If you’re ever faced with trying to pick up a grain of rice with a pair of chopsticks, consider the scientists behind this latest innovation, which has been called “a medical breakthrough on the verge of becoming reality.” They meticulously constructed a soft robot capable of carrying different types of drugs through the body. It is the size of a grain of rice and can be driven to various internal targets via magnetic fields.

Researchers at the School of Mechanical and Aerospace Engineering (MAE) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU Singapore) in Singapore have built on previous work to create a grain-sized soft robot that can enter the body and is controlled by magnetic fields. They came out. a specific target. Once there, he can quickly or slowly release the medicine he has stored in his small frame.

While this type small scale biotechnology Having four compartments that can carry and release different drugs is nothing new.

“In this study, we proposed a millimeter-scale soft robot that can be actuated by alternating magnetic fields to deliver four types of drugs with reprogrammable drug delivery order and dosage,” said MAE principal investigator Assistant Professor Lum Guo Zhan. New Atlas. “This drug delivery function is unprecedented for small-scale robots because the majority of existing robots of this type can carry at most one type of drug. While rare miniature robots that can carry more than one drug exist, such robots cannot change the delivery order and dosage of these robots.” cannot carry more than three types of drugs, selectively deliver their drugs, maintain mobility, or release their drugs to more than one site.

“In comparison, our soft robot has great potential to enable advanced targeted combination therapy, where four types of drugs, each with a specific drug sequence and dosage, need to be delivered to various disease sites.”

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If this sounds somewhat like a science fiction scenario, you’re right; the team was initially inspired by the 1966 film. Fantastic JourneyWe highly recommend you watch the trailer. Here.

“The scenario in a science fiction movie is now getting closer to reality with the innovation of our laboratory,” said Lum. “Traditional drug delivery methods, such as oral administration and injection, will appear relatively inefficient compared to sending a small robot through the body to deliver the drug exactly where it is needed.”

The team has previously created a small robot, also controlled by magnets, that can ‘swim’ through openings and hold on to small objects. But the new development, which involves a small robot made of magnetic microparticles and polymer, is a major step forward in biocompatible personalized and targeted drug delivery.

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This small robot is the first of its kind to demonstrate both biocompatibility and efficacy in the controlled release of various drugs to different sites. This has the potential to be a game-changing way of delivering treatment.

Dr., a surgeon at the Department of Neurology, Faculty of Medicine. “As a doctor who performs minimally invasive procedures, we currently use a catheter and wire to pass through blood vessels to treat problems,” said Yeo Leong Litt Leonard. National University Hospital and Ng Teng Fong General Hospital, which was not involved in the research, said: “But it will not be long before this is replaced by small robots that can swim autonomously through the body and reach places we cannot reach with our vehicles. These robots can stay in place and release drugs over time, meaning the catheter or stent remains in the body for a long time.” “It would be much safer than letting it go for too long. This is a medical breakthrough that’s on the verge of happening.”

Lum, who has been working on small-scale robots for 11 years, also believes this new technology has the potential to change the face of invasive medical procedures and provide more targeted and effective treatment.

The robot, which has not yet undergone clinical testing, has so far demonstrated that it can navigate a variety of fluid viscosities that mimic the environment it would encounter in the human body. In laboratory tests, it was able to travel to four different sites at a speed between 0.30 mm and 16.5 mm per second, releasing a specific drug at each point. What’s more, engineers were able to manipulate the device to slowly release a drug over eight hours, and they believe the robot has the potential to offer both immediate and continuous drug delivery tailored to the patient’s needs.

“The roadmap to achieve this goal is to first further evaluate the performance of robots with organ-on-chip devices and eventually conduct animal experiments,” Lum added. “Perhaps we can complete this phase of the research in the next two to five years.”

The NTU research team is now considering developing smaller soft robots that could be used to breach the blood-brain barrier for tumors and also treat bladder and colorectal cancers. Once the device has completed its work, it can be safely removed from the body by directing it in the direction in which it entered.

“We aim to have our robot reverse its trajectory and exit the entry point after performing the necessary treatments,” Lum said. “Since our small-scale robot can leverage its size to non-invasively access the human body through natural openings or pinholes, it will also be able to exit through these openings.”

“In these experiments, we showed that 98.791-99.633% of anonymous human dermal fibroblast cells (ATCC) remained viable after interacting with our robot’s smart magnetic composites,” he added. “Since these viability rates were greater than 98% and similar to the viability rate of the control group, which was evaluated at 99.688%, these results show that our smart magnetic composites do not cause observable cell damage or death and are indeed very biocompatible.”

And we had to ask: Does working on this type of scientific research require both patience and steady hands? As expected, the answer is a resounding yes.

“We actually need very steady hands when building and testing these robots,” Lum said. “Because these robots are so small, we also use microscopes and high-resolution cameras to observe them during experiments. But I am very motivated by the idea that these robots have the potential to transform a wide range of treatments in the future, and my team will push the boundaries of this technology.”

The research was published in the journal Advanced Materials.

Source: Nanyang Technological University, Singapore