In the future, this robotic thread may be paired with existing endovascular technologies, enabling doctors to remotely guide the robot through a patient’s brain vessels to quickly treat blockages and lesions, such as those that occur in aneurysms and stroke.

“Stroke is the number five cause of death and a leading cause of disability in the United States. If acute stroke can be treated within the first 90 minutes or so, patients’ survival rates could increase significantly,” says Xuanhe Zhao, associate professor of mechanical engineering and of civil and environmental engineering at MIT. “If we could design a device to reverse blood vessel blockage within this ‘golden hour,’ we could potentially avoid permanent brain damage. That’s our hope.”

MIT biologists have discovered an unexpected effect of a ketogenic, or fat-rich, diet: They showed that high levels of ketone bodies, molecules produced by the breakdown of fat, help the intestine to maintain a large pool of adult stem cells, which are crucial for keeping the intestinal lining healthy.

The researchers also found that intestinal stem cells produce unusually high levels of ketone bodies even in the absence of a high-fat diet. These ketone bodies activate a well-known signaling pathway called Notch, which has previously been shown to help regulate stem cell differentiation.

Researchers from IIT Bombay have designed a protein-based carrier for delivering drugs into cancer cells.

An effective strategy towards treating cancer is to deliver just the right dose of the anticancer drug to kill only cancerous cells and cause minimum damage to other healthy tissues. Scientists are experimenting with various techniques to achieve targeted delivery and controlled release of anticancer drugs. In a recent study, researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Bombay (IIT Bombay) have used a protein derived from the serum of cows--- called bovine serum albumin (BSA)---in a saline solution, to make a hydrogel that acts as a drug carrier. 

The CRISPR genome-editing system is best-known for its potential to correct disease-causing mutations and add new genes into living cells. Now, a team from MIT and Harvard University has deployed CRISPR for a completely different purpose: creating novel materials, such as gels, that can change their properties when they encounter specific DNA sequences.

The researchers showed they could use CRISPR to control electronic circuits and microfluidic devices, and to release drugs, proteins, or living cells from gels. Such materials could be used to create diagnostic devices for diseases such as Ebola, or to deliver treatments for diseases such as irritable bowel disease.

Beta-amyloid plaques, the protein aggregates that form in the brains of Alzheimer’s patients, disrupt many brain functions and can kill neurons. They can also damage the blood-brain barrier — the normally tight border that prevents harmful molecules in the bloodstream from entering the brain.

MIT engineers have now developed a tissue model that mimics beta-amyloid’s effects on the blood-brain barrier, and used it to show that this damage can lead molecules such as thrombin, a clotting factor normally found in the bloodstream, to enter the brain and cause additional damage to Alzheimer’s neurons.

More than three decades of research on Alzheimer’s disease have not produced any major treatment advances for those with the disorder, according to a UCLA expert who has studied the biochemistry of the brain and Alzheimer’s for nearly 30 years. “Nothing has worked,” said Steven Clarke, a distinguished professor of chemistry and biochemistry. “We’re ready for new ideas.” Now, Clarke and UCLA colleagues have reported new insights that may lead to progress in fighting the devastating disease.

Epithelial cancers, such as cancers of the lung and pancreas, use the ανβ3 molecule to gain drug resistance to standard cancer therapies and to become highly metastatic. In a paper published in Cancer Research, University of California San Diego School of Medicine researchers identified a new therapeutic approach in mouse models that halts drug resistance and progression by using a monoclonal antibody that induces the immune system to seek and kill ανβ3-expressing cancer cells.

A cancer therapy invented at Rice University has crossed a milestone in clinical trials, a major development in a decades long quest to develop a treatment that destroys tumors without the debilitating side effects of chemotherapy, invasive surgery and radiation.

Thirteen of the first 15 prostate cancer patients treated in a clinical trial of the nanoparticle-based, focal therapy showed no detectable signs of cancer a year after treatment, according to a study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS).

Stanford engineers have developed experimental stickers that pick up physiological signals emanating from the skin, then wirelessly beam these health readings to a receiver clipped onto clothing. It’s all part of a system called BodyNet.

We tend to take our skin’s protective function for granted, ignoring its other roles in signaling subtleties like a fluttering heart or a flush of embarrassment.

Now, Stanford engineers have developed a way to detect physiological signals emanating from the skin with sensors that stick like band-aids and beam wireless readings to a receiver clipped onto clothing.

