A team of Sandia researchers have created scaffolds of carbon nanotubes that could lead to prosthetic limbs being about to essentially feel. The limbs would be controlled by existing nerves by relaying real time sensations to the limbs. The nanotubes would remain in the tissues after the scaffold had disintegrated. This would essentially create a connection between the device and the nerves of the person.
It sounds really interesting. I'm just wondering if it would actually work.
Remember how I was telling you about my Little Mermaid pj's that I ruined? Well after I got all bandaged up from cracking my head open, I got a few stitches. A few weeks later when the doctor took the stitches out, I had a lovely scar on my forehead. I still have my scar. Actually, I have a lot of scars from over the years. Here is something for those of you who get scarred up like me.
Researchers at Johns Hopkins University have developed a healing gel that can re-grow skin and blood vessels. The hydrogel is made up of sugar dextran and it's dissolved in water and polyethlyene glycol. This gel will be really helpful for patients with severe burns because it will help reduce the scarring.
When I was little, I was chasing my cousin around my baby sitters house. I slipped on the newly waxed floor and ran into the wall, forehead first. My head was split open and I had to get a bunch of stitches. I still remember it all. The one thing I remember most is all the blood. It was everywhere. The worst part was that my favorite Disney, The Little Mermaid pj's were destroyed. It was horrible.
MIT has developed a bandage that could have stopped the bleeding from my forehead a lot quicker then it was stopped. My Little Mermaid pj's probably still would have had some blood on them, but at least I wouldn't have passed out from blood loss. Anyway, the new bandage uses a natural clotting agent found in our blood to stop bleeding instantly. These bandages are extremely useful for wounds on the neck, where tourniquets can't be applied and one bleeds out very quick.
I went to the ER one night with severe pain in my lower back. I was there for five hours standing in one place because I couldn't sit, lay down, or even walk very much. It was horrible, and the ER didn't do anything but give me shots of morphine (which don't work on me). The only thing that kept me sane as the pain was trying to engulf me was the crazy man in the bed across from me.
They kept trying to shut the curtain so he wouldn't bother me, but he became more of a comic relief then a bother. He had just suffered a mild heart attack, but that didn't stop him from pissing off the nurses. He kept taking off the top of the gown and complaining that his chest hurt. The nurses would tell him he just had a heart attack then make him put the gown back on. He would wink at me then hit the call button after they left so that they would come back. He would ask for a pain killer, but he wasn't allowed one because he had a stress test scheduled for the morning. At one point, a nurse pulled out his call button, or at least that's what I saw. She claimed otherwise. He kept me laughing the whole night, even pressing the call button after I plugged it back in so that he could ask the nurse to do something for my pain.
He was a very nice guy, and I hope that where ever he is that he is well.
A team of scientists from the University of California, San Diego have developed a hydrogel that could provide the structure needed for a post-heart attack heart to regrow new heart cells. The bonus, no surgery. The new hydrogel made out of muscle cells of liquid cardiac connective tissue can be injected into the heart. The gel could be injected with a catheter, so forget the surgery. Who needs it when people keep coming up with new breakthroughs like this one?
Want to know more? Watch the video above or check out this article.
