• Biodegradable implant could help doctors

    From ScienceDaily@1:317/3 to All on Tuesday, March 22, 2022 22:30:48
    Biodegradable implant could help doctors monitor brain chemistry

    Date:
    March 22, 2022
    Source:
    Penn State
    Summary:
    A wireless, biodegradable sensor could offer doctors a way to
    monitor changes in brain chemistry without requiring a second
    operation to remove the implant, according to an international
    team of researchers.



    FULL STORY ==========================================================================
    A wireless, biodegradable sensor could offer doctors a way to monitor
    changes in brain chemistry without requiring a second operation to remove
    the implant, according to an international team of researchers.


    ==========================================================================
    In a minimally invasive procedure on mice, the researchers inserted
    a wireless, biodegradable device into the deep brain region of a
    mouse. The device collected data on levels of dopamine, an important neurotransmitter, and other properties of the brain, such as pH levels, temperature and electrophysiology before harmlessly dissolving back into
    the body.

    Because dopamine is critical in many neural-related conditions, a
    biodegradable sensor to detect the neurotransmitter could be used by
    doctors for a range of treatments and operations.

    "The direct measurement of dopamine can be very significant because of
    the role that neurotransmitters play in a lot of neural related disease,"
    said Larry Cheng, the Dorothy Quiggle Professor in Engineering and an
    associate of the Institute for Computational and Data Sciences. "I
    think people in the past have been looking at a lot of the other
    parameters in form of temperature, or fever, or sweating, among
    others. These related parameters can be very helpful when we don't have
    the direct measurement, but if we can have the direct measurement of
    this neurotransmitter at the target location, and in real time, that can
    be certainly more direct and even more helpful, because information can sometimes be very challenging to infer based on those other parameters."
    The silicon-based implant includes a semiconductor called two-dimensional transition metal dichalcogenides, or TMDCs, which are considered an
    emerging class of materials increasingly used in nanoelectronics and nanophotonics applications. The ability for these atomically thin TMDCs
    to be manipulated allowed the scientists to design the implant to be biodegradable yet maintain electrical and electrochemical performance.

    To make this implantable, all of this equipment must be packed into a
    probe that measured about 13 or 14 millimeters long, said Cheng. For perspective, the diameter of a regular strength aspirin is about 14 millimeters.



    ========================================================================== "That's really for the entire device, but, if we're talking about the
    sensor, itself, that is even smaller," said Cheng, who is also a member
    of the Materials Research Institute.

    The team then tested the device by inserting the probe in a section of
    the mouse's brain called the basal ganglia.

    In a clinical setting, Cheng said patients would wear a headband or other
    type of apparatus to relay the implant's signals to equipment that the
    medical staff could the use to monitor the patients' condition.

    According to the researchers, the main benefit of a biodegradable device
    is that it would require no further surgeries -- which add risks to
    recovery -- to remove the device.

    "Currently, after full recovery, the device has to be removed, or there
    will be just something inside we don't need to use," said Cheng. "So
    that's why here, the device is designed to be biodegradable and after
    a certain amount of time and after it has fulfilled its function, it
    can safely dissolve. So, the patient won't need to have go through the
    second surgery operation to remove the device.



    ==========================================================================
    The sheer number of chemicals, materials and designs that could be used
    to make this device required advanced computing techniques, according to
    Cheng. He added that computers were used to simulate different chemicals
    and bioengineering schemes to find the ideal materials and design to
    detect and measure the target molecule, in this case, dopamine.

    "We have to introduce the material to model the 2D material and the
    dopamine and then you have to make sure they are stable," said Cheng. "So, we'll have to optimize the initial structure and then we further study
    the interaction between the stabilized material and the dopamine."
    Ultimately, the team hopes that the device will be used to help human
    patients, but they expect that an immediate need might be for doctors
    who are engaged in animal studies.

    "Some of the potential treatment options may first be available in animal studies where the implant could help scientists initially evaluate how
    a disease progresses, how a patient recovers from a treatment and how
    effective that treatment is," said Cheng. "So, the implant can be very
    helpful to simply use in an animal model to better investigate these questions." Future work could be aimed at creating a sensor that monitors other aspects of brain chemistry, beyond dopamine detection, Cheng said.


    ========================================================================== Story Source: Materials provided by Penn_State. Original written by Matt Swayne. Note: Content may be edited for style and length.


    ========================================================================== Journal Reference:
    1. Seung Min Yang, Jae Hyung Shim, Hyun‐U Cho, Tae‐Min
    Jang,
    Gwan‐Jin Ko, Jeongeun Shim, Tae Hee Kim, Jia Zhu, Sangun
    Park, Yoon Seok Kim, Su‐Yeon Joung, Jong Chan Choe,
    Jeong‐Woong Shin, Joong Hoon Lee, Yu Min Kang, Huanyu Cheng,
    Youngmee Jung, Chul‐Ho Lee, Dong Pyo Jang, Suk‐Won
    Hwang. Hetero‐Integration of Silicon Nanomembranes with 2D
    Materials for Bioresorbable, Wireless Neurochemical System. Advanced
    Materials, 2022; 2108203 DOI: 10.1002/ adma.202108203 ==========================================================================

    Link to news story: https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2022/03/220322170528.htm

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