Category Archives: BioEngineering

Researchers at UCLA have developed an improved method to detect the presence of DNA biomarkers of disease that is compatible with use outside of a hospital or lab setting. The new technique leverages the sensors and optics of cellphones to read light produced by a new detector dye mixture that reports the presence of DNA molecules with a signal that is more than 10-times brighter.

Nucleic acids, such as DNA or RNA, are used in tests for infectious diseases, genetic disorders, cancer mutations that can be targeted by specific drugs, and fetal abnormality tests. The samples used in standard diagnostic tests typically contain only tiny amounts of a diseases related nucleic acids. To assist optical detection, clinicians amplify the number of nucleic acids making them easier to find with the fluorescent dyes.

Both the amplification and the optical detection steps have in the past required costly and bulky equipment, largely limiting their use to laboratories.

In a studypublished onlinein the journal ACS Nano, researchers from three UCLA entities the Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, the California NanoSystems Institute, and the David Geffen School of Medicine showed how to take detection out of the lab and for a fraction of the cost.

The collaborative team of researchers included lead author Janay Kong, a UCLA Ph.D. student in bioengineering; Qingshan Wei, a post-doctoral researcher in electrical engineering; Aydogan Ozcan, Chancellors Professor of Electrical Engineering and Bioengineering; Dino Di Carlo, professor of bioengineering and mechanical and aerospace engineering; andOmai Garner, assistant professor of pathology and medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

The UCLA researchers focused on the challenges with low-cost optical detection. Small changes in light emitted from molecules that associate with DNA, called intercalator dyes, are used to identify DNA amplification, but these dyes are unstable and their changes are too dim for standard cellphone camera sensors.

But the team discovered an additive that stabilized the intercalator dyes and generated a large increase in fluorescent signal above the background light level, enabling the test to be integrated with inexpensive cellphone based detection methods. The combined novel dye/cellphone reader system achieved comparable results to equipment costing tens of thousands of dollars more.

To adapt a cellphone to detect the light produced from dyes associated with amplified DNA while those samples are in standard laboratory containers, such as well plates, the team developed a cost-effective, field-portable fiber optic bundle. The fibers in the bundle routed the signal from each well in the plate to a unique location of the camera sensor area. This handheld reader is able to provide comparable results to standard benchtop readers, but at a fraction of the cost, which the authors suggest is a promising sign that the reader could be applied to other fluorescence-based diagnostic tests.

Currently nucleic acid amplification tests have issues generating a stable and high signal, which often necessitates the use of calibration dyes and samples which can be limiting for point-of-care use, Di Carlo said. The unique dye combination overcomes these issues and is able to generate a thermally stable signal, with a much higher signal to noise ratio. The DNA amplification curves we see look beautiful without any of the normalization and calibration, which is usually performed, to get to the point that we start at.

Additionally, the authors emphasized that the dye combinations discovered should be able to be used universally to detect any nucleic acid amplification, allowing for their use in a multitude of other amplification approaches and tests.

The team demonstrated the approach using a process called loop-mediated isothermal amplification, or LAMP, with DNA from lambda phage as the target molecule, as a proof of concept, and now plan to adapt the assay to complex clinical samples and nucleic acids associated with pathogens such as influenza.

The newest demonstration is part of a suite of technologies aimed at democratizing disease diagnosis developed by the UCLA team. Includinglow-cost optical readout and diagnostics based on consumer-electronic devices,microfluidic-based automationandmolecular assays leveraging DNA nanotechnology.

This interdisciplinary work was supported through a team science grant from the National Science Foundation Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation program.

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UCLA researchers make DNA detection portable, affordable using cellphones - University of California

Newswise By the time someone realizes they damaged a ligament, tendon or cartilage from too much exercise or other types of physical activity, its too late. The tissue is stretched and torn and the person is writhing in pain.

But a team of researchers led by University of Utah bioengineering professors Jeffrey Weiss and Michael Yu has discovered that damage to collagen, the main building block of all human tissue, can occur much earlier at a molecular level from too much physical stress, alerting doctors and scientists that a patient is on the path to major tissue damage and pain.

This could be especially helpful for some who want to know earlier if they are developing diseases such as arthritis or for athletes who want to know if repeated stress on their bodies is taking a toll.

The scientific value of this is high because collagen is everywhere, Yu says. When we are talking about this mechanical damage, were talking about cartilage and tendons and even heart valves that move all the time. There are so many tissues which involve collagen that can go bad mechanically. This issue is important for understanding many injuries and diseases.

