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Mosquitoes can teach us about injection techniques

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Written by Thomas Hesselberg
Sunday, 28 September 2008
A new study shows that mosquitoes can provide important inspiration for the development of painless medical micro-needles. Photo courtesy of photocase.com. Engineers from the North Carolina State University in the US have investigated the anatomy and behaviour of biting mosquitoes and modelled how the thin hollow tube, with which the mosquitoes bite, avoids buckling. Their results have implications for the development of micro-needles for medical purposes Although all animal life forms deserve respect and the right to exist in their natural niche, there are some animals harmful to man, you sometimes would wish did not exist. Mosquitoes are one of these animals. The species Aedes egypti, for instance, is a carrier of several diseases harmful to man such as Dengue fever and malaria, the latter diseases kills more than a million humans annually. However, a new study shows that perhaps we can also make use of Aedes egypti for something positive. The anatomy and the method by which the mosquito injects it proboscis (a long hollow tube which it uses to such up the blood with) could provide useful inspiration for the development of biomimetic micro-needles. Tag it: ? Be first to comment this article \| Add as favourites (0) \| Quote this article on your site \| Views: 43 \| E-mail
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DNA as building blocks in nanotechnology

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Written by Thomas Hesselberg
Friday, 14 December 2007
Complex nanostructures can be built from solutions containing nucleic acids. Photo courtesy of photocase.com In the last few years, development in nanotechnology has enabled us almost literally to construct new molecules by using individual atoms as building blocks in an �atom by atom� approach. This opens up a unique opportunity for designing completely new chemical and material products with a high degree of control of the emergent functional properties. Biological molecules are especially attractive for the nanoscientists as building blocks due to their spatial complexity, their self-assembling properties and the many diverse ways in which biological molecules can be assembled. In a new paper, scientists from the Russian Academy of Science show that the most promising building blocks are the nucleic acids found for instance in DNA. Their superior properties include their difference in length from a few nucleotides to chains several of micrometres long, the ability of the nitrogen bases to chemically react with a long host of other compounds and of course the ability of strands of nucleic acids to bond with other strands of nucleic acids to form complex three-dimensional structures. Tag it: ? Be first to comment this article \| Add as favourites (23) \| Quote this article on your site \| Views: 317 \| E-mail
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Iridescent nanostructures: Letting cells do the work

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Written by Thomas Hesselberg
Thursday, 28 June 2007
A Morpho butterfly, with the characteristic blue iridescent colour. Courtesy of Photocase.com. Nature often creates more complicated structures using less energy than we can with our technology. Engineers and biologists, therefore, work together in the field of biomimetics and use inspiration from nature to develop new technology. One promising area is the development of small nano-crystals to give surfaces an iridescent and/or a metallic look. Such visual effects are found in many birds, fishes and insects and are used to attract mates or startle predators. These effects have applications in a wide range of areas including the counterfeiting industry, in cosmetics and in paints. Traditionally biomimetic photonic crystals have been made by focused ion beam chemical vapour depositions. A method that relies on powerful ion beams to irradiate vapour free nitrogen radicals and other compounds at high temperatures onto a surface and thereby slowly building up the structure. This method, however, is very costly and thus only commercially relevant for production of very expensive nanostructures... Tag it: ? Be first to comment this article \| Add as favourites (24) \| Quote this article on your site \| Views: 430 \| E-mail
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