Today’s bandages are pretty good at covering up wounds, sealing them off from infectious bacteria and allowing the body to go to work patching up the damage. But could there come a time when bandages play more of an active role in accelerating healing and fighting infection, so we can peel them off and get on with our lives sooner? […]

Researchers at EPFL have developed a new biodegradable circuit that can be implanted to deliver painkillers to a specific location in the body on demand. When the device is heated up from a source outside the body, it releases a controlled amount of a drug over several days, before safely dissolving away when it’s no longer needed. The device is […]

If you were designing a new back brace, trying it out on people could be kind of risky – what if it was flawed, and ended up hurting the test subjects? It was with this in mind that scientists at Britain’s University of Lancaster have created what is reportedly the world’s first human torso simulator. The researchers started with CT […]

It was just last year that we heard how scientists from Stanford University had designed a skin-worn sensor that measures stress via cortisol levels in the sweat. Now, researchers from that same institute have announced a similar sensor that tracks other vital signs. Known as BodyNet, the new technology was developed by a team led by chemical engineering professor Zhenan […]

When it comes to the continuous monitoring of people’s vital signs, the rigid electrodes that are typically adhered to the skin can be uncomfortable, awkward, and a cause of skin irritation. That’s where a new soft, flexible, wireless monitor is designed to come in. Developed by a team at the Georgia Institute of Technology, the device has a medical-grade non-allergenic […]

Outside of expensive transplants and drugs with questionable effectiveness, a proper treatment has continued to elude the great number of scientists working in the realm of hair loss. But sources of optimism are never far away, the latest coming out of Japan’s Yokohama National University where scientists have developed an improved technique they claim brings higher rates of follicle growth […]

Tennis elbow, carpal tunnel syndrome, and “mouse arm” all have two things in common: they’re the result of muscle strain, and they’re the subject of a new wearable. Known as MLI Elbow, the Danish device is aimed at alerting users to actions that could cause such injuries. MLI (muscle load index) Elbow takes the form of an electronic module that’s […]

Proteins are the workhorses of the cell, but nature sometimes has room for improvement. Now a team from the University of Washington’s Institute for Protein Design (IPD) and the University of California San Francisco (UCSF) has created a new artificial protein that acts like a switch, turning regular cells into “smart cells.” Different types of synthetic proteins are finding use […]

With a few experimental exceptions, bandages generally just cover wounds, as opposed to actively healing them. That’s not the case with a new heat-activated “active adhesive dressing” (AAD), however, which forgoes antibiotics while mimicking embryonic skin. Up to a certain point in their development, embryos don’t get scars when their skin wounds heal. This is because skin cells around such […]

When someone overdoses on opioid drugs, which is happening increasingly often, an injection of naloxone could save their life … if it’s administered soon enough. A wearable system that’s currently in development is intended to make that happen automatically. Although drug-users can give themselves naloxone injections after overdosing, the problem is that they’re often so incapacitated that they’re unable or […]