The teams research, funded by the National Institutes of Health, was published this week in the latest issue of Nature Communications.

Before, scientists thought collagen which are strands of protein braided into a ropelike structure that give tissue its strength and stiffness would just stretch or slide by each other during repeated stress. They never knew if they actually got damaged. As a result, patients who put repeated stress on their body would not know if they were on the road to something worse from tough physical activity.

But now the team discovered that the collagen molecule does in fact get unraveled at a molecular level before complete failure of the tissue occurs. This type of minor damage, called subfailure damage, is associated with common injuries to connective tissues such as ligament and meniscus tears and various types of tendinitis such as tennis elbow and rotator cuff tendinopathy.

Accumulation of subfailure damage can go on for a long time with no catastrophic failure, but repeated damage results in inflammation, says Weiss, So this vicious cycle continues, the inflammation breaks down the tissue, making it more susceptible to damage, which then can result in a massive tear.

The team used a new probe called collagen hybridizing peptide (CHP), a tiny version of collagen that binds to unraveled strands of damaged collagen, to figure out where and how much damage has occurred in overloaded tendons.

This paves the way for medical researchers to use CHP probes in the future as a way of diagnosing if a person has damaged collagen and if so, how much and where, before a massive tear happens. Weiss and Yu also believe it can be used as a way to deliver drugs straight to the damaged tissue because the CHP targets only the damaged collagen. Finally, it will tell doctors even more about what happens to our bodies during repeated physical activity.

A fundamental understanding of the loads and strain that cause molecular damage has eluded us until now, says Weiss. Our findings can translate into recommendations for athletes on how to train or what rehabilitation protocols people who are injured can use.

Co-authors include researchers in the Department of Bioengineering at the University of Utah (Jared Zitnay, Yang Li, Boi Hoa San and Shawn Reese) and the Department of Civil and Environmental Engineering at Massachusetts Institute of Technology (Markus Buehler, Zhao Qin and Baptiste DePalle. The CHP probe has been commercialized by 3Helix, Inc, based in Salt Lake City, Utah.

This news release and photos may be downloaded from: http://unews.utah.edu

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Combating Wear and Tear - Newswise - Newswise (press release)

Supplied Content (Edited)

Auckland, March 20, 2017

The Auckland Bioengineering Institute (ABI) of the University of Auckland hopes to develop new international strategic partnerships and investor opportunities for medical technology (medtech).

The Institutes Strategic Partnership Specialist Dr Diana Siew said that she would focus on promoting Medtech Core and Consortium for Medical Device Technologies (CMDT), the latter founded by her with ABI Director Distinguished Professor Peter Hunter to reduce the isolation of medical technology research institutions in New Zealand.

CMDT is a partnership led of the University of Auckland with the Canterbury University, Otago University, Auckland University of Technology, Victoria University of Wellington and Callaghan Innovation.

High Achiever

ABI announced today the appointment of Dr Siew as its Strategic Partnership Specialist, stating that she has a strong innovation, research management and relationship management background in New Zealands medical technology sector.

She will continue in her role as the Co-Chair of CMDT and Associate Director of Medtech Core. She is an alumnus of the University of Auckland with a doctorate in Chemistry with several years of experience in New Zealands Medtech environment, including previous roles with Industrial Research Ltd and Callaghan Innovation.

Feedback from multinationals was that they found it hard to work in New Zealand with its large number of different research organisations in the medical health technology space. They sometimes did not know where to start to find all the people for a particular focus, Dr Siew said.

CMDT partners have developed Consortium as a national network to highlight New Zealands medtech activity and connect companies, the research industry, health providers and government stakeholders.

It is the NZ Inc front for medtech research in this country and makes it easier for multinational companies to work in New Zealand.

Trust and Transparency

Medtech Core is a translational research pipeline of new technologies for the medtech sector. ABI has created a high level of trust in the network and transparency between the partners.

Earlier this month, the CMDT partners hosted a workshop for a group of Japanese researchers, companies and funders to support a collaboration between the two countries, focused on developing new technologies for elderly care.

While working at Callaghan Innovation, Dr Siew established Standing Trial Population Centres that support fast early-stage validation studies of medical devices and digital health systems to accelerate technology development for both health and economic outcomes.

Quick validation

This platform accelerates the ability of a medtech company to get quick validation for prototypes and concepts that on which they are working. This reduces the time and expense in identifying clinical expertise and recruiting patients, she said.