MIT researchers have built a modern microprocessor from carbon nanotube transistors, which are widely seen as a faster, greener alternative to their traditional silicon counterparts.

The microprocessor, described in the journal Nature, can be built using traditional silicon-chip fabrication processes, representing a major step toward making carbon nanotube microprocessors more practical.

Hope has been restored for the rechargeable lithium metal battery – a potential battery powerhouse relegated for decades to the laboratory by its short life expectancy and occasional fiery demise while its rechargeable sibling, the lithium-ion battery, now rakes in more than $30 billion a year.

A team of researchers at Stanford University and SLAC National Accelerator Laboratory has invented a coating that overcomes some of the battery’s defects, described in a paper published Aug. 26 in Joule.

The majority of soft robots today rely on external power and control, keeping them tethered to off-board systems or rigged with hard components. Now, researchers from the Harvard John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences (SEAS) and the Caltech Division of Engineering and Applied Science have developed soft robotic systems, inspired by origami, that can move and change shape in response to external stimuli, paving the way for fully untethered soft robots.

With water scarcity a growing problem worldwide, University of California, Berkeley, researchers are close to producing a microwave-sized water harvester that will allow you to pull all the water you need directly from the air — even in the hot, dry desert.

In a paper appearing in ACS Central Science, a journal of the American Chemical Society, UC Berkeley’s Omar Yaghi and his colleagues describe the latest version of their water harvester, which can pull more than five cups of water (1.3 liters) from low-humidity air per day for each kilogram (2.2 pounds) of water-absorbing material, a very porous substance called a metal-organic framework, or MOF. That is more than the minimum required to stay alive.

Scientists at EPFL have developed a tiny pump that could play a big role in the development of autonomous soft robots, lightweight exoskeletons and smart clothing. Flexible, silent and weighing only one gram, it is poised to replace the rigid, noisy and bulky pumps currently used. The scientists’ work has been published in Nature.

Soft robots have a distinct advantage over their rigid forebears: they can adapt to complex environments, handle fragile objects and interact safely with humans. Made from silicone, rubber or other stretchable polymers, they are ideal for use in rehabilitation exoskeletons and robotic clothing. Soft bio-inspired robots could one day be deployed to explore remote or dangerous environments.

A chameleon can alter the color of its skin so it either blends into the background to hide or stands out to defend its territory and attract a mate. The chameleon makes this trick look easy, using photonic crystals in its skin. Scientists, however, have struggled to make a photonic crystal “smart skin” that changes color in response to the environment, without also changing in size.

The journal ACS Nano published research led by chemists at Emory University that found a solution to the problem. They developed a flexible smart skin that reacts to heat and sunlight while maintaining a near constant volume.

Researchers have leveraged the bug’s superb scurrying skills to create a cleverly simple method to assess and improve locomotion in robots.

Normally, tedious modeling of mechanics, electronics, and information science is required to understand how insects’ or robots’ moving parts coordinate smoothly to take them places. But in a new study, biomechanics researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology boiled down the sprints of cockroaches to handy principles and equations they then used to make a test robot amble about better.

UCLA scientists’ method will allow more advanced materials to be used for desalination and other processes

Deriving drinkable water from seawater, treating wastewater and conducting kidney dialysis are just a few important processes that use a technology called membrane filtration.

The key to the process is the membrane filter — a thin, semi-porous film that allows certain substances such as water to pass through while separating out other, unwanted substances. But in the past 30 years, there have been no significant improvements in the materials that make up the key layers of commercially produced membrane filters.

When medical laboratories analyze blood samples for signs of disease, they sometimes use instruments that rely on a technology called digital microfluidics. The technique uses electric signals to pull tiny droplets of the sample across a surface so they can be analyzed.

One drawback of the process is that the electric signals tend to damage the surface that the droplets travel over, which can cause the device to fail unexpectedly or deteriorate over time.

A research team led by the University of California San Diego has developed a soft robotic lens whose movements is controlled by the eyes—blink twice and the lens zooms in and out; look left, right, up or down and the lens will follow.

The lens is the first example of an interface between humans and soft machines. “The human-machine interface, as we know it, features classical machines: computers, wheelchairs, and rigid robotics, for example. The innovation here is the interface with soft robotics. This can really open up new opportunities in the field,” said Shengqiang Cai, a professor of mechanical and aerospace engineering at UC San Diego who led the research.