New Atlas

Medical Audio available

Wirelessly-activated implant treats bladder problems using light

Ben Coxworth January 3, 2019

Currently, if people have urinary problems such as incontinence or an overactive bladder, medication and/or electronic nerve-stimulating implants are required. An experimental new implant may work better, however, treating the problem using integrated micro-LEDs.

This CT scan of a rat shows the device implanted around the bladder

Medical

Relieving constipation by shining light where the Sun don't shine

Michael Irving May 20, 2018

The field of optogenetics is all about using light to stimulate cells in the body. Now, researchers from Flinders University have used the technique to shine a light where the Sun don’t shine, stimulating nerves in the gut to relieve chronic constipation.

Shining light onto nerves in the gut could help relieve chronic constipation

Biology

Discovery of "anxiety cells" in mice could lead to better therapies

Rich Haridy January 31, 2018

A new study has opened up a potential pathway to future anti-anxiety treatments after effectively demonstrating the identification of specific "anxiety cells" in the brains of mice and successfully turning those cells on or off with beams of light.

New research has identified and controlled suspected "anxiety cells" in a mouse brain

Medical

Forget shots – diabetes smartphone app tells cells when to produce insulin

Lisa-Ann Lee April 27, 2017

While there's no shortage of glucose-monitoring devices on the market, a team of Chinese scientists is going one step further to make life easier for diabetics. They've created a system that uses a smartphone to direct engineered cells to produce insulin when needed.

A diabetic mouse that has been implanted with engineered cells to produce insulin on demand via ...

Robotics

Tiny backpack puts dragonflies under remote control

Michael Irving January 29, 2017

Researchers have developed a system that a living dragonfly can wear like a backpack, allowing engineers to steer it remotely to deliver payloads, conduct reconnaissance and even guide pollination.

Through the DragonflEye project, researchers are developing cyborg dragonflies that can be remotely controlled thanks to ...

Biology

Laser activates hunt-and-kill behaviors in mice

Michael Franco January 13, 2017

Laser-activated killer mice? It might not be so far-fetched thanks to new research out of Yale that triggered stalking and biting behaviors in mice by stimulating neurons with light.

Medical

Implantable optical fibers might light up early signs of disease

Nick Lavars October 17, 2016

A soft, stretchy optical fiber developed at MIT and Harvard appears to be quite a promising candidate for using light to stimulate cells inside the brain, and could possibly even act as an warning light for diseases in other parts of the body.

Unlike other optical fibers which can be rigid as glass, the new hydrogel-based fiber is a ...

Medical

Painless light pulses, instead of harsh electric shocks, shown to restore heart rhythms

Michael Irving September 15, 2016

Current treatments for arrhythmia involve administering an intense burst of electricity in times of cardiac arrest, but these pulses are painful and harmful. Now scientists have found that beams of light can restore regular heart function, as a gentle and safe alternative to a harsh electric shock.

Scientists have found, in tests on mice and simulated human hearts, that administering painless pulses of ...

Robotics

Light used to steer muscle-powered bio-bots

Ben Coxworth March 16, 2016

It was just a couple of years ago that we heard about how scientists were using electrical fields to activate tiny muscle-powered "walking" biological robots – or "bio-bots." Recently, however, the researchers made an improvement: the bio-bots can now be steered using light.

One of the bio-bots, with its ring of muscle around a 3D-printed skeleton

Medical

Tiniest-ever LED implants could help find cures for neurological disorders

Ben Coxworth December 17, 2015

Before cures for diseases such as Alzheimer's can be found, scientists need a better understanding of how neurons in the brain communicate with one another. Researchers recently took a step towards that goal, by developing the smallest LED probes ever implanted in a living brain.

The LED probes can both activate individual neurons, and detect subsequent responses in neighboring neurons