Nanotechnology  

A new simple tool developed by nanoengineers is opening the door to an era when anyone will be able to build sensors, anywhere, including physicians in the clinic, patients in their home and soldiers in the field. They filled off-the-shelf ballpoint pens with special inks and were able to draw sensors to measure glucose directly on the skin and sensors to measure pollution on leaves.

Using a new simple tool, nanoengineers at the University of California, San Diego, are opening the door to an era when anyone will be able to build sensors, anywhere, including physicians in the clinic, patients in their home and soldiers in the field. The team from the UCSD, developed high-tech bio-inks that react with several chemicals, including glucose. They filled off-the-shelf ballpoint pens with the inks and were able to draw sensors to measure glucose directly on the skin and sensors to measure pollution on leaves.

Skin and leaves aren't the only media on which the pens could be used. Researchers envision sensors drawn directly on smart phones for personalized and inexpensive health monitoring or on external building walls for monitoring of toxic gas pollutants. The sensors also could be used on the battlefield to detect explosives and nerve agents.

The team, led by Joseph Wang, the chairman of the Department of NanoEngineering at the University of California, San Diego, published their findings in Advanced Healthcare Materials. Wang also directs the Center for Wearable Sensors at UC San Diego.

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"Our new biocatalytic pen technology, based on novel enzymatic inks, holds considerable promise for a broad range of applications on site and in the field," Wang said.

The biggest challenge the researchers faced was making inks from chemicals and biochemicals that aren't harmful to humans or plants; could function as the sensors' electrodes; and retain their properties over long periods in storage and in various conditions. Researchers turned to biocompatible polyethylene glycol, which is used in several drug delivery applications, as a binder. To make the inks conductive to electric current they used graphite powder. They also added chitosan, an antibacterial agent which is used in bandages to reduce bleeding, to make sure the ink adhered to any surfaces it was used on. The inks' recipe also includes xylitol, a sugar substitute, which helps stabilize enzymes that react with several chemicals the do-it-yourself sensors are designed to monitor.

"Our new biocatalytic pen technology, based on novel enzymatic inks, holds considerable promise for a broad range of applications on site and in the field."

Wang's team has been investigating how to make glucose testing for diabetics easier for several years. The same team of engineers recently developed non-invasive glucose sensors in the form of temporary tattoos. In this study, they used pens, loaded with an ink that reacts to glucose, to draw reusable glucose-measuring sensors on a pattern printed on a transparent, flexible material which includes an electrode. Researchers then pricked a subject's finger and put the blood sample on the sensor. The enzymatic ink reacted with glucose and the electrode recorded the measurement, which was transmitted to a glucose-measuring device. Researchers then wiped the pattern clean and drew on it again to take another measurement after the subject had eaten.

Researchers estimate that one pen contains enough ink to draw the equivalent of 500 high-fidelity glucose sensor strips. Nanoengineers also demonstrated that the sensors could be drawn directly on the skin and that they could communicate with a Bluetooth-enabled electronic device that controls electrodes called a potentiostat, to gather data.

The pens would also allow users to draw sensors that detect pollutants and potentially harmful chemicals sensors on the spot. Researchers demonstrated that this was possible by drawing a sensor on a leaf with an ink loaded with enzymes that react with phenol, an industrial chemical, which can also be found in cosmetics, including sunscreen. The leaf was then dipped in a solution of water and phenol and the sensor was connected to a pollution detector. The sensors could be modified to react with many pollutants, including heavy metals or pesticides.

Next steps include connecting the sensors wirelessly to monitoring devices and investigating how the sensors perform in difficult conditions, including extreme temperatures, varying humidity and extended exposure to sunlight.




SOURCE  UCSD via EurekAlert

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 Aging  

Craig Venter, Peter Diamandis and Robert Hariri have teamed up to form a new company to fight aging. Human Longevity Inc. announced plans to sequence 40,000 human genomes in year to better understand age-related diseases like cancer and dementia.

Craig Venter, is now on a quest to conquor age-related disease.  The well-known scientist behind the successful completion of the Human Genome Project and the team leader of a project to create a custom-made lifeform has started a new venture, Human Longevity Inc.

Venter has teamed up with stem cell pioneer Dr. Robert Hariri and X Prize Foundation founder Dr. Peter Diamandis to form the company. Human Longevity Inc will use both genomics and stem cell therapies to find treatments that allow aging adults to stay healthy and functional for as long as possible.

"I haven't been a skeptic, but I have been one of the people complaining that too little has happened after the human genome was sequenced," Venter told National Geographic.

"We're hoping to make numerous new discoveries in preventive medicine. We think this will have a huge impact on changing the cost of medicine," Venter said on a conference call announcing his latest venture.

Fighting aging is increasingly becoming a scientific and business rallying point; Venter's transition into longevity follows the formation in September of Google-backed biotechnology company Calico.

Robert Hariri, J. Craig Venter, and Peter Diamandis (right to left)
Image Source -Brett Shipe/Science

The company, which will be based in San Diego-based already has $70 million in private backing and has already purchased two ultrafast HiSeq X Ten gene sequencing systems from Illumina Inc, a leading manufacturer of DNA sequencing machines, with the option to buy three more.

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The company plans to use that technology to map 40,000 human genomes in a push to build the world's largest database of human genetic variation. The database will include sequences from the very young through the very old, both diseased and healthy. 40,000 is the calculated number the two gene sequencing machines can complete in a year.

"This will be one of the largest data studies in the history of science and medicine," Venter told the conference call.

Along with gathering whole genome data, the company will collect genetic data on the trillions of microbes - including bacteria, viruses and fungi - living in and on humans.

By better understanding the microbiomes in the gut, in the mouth, on the skin and other sites on the body, the company said it hopes to develop better probiotics as well as better diagnostics and drugs to improve health and wellness.

The company's initial treatment targets will be some of the toughest age-related diseases: cancer, diabetes and obesity, heart and liver diseases, and dementia.

Venter said the company will start first with cancer. It has teamed up with the Moores Cancer Center at the University of California, San Diego, with the goal of sequencing the genomes of everyone who comes there for treatment, as well as doing a full genome sequence on their tumors.

"Cancer is one of the most actionable areas right now with genomic-based therapies," Venter said, adding that cancer is "just the first of a multitude of diseases we will be sequencing this year."

"Undoubtedly, important biologic discoveries will be made along the way, but it remains unclear whether such efforts like Human Longevity Inc and Calico can influence longevity," Dr. Eric Topol, Scripps Health chief academic officer and director of the Scripps Translational Science Institute said.

In addition to UCSD, the company has established strategic collaborations with privately held Metabolon Inc of North Carolina, a company that focuses on biochemical profiling, as well as his own J. Craig Venter Institute, a nonprofit genomics research institute.



SOURCE  Reuters

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