It is an easy access tool for multinationals to see the four main areas where the Standing Trials Population Centres operate in technologies for elderly care, rehabilitation innovation and remote community care, and design and development for new devices.

Waikato District Health Boards Institute of Healthy Ageing and AUT are key partners to two of the Standing Trials Populations Centres.

Another initiative developed by Dr Siew for medtech is a showcase on the latest technologies available in New Zealand.

These Technology Innovation Knowledge and Interchange (TIKI) tours focus on the latest innovations for busy clinicians in health boards and other health organisations. The TIKI tours are intended to be a discussion platform between clinicians at district health boards and New Zealand health tech innovators. It is about alerting clinicians to what technologies are coming out both from industry and research institutions, so that they are aware of these for use in our health system, Dr Siew said.

*

Photo Caption:

Diana Siew

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Global partnerships brewing at bioengineering institute ... - Indian NewsLink

Researchers at UCLA have developed an improved method to detect the presence of DNA biomarkers of disease that is compatible with use outside of a hospital or lab setting. The new technique leverages the sensors and optics of cellphones to read light produced by a new detector dye mixture that reports the presence of DNA molecules with a signal that is more than 10-times brighter.

Nucleic acids, such as DNA or RNA, are used in tests for infectious diseases, genetic disorders, cancer mutations that can be targeted by specific drugs, and fetal abnormality tests. The samples used in standard diagnostic tests typically contain only tiny amounts of a diseases related nucleic acids. To assist optical detection, clinicians amplify the number of nucleic acids making them easier to find with the fluorescent dyes.

Both the amplification and the optical detection steps have in the past required costly and bulky equipment, largely limiting their use to laboratories.

In a study published onlinein the journal ACS Nano, researchers from three UCLA entities the Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science, the California NanoSystems Institute, and the David Geffen School of Medicine showed how to take detection out of the lab and for a fraction of the cost.

The collaborative team of researchers included lead author Janay Kong, a UCLA Ph.D. student in bioengineering; Qingshan Wei, a post-doctoral researcher in electrical engineering; Aydogan Ozcan, Chancellors Professor of Electrical Engineering and Bioengineering; Dino Di Carlo, professor of bioengineering and mechanical and aerospace engineering; andOmai Garner, assistant professor of pathology and medicine at the David Geffen School of Medicine at UCLA.

The UCLA researchers focused on the challenges with low-cost optical detection. Small changes in light emitted from molecules that associate with DNA, called intercalator dyes, are used to identify DNA amplification, but these dyes are unstable and their changes are too dim for standard cellphone camera sensors.

But the team discovered an additive that stabilized the intercalator dyes and generated a large increase in fluorescent signal above the background light level, enabling the test to be integrated with inexpensive cellphone based detection methods. The combined novel dye/cellphone reader system achieved comparable results to equipment costing tens of thousands of dollars more.

To adapt a cellphone to detect the light produced from dyes associated with amplified DNA while those samples are in standard laboratory containers, such as well plates, the team developed a cost-effective, field-portable fiber optic bundle. The fibers in the bundle routed the signal from each well in the plate to a unique location of the camera sensor area. This handheld reader is able to provide comparable results to standard benchtop readers, but at a fraction of the cost, which the authors suggest is a promising sign that the reader could be applied to other fluorescence-based diagnostic tests.

Currently nucleic acid amplification tests have issues generating a stable and high signal, which often necessitates the use of calibration dyes and samples which can be limiting for point-of-care use, Di Carlo said. The unique dye combination overcomes these issues and is able to generate a thermally stable signal, with a much higher signal to noise ratio. The DNA amplification curves we see look beautiful without any of the normalization and calibration, which is usually performed, to get to the point that we start at.

Additionally, the authors emphasized that the dye combinations discovered should be able to be used universally to detect any nucleic acid amplification, allowing for their use in a multitude of other amplification approaches and tests.

The team demonstrated the approach using a process called loop-mediated isothermal amplification, or LAMP, with DNA from lambda phage as the target molecule, as a proof of concept, and now plan to adapt the assay to complex clinical samples and nucleic acids associated with pathogens such as influenza.

The newest demonstration is part of a suite of technologies aimed at democratizing disease diagnosis developed by the UCLA team. Including low-cost optical readout and diagnostics based on consumer-electronic devices,microfluidic-based automation andmolecular assays leveraging DNA nanotechnology.

This interdisciplinary work was supported through a team science grant from the National Science Foundation Emerging Frontiers in Research and Innovation program.

