The BrainPort device has three components. First, the blind or visually impaired person wears special sunglasses outfitted with a digital camera in its center. The sunglasses are connected to a small handheld device, roughly the size of an iPod. This device features a number of control functions, allowing the user to adjust the zoom and light settings.

Most crucially, this device houses a CPU that converts the images captured by the sunglasses into electrical pulses - the job usually performed by the retina. The final part of the process is to find a replacement for the over two million optic nerves needed in working eyes to transfer visual information from the retina to the visual cortex in the brain. The neuroscientists at Wicab decided to use the huge cluster of nerves found on the tip of the tongue.

To accomplish this, they designed what is essentially an electrode lollipop, which measures about nine square centimeters and can be placed directly on the tongue. Thus, sensors that would usually be utilized to detect different tastes are instead repurposed to process the visual data coming from the BrainPort. The device only allows users to "see" in black and white, as it works by dividing the visual field into a huge field of pixels. White pixels cause a strong electric pulse, while black pixels create no pulse whatsoever.

The neuroscientists know that the device works, but are not entirely certain on some of the specifics. They are not completely sure whether the brain considers the incoming data to be visual - thus sending it to the visual cortex - or to be a feeling of touch on the tongue, which would send the information to the somatosensory cortex. The end result, however, is the same: the user can effectively see, and he or she also feels a crackling sensation on the tongue akin
to drinking champagne or eating Pop Rocks.

This may not necessarily sound like the most practical solution - for instance, it may be difficult for users to see and talk at the same time - BrainPort has one huge advantage over previous devices in that it is not invasive, requiring no implants or surgeries in order to be used. The tongue is the ideal organ for such a device as its nerve fibers are packed close together and are much nearer to the surface than those of, say, the fingers. As an added bonus, the mouth's saliva provides a good conductor for the electrical current.

Users can become acclimated to the device within only fifteen minutes, and from that point can begin to glean spatial information from the pulses received. Four patients are currently testing BrainPort, and they have already been able to locate doorways and elevator buttons, arrange utensils on a dinner table, and even read letters and numbers.

The makers of BrainPort ultimately hope the device will help not only the blind but also those impaired by such diseases as glaucoma. They plan to submit the device for FDA approval by the end of August. Estimating the initial price at roughly $10,000, they hope to have BrainPort on the market by the end of the year.

[Scientific American]

Researchers at the Laboratory for Biomaterials and Drug Delivery at Children's Hospital Boston saw the need for a new way of getting eye medications delivered. They found that, using traditional eye drops, less than ten percent of the medication stays in the eye; blinking and tears wash out the rest.

The solution that this team developed is a multi-layer contact lens, with a biodegradable medium containing the drug inside of it. The contact lenses can slowly release the drug into the eye.

I'm already getting a weird feeling, talking about biodegradable polymers in my eye. But all of the materials used in these contacts are FDA-approved already, and the lab is already testing on animals, moving on to human testing as soon as possible. It's probably better than multiple-times-a-day eye drops, but you still have to get this thing into your eye...

A drug-dispensing contact lens [via Science Blog]

Replacement joints have always been sprayed with a compound that helps trick the body into thinking that they are natural bone. But the new process, developed by Tel Aviv University Professor Noam Eliaz, uses electricity to charge the replacement joint, and the charged metal pulls the coating from an electrochemical bath, similar to the very old technology of electroplating.

This new coating method makes the applied synthetic tissue pretty much indistinguishable from actual bone tissue. This process tricks the body into thinking the replacement joint is actual bone and accepting the replacements much more easily. The team has reported 33% fewer complications with this new coating process.

And as these coatings improve, doctors will get closer and closer to being able to say "We can rebuild him. We have the technology." Or maybe to "upgrade" humanity into some sort of race of Cybermen...[via PhysOrg]

(Image: an electron microscope image of the synthetic coating, from AFTAU)

In the June 23rd issue of Proceedings of the National Academy of Science, scientists described their cancer-detecting electric nose. It can process sample cells and sniff out harmful ones, the same way a human nose uses selective receptors to detect certain smells.

The chemical nose includes three such receptors now, but the researchers have hundreds more that they can add to the array, making the chemical nose more and more useful.

What makes this technology so powerful is its ability to adapt. When the human nose detects a new smell, the brain records the new smell and can remember previously experienced smells. The same is true of the chemical nose: it can cross-reference everything it detects with an extensive memory of cancer markers, creating new patterns when it needs to.

The result is an adaptable, precise method for cataloging and detecting new markers for various types of cancer. And just as a human nose can tell when something is "off," the chemical nose can also signal any abnormality, even if it can't pinpoint precisely what the problem is.

Now that this chemical nose can sniff cancer, maybe we can give the cancer sniffing cat a break.

'Chemical Nose' May Sniff Out Cancer Earlier [via Science Daily]

For further reading: What's the Future of Cancer Diagnosis?

(Image: an illustration of the chemical nose receptors at work, from University of Massachusetts Amherst)

The researchers, led by Associate Professor William Richard and researcher David Zar, have developed technology that makes your smartphone compatible with commercial USB ultrasound probes. That would allow you to use your phone for "imaging kidneys, liver, bladder and eyes, prostate and uterine screenings and biopsies, as well as using vascular probes for imaging veins and arteries for starting IVs and central lines," according to United Press International.

Said Richard:

You can carry around a probe and cell phone and image on the fly now. Imagine having these smart phones in ambulances and emergency rooms. On a larger scale, this kind of cell phone is a complete computer that runs Windows.

Oh, it needs to run Windows. Oh well. In any case, the researchers hope the technology will help people in remote areas of the developing world to have more access to scans. Plus they can use the scans to send data to a centralized area, on the other side of the world, where the experts can make a diagnosis. But it's also one step closer to small hand-held medical diagnostic devices, like Dr. McCoy's salt shakers.

The Fletcher bra works by flooding "cooling panels" with liquid. Then it looks for variations in the breast's skin temperature that could indicate an early malignancy. Fletcher's team claimed it would be "comfortable," but the cumbersome design includes:

a pair of body compliant liquid-perfused cooling panels lying adjacent and held within the inner contour of each cup... a pump connected by flexible tubing to the liquid-perfused cooling panels, a solenoid valve for controlling the flow of cooling liquid between the pump and the refrigerator-heat exchanger and heaters, a refrigerator-heat exchanger for cooling the cooling fluid, a heater for heating the cooling fluid, a cooling fluid reservoir tank, a temperature sensor located in the reservoir tank for sensing the cooling fluid temperature and a temperature readout and controller circuit for controlling the solenoid valve and heater circuit.

Maybe not something you'd wear to a party. Here's a diagram from the patent. (Click to enlarge.)

Fletcher's dream isn't dead. In 2002, researchers at De Montfort University in Leicester, England came up with a bra that uses tiny electrical currents to find tumors, which are denser than regular tissue. But clinical trials in China were supposed to lead to that device becoming available by 2005, which obviously hasn't happened. [FreePatentsOnline