Archive for the ‘Medical Gadgets’ Category

Ever wanted to create your own cancer diagnostic test? Stanford Medicine magazine has profiled the work of Purvesh Khatri and Atul Butte who have developed a method to easily create cancer biomarker spotting tests. They use publicly available data from National Center for Biotechnology Information’s GEO database of gene expression of cancer tumors, a bit of statistics and data filtering, and outsourcing of an ELISA test ... Full story

Canada’s The Globe and Mail is reporting that workers at Ontario’s Pickering and Darlington nuclear power plants have been testing a new device that detects brain waves through skin contact on the arm.  The hope is to have the ability to detect when workers are losing concentration, a critical issue when dealing with nuclear fission. It’s not clear how the device manages to gather enough signal so ... Full story

Varian Medical Systems, Inc., a Palo Alto, California firm, received FDA clearance to update the control software of the Clinac and Trilogy targeted radiotherapy devices and for the new Pivotal Care Solution for prone breast treatment. This enables a higher intensity dose delivery, up to 2400 monitor units per minute, and better support for treating breast cancer in the prone position. The technology can now facilitate treating breast ... Full story

DNA Genotek, a subsidiary of OraSure Technologies, received FDA clearance to market the Oragene Dx saliva DNA collection device. According to the company this is the first 510(k) approval for a DNA collection and stabilization device. The device promises reliable collection of DNA samples and ... Full story

A sequence alignment is a way of arranging the sequences of D.N.A, R.N.A or protein to identify regions of similarity. These similarities may be consequences of functional, structural, or evolutionary relationships between the sequences. From such an alignment, biologists may infer shared evolutionary origins, identify functionally important sites, and illustrate mutation events. More importantly, biologists can trace the source of certain genetic diseases. Traditionally, multiple sequence ... Full story

Researchers at the University of Arizona College of Engineering received a grant to develop a new medical imaging technology to detect tumors and pathogens. The method is based on the terahertz block of the electromagnetic spectrum. The scarcely researched terahertz band lies between microwave and optical and all these spectral frequencies can be used for imaging. Although terahertz radiation can penetrate many different materials, including ... Full story

Researchers from Millennium Pharmaceuticals have demonstrated significant accuracy and dynamic sensitivity of Cerenkov Luminescence Imaging (CLI) against conventional PET imaging techniques. CLI is an emerging imaging modality similar to bio-luminescence imaging which is being investigated as a more rapid, lower-cost alternative to PET for preclinical drug discovery applications. CLI captures visible protons emitted byCerenkov Radiation, the phenomenon responsible for the bluish glow often ... Full story

Microsulis Medical is reporting that its Acculis microwave thermal ablation system has been successfully integrated with the da Vinci robotic surgical system and used to perform a minimally invasive hepatectomy. The Acculis Accu2i pMTA applicator delivers microwave energy at 2.45 GHz while pumping cooling fluid through the applicator needle to keep the device within operating temperatures. Some ... Full story

Capsular endoscopy of the GI tract has its advantages, but since the swallowed capsule moves randomly through the intestines, there’s absolutely no control of where the eye of the device is pointing at. Now researchers from Tel Aviv University and Brigham and Women’s Hospital are using a 3T MRI machine to both power and propel a new capsule they invented. The tail of the device ... Full story

A collaboration of researchers from Wayne State University, the Mayo Clinic and Johns Hopkins Medicine has discovered a potential new treatment for macular degeneration and retinitis pigmentosa. The investigators managed to attach steroids to dendrimers nanoparticles and showed that the drugs only targeted the activated microglia, the damage-causing cells associated with neuroinflammation. The researchers published their article online in the journal Biomaterials.... Full story