Go here to see the original:
UCLA researchers make DNA detection portable, affordable using cellphones - UCLA Newsroom

Scanning electron micrograph (SEM) image of individual nanowires and groups of nanowires. Each wire can produce an electric current when hit by light.

A team of engineers at the University of California San Diego and La Jolla-based startup Nanovision Biosciences Inc. have developed the nanotechnology and wireless electronics for a new type of retinal prosthesis that brings research a step closer to restoring the ability of neurons in the retina to respond to light. The researchers demonstrated this response to light in a rat retina interfacing with a prototype of the device in vitro.

They detail their work in a recent issue of the Journal of Neural Engineering. The technology could help tens of millions of people worldwide suffering from neurodegenerative diseases that affect eyesight, including macular degeneration, retinitis pigmentosa and loss of vision due to diabetes.

Despite tremendous advances in the development of retinal prostheses over the past two decades, the performance of devices currently on the market to help the blind regain functional vision is still severely limited -well under the acuity threshold of 20/200 that defines legal blindness.

Read howstem cell transplants have restored vision

We want to create a new class of devices with drastically improved capabilities to help people with impaired vision, said Gabriel A. Silva, one of the senior authors of the work and professor in bioengineering and ophthalmology at UC San Diego. Silva also is one of the original founders of Nanovision.

The new prosthesis relies on two groundbreaking technologies. One consists of arrays of silicon nanowires that simultaneously sense light and electrically stimulate the retina accordingly. The nanowires give the prosthesis higher resolution than anything achieved by other devicescloser to the dense spacing of photoreceptors in the human retina. The other breakthrough is a wireless device that can transmit power and data to the nanowires over the same wireless link at record speed and energy efficiency.

One of the main differences between the researchers prototype and existing retinal prostheses is that the new system does not require a vision sensor outside of the eye to capture a visual scene and then transform it into alternating signals to sequentially stimulate retinal neurons. Instead, the silicon nanowires mimic the retinas light-sensing cones and rods to directly stimulate retinal cells. Nanowires are bundled into a grid of electrodes, directly activated by light and powered by a single wireless electrical signal. This direct and local translation of incident light into electrical stimulation makes for a much simplerand scalablearchitecture for the prosthesis.

The power provided to the nanowires from the single wireless electrical signal gives the light-activated electrodes their high sensitivity while also controlling the timing of stimulation.

To restore functional vision, it is critical that the neural interface matches the resolution and sensitivity of the human retina, said Gert Cauwenberghs, a professor of bioengineering at the Jacobs School of Engineering at UC San Diego and the papers senior author.

Wireless telemetry system

Power is delivered wirelessly, from outside the body to the implant, through an inductive powering telemetry system developed by a team led by Cauwenberghs.

The device is highly energy efficient because it minimizes energy losses in wireless power and data transmission and in the stimulation process, recycling electrostatic energy circulating within the inductive resonant tank, and between capacitance on the electrodes and the resonant tank. Up to 90 percent of the energy transmitted is actually delivered and used for stimulation, which means less RF wireless power emitting radiation in the transmission, and less heating of the surrounding tissue from dissipated power.

The telemetry system is capable of transmitting both power and data over a single pair of inductive coils, one emitting from outside the body, and another on the receiving side in the eye. The link can send and receive one bit of data for every two cycles of the 13.56 megahertz RF signal; other two-coil systems need at least 5 cycles for every bit transmitted.

Proof-of-concept test Primary cortical neurons cultured on the surface of an array of optoelectronic nanowires. Here a neuron is pulling the nanowires, indicating the the cell is doing well on this material.

For proof-of-concept, the researchers inserted the wirelessly powered nanowire array beneath a transgenic rat retina with rhodopsin P23H knock-in retinal degeneration. The degenerated retina interfaced in vitro with a microelectrode array for recording extracellular neural action potentials (electrical spikes from neural activity).

The horizontal and bipolar neurons fired action potentials preferentially when the prosthesis was exposed to a combination of light and electrical potentialand were silent when either light or electrical bias was absent, confirming the light-activated and voltage-controlled responsivity of the nanowire array.

The wireless nanowire array device is the result of a collaboration between a multidisciplinary team led by Cauwenberghs, Silva and William R. Freeman, director of the Jacobs Retina Center at UC San Diego, UC San Diego electrical engineering professor Yu-Hwa Lo and Nanovision Biosciences.

