to make materials in many shapes and structures.
Unlike typical printers, which simply place ink on paper, 3D printers deposit layer after layer of plastics, metals or even living cells to create multidimensional objects.
One specific material, known as a hydrogel (the stuff that contact lenses are made of), has been a favorite prospect for fabricating artificial tissues, organs and implants.
But getting these from the lab to the clinic has been tough because traditional 3D-printed hydrogels tend to either break when stretched, crack under pressure or are too stiff to mold around tissues.
“Imagine if you had a rigid plastic adhered to your heart. It wouldn’t deform as your heart beats,” said Burdick. “It would just fracture.”
To achieve both strength and elasticity within 3D printed hydrogels, Burdick and his colleagues took a cue from worms, which repeatedly tangle and untangle themselves around one another in three-dimensional “worm blobs” that have both solid and liquid-like properties. Previous research has shown that incorporating similarly intertwined chains of molecules, known as “entanglements,” can make them tougher.
Their new printing method, known as CLEAR (for Continuous-curing after Light Exposure Aided by Redox initiation), follows a series of steps to entangle long molecules inside 3D-printed materials much like those intertwined worms.
When the team stretched and weight-loaded those materials in the lab (one researcher even ran over a sample with her bike) they found them to be exponentially tougher than materials printed with a standard method of 3D printing known as Digital Light Processing (DLP). Better yet: They also conformed and stuck to animal tissues and organs.
“We can now 3D print adhesive materials that are strong enough to mechanically support tissue,” said co-first author Matt Davidson, a research associate in the Burdick Lab. “We have never been able to do that before.”
Revolutionizing care
Burdick imagines a day when such 3D-printed materials could be used to repair defects in hearts, deliver tissue-regenerating drugs directly to organs or cartilage, restrain bulging discs or even stitch people up in the operating room without inflicting tissue damage like a needle and suture can.
His lab has filed for a provisional patent and plans to launch more studies soon to better understand how tissues react to the presence of such materials.
But the team stresses that their new method could have impacts far beyond medicine—in research and manufacturing too. For instance, their method eliminates the need for additional energy to cure, or harden, parts, making the 3D printing process more environmentally friendly.
“This is a simple 3D processing method that people could ultimately use in their own academic labs as well as in industry to improve the mechanical properties of materials for a wide variety of applications,” said first author Abhishek Dhand, a researcher in the Burdick Lab and doctoral candidate in the Department of Bioengineering at the University of Pennsylvania. “It solves a big problem for 3D printing.”
Here’s a link to and a citation for the paper,
Additive manufacturing of highly entangled polymer networks by Abhishek P. Dhand, Matthew D. Davidson, Hannah M. Zlotnick, Thomas J. Kolibaba, Jason P. Killgore, and Jason A. Burdick. Science 1 Aug 2024 Vol 385, Issue 6708 pp. 566-572 DOI: 10.1126/science.adn692
