• Biomaterial Could Let Doctors 'Sculpt' Delicate Facial Features
    20 replies, posted
[QUOTE]A new biomaterial may help surgeons rebuild the delicate soft structures of the human face, like the cheeks, after a disease or injury has caused disfigurement. The material, which is half synthetic and half biological, can be injected under the skin as a liquid, massaged into shape, and then permanently "locked" by exposure to light.Soft tissues are hard to replace, especially in the face. "We have metals and plastics for your bone," says [URL="http://www.bme.jhu.edu/people/primary.php?id=386"]Jennifer Elisseeff[/URL], a [URL="http://www.technologyreview.com/tr35/profile.aspx?TRID=250"]TR35[/URL] winner in 2002 and one of the researchers on a paper published in [I]Science Translational Medicine [/I]that describes the work. But surgeons lack good replacements for things like cheeks and lips—and even slight deformities can lead to severe social and emotional problems for patients. Existing implants are often insufficient for reconstructing larger defects, such as those left behind by tumor excisions or extreme trauma. [URL="http://web1.johnshopkins.edu/JLAB/spip.php?article103"]Alexander Hillel[/URL] and his colleagues at Johns Hopkins University have created a new type of transplant material that addresses these problems. It's a blend of hyaluronic acid—a biological material already used as a soft-tissue implant—and polyethylene glycol, a synthetic material. The blend is a liquid polymer that can be injected—thus avoiding the need for surgery. Once injected, the material can be sculpted into the necessary shape. When exposed to light of specific wavelengths, the messy tangle of polymer chains in the liquid implant rearrange into a stable, crosshatched form, stiffening the implant. The fact that the LED uses visible light to set the implant is important, says [URL="http://fds.duke.edu/db/pratt/BME/guilak"]Farshid Guilak[/URL], a professor of orthopedic surgery and biomedical engineering at Duke University: "Visible light is much safer than UV light, which can have a number of adverse effects, primarily DNA damage and cell death." [URL="http://www.tissueeng.net/lab/peopleDetail.php?id=16"]Ali Khademhosseini[/URL], an associate professor at Harvard-MIT's Division of Health Sciences and Technology, says the new material shows great promise. "To my knowledge, this is the furthest that such an approach has been taken, as the paper has extensive animal studies as well as pilot human studies," he says. To set the implants, the researchers devised a green-light LED array that can penetrate up to four millimeters of skin. It only takes two minutes of exposure before the implant fully sets, and there were no painful side effects.[/QUOTE] [url]http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/38150/page1/[/url] Fuck yeah science[URL="http://www.technologyreview.com/biomedicine/38150/page1/"][/URL]
Thats... well that's actually quite brilliant, really.
This plus skin grafts and you could pretty much rebuild someone's face.
Sad that people will use this because they think they're ugly, when they're not. For burn, or fall victims though, this is very good.
I wonder if it can be applied to robots.
[QUOTE=Rubs10;31390372]I wonder if it can be applied to robots.[/QUOTE] Please, no.
[QUOTE=Rubs10;31390372]I wonder if it can be applied to robots.[/QUOTE]Don't give Japan ideas.
[QUOTE=Nerts;31390385]Don't give Japan ideas.[/QUOTE] Great, sex robots that actually [B]LOOK[/B] like the real deal. But they'd still move like a damn retard and creep everyone out, except the incredibly horny people.
[QUOTE=Van-man;31390488]Great, sex robots that actually [B]LOOK[/B] like the real deal. But they'd still move like a damn retard and creep everyone out, except the incredibly horny people.[/QUOTE] that's what makes it interesting
Oh man. Cher will just eat this up.
Finally Sheploo can heal his fucked-up face without having to spent 30,000 Palladium on a bloody medical upgrade station built excusively to heal his fucked-up face.
Good. Now make me handsome.
[img]http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100213004316/bioshock/images/thumb/7/7e/Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png/830px-Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png[/img] Anyone?
[QUOTE=FPSMango;31392415][img]http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100213004316/bioshock/images/thumb/7/7e/Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png/830px-Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png[/img] Anyone?[/QUOTE] [I]"But that was then, when we took what we got, but with ADAM... the flesh becomes clay. What excuse do we have not to sculpt, and sculpt, and sculpt, until the job is done?"[/I]
Science is awesome. Few things can be worse than a disfigured face, and a way to treat that is always great. Though, I can also see stars gone crazy with cosmetic surgeries once this material becomes commonly used...
This is good because people with permanent facial injuries wont be required to have a dead person's face transplanted onto their bodies and be forced to take drugs to prevent organ rejection
The training program will be ZBrush with a tablet.
[QUOTE=FPSMango;31392415][img]http://images2.wikia.nocookie.net/__cb20100213004316/bioshock/images/thumb/7/7e/Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png/830px-Stienman%27s_Mistakes.png[/img] Anyone?[/QUOTE] if i ever become a plastic surgeon i'm going to change my last name to steinman to freak out my nerdy patients
Why draw a penis on someone's forehead when they're asleep when we have this?
[QUOTE=Nikota;31391466]Oh man. Cher will just eat this up.[/QUOTE] I still think that Cher is a position, not an actual person. When one Cher is bested in entertainment combat, they upgrade the next person to Cher status. Sort of like the Grey Fox.
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