A path to clinical translationPrimary cortical neurons cultured on the surface of an array of optoelectronic nanowires. Note the extensive neurite outgrowth and network formation. Freeman, Silva and Scott Thorogood, have co-founded La Jolla-based Nanovision Biosciences, a partner in this study, to further develop and translate the technology into clinical use, with the goal of restoring functional vision in patients with severe retinal degeneration. Animal tests with the device are in progress, with clinical trials following.

We have made rapid progress with the development of the world's first nanoengineered retinal prosthesis as a result of the unique partnership we have developed with the team at UC San Diego, said Thorogood, who is the CEO of Nanovision Biosciences.

This article has been republished frommaterialsprovided byUC San Diego. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

Reference:

Ha, S., Khraiche, M., Akinin, A., Jing, Y., Damle, S., Kuang, Y., Bauchner, S., Lo, Y., Freeman, W., Silva, G. and Cauwenberghs, G. (2016). Towards high-resolution retinal prostheses with direct optical addressing and inductive telemetry. Journal of Neural Engineering, 13(5), p.056008.

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Bioengineering to Restore Sight - Technology Networks

The Eel River Recovery Project is sponsoring two events this weekend to celebrate Eel River fish, aquatic life and restoration.

On Saturday, there will be a field trip to the upper Eel River to look for spawning steelhead. On Sunday, there will be a series of presentations at the Willits Hub at 630 South Main St.

The Saturday field trip will depart from the Willits Hub at 9 a.m. and will travel to the upper Eel River, Soda Creek and Lake Pillsbury via Upper Lake. Soda Creek is the largest tributary to join the Eel River within the Potter Valley Project, and it does so just one mile downstream of Scott Dam, which forms Lake Pillsbury.

The creek is on Mendocino National Forest and the group will visit a restoration site that resulted from a cooperative effort funded by Trout Unlimited and implemented by BioEngineering Associates of Laytonville.

After touring the restoration site, the walk will go further up Soda Creek to see spawning steelhead, if they are present. Just 15 minutes from Soda Creek is the grassy plain above Lake Pillsbury for lunch and to likely see several hundred Tule elk.

On Sunday, doors will open at the Willits Hub at 9:30 a.m. for coffee, bagels and fresh fruit, and presentations will begin at 10. The event will allow people from Willits and residents of nearby areas to drop in throughout the day to listen to experts on fisheries, aquatic life and restoration in an intimate setting.

The ERRP collects data all over the Eel River basin and fisheries. Biologist Pat Higgins, ERRPs managing director, will give presentations at different times. Topics will include fall Chinook salmon, Sacramento pikeminnow dive results, basinwide temperature patterns and using aquatic insects to understand stream health.

Longtime Mendocino County fisheries biologist Park Steiner will summarize findings of his 30 years of work on the upper Eel River and provide results of recent salmon surveys within and below the Potter Valley Project and in Tomki Creek.

Dr. Mary Power is a faculty member at UC Berkeley in the Department of Integrative Biology and the faculty director of the Angelo Reserve on the upper South Fork Eel River near Branscomb. Power will talk in the late morning about UC research in the Eel River basin, which includes assisting the ERRP with toxic cyanobacteria monitoring. Her husband, UC Berkeley professor of geology Bill Dietrich, will also present a summary of findings from the National Science Foundation Critical Observatory Zone project that has been going on for several years.

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In the afternoon, two accomplished restoration practitioners will share photos that show very successful Mendocino County stream-side or riparian restoration projects. Evan Engber of BioEngineering Associates will talk about restoring river banks and stream channels using large amounts of live willow and strategic amounts of large rock, including projects within the Eel River watershed. Former watershed coordinator and retired river guide Craig Bell will follow with a slide show demonstrating riparian restoration, using bioengineering, of seven miles of the lower Garcia River, a southern Mendocino coastal river.

Also in the afternoon, film maker Shane Anderson will show a clip of A Rivers Last Chance, a movie about the Eel River he is releasing soon, and talk about his craft. There will be wild caught rock fish served for dinner from 4 to 6 p.m. to celebrate the wild Eel River and the reinvigoration of the Willits Hub. There is no charge for admission to either of the ERRP weekend events, but donations will be accepted.

More events are planned to help support crowdfunding, which continues through April 15, to raise one years rent for the Willits Hub building. Several Willits based groups will be located there, and the ERRP also intends to establish an office. Follow ERRP on Facebook, or go to eelriverrecovery.org for agenda details and to learn about other activities. Donate at everribbon.com/ribbon/view/64018. For more information, call Robin at (707) 459-0155.

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Willits goes wild for Eel River fish and aquatic life - The Willits News