Category Biology/Biotechnology

Erhan Genc investigates how intelligence is reflected in brain structures. Credit: RUB, Kramer

The more intelligent a person, the fewer connections there are between the neurons in his or her cerebral cortex. This is the result of a study conducted by neuroscientists working with Dr Erhan Genç and Christoph Fraenz at Ruhr-Universität Bochum; the study was performed using a specific neuroimaging technique that provides insights into the wiring of the brain on a microstructural level...

This is a photomicrograph of tissue that has grown into the stroke cavity in the stroke-healing gel. The red tubes are blood vessels. They are growing into the site of the stroke in the center of the image. The green filaments are axons. These grow along the blood vessels as they enter the gel and infarct area. The blue ovoids are cell nuclei in the tissue. Credit: UCLA Health

In a first-of-its-kind finding, a new stroke-healing gel helped regrow neurons and blood vessels in mice with stroke-damaged brains, researchers report. “We tested this in laboratory mice to determine if it would repair the brain in a model of stroke, and lead to recovery,” said Dr. S. Thomas Carmichael, Professor and Chair of neurology at UCLA...

The 3D bioprinter designed by Khademhosseini has two key components: a custom-built microfluidic chip (pictured) and a digital micromirror. Credit: Amir Miri

Device could help advance regenerative medicine. A UCLA Samueli-led team has developed a specially adapted 3D printer to build therapeutic biomaterials from multiple materials. The advance could be a step toward on-demand printing of complex artificial tissues for use in transplants and other surgeries. “Tissues are wonderfully complex structures, so to engineer artificial versions of them that function properly, we have to recreate their complexity,” said Ali Khademhosseini, who led the study and is UCLA’s Levi James Knight, Jr., Professor of Engineering at the UCLA Samueli School of Engineering...

A digital clock continues to run as damaged circuits instantaneously heal themselves, rerouting electrical signals without interruption. Credit: Nature Materials

Many natural organisms have the ability to repair themselves. Now, manufactured machines will be able to mimic this property. In findings published this week in Nature Materials, researchers at Carnegie Mellon University have created a self-healing material that spontaneously repairs itself under extreme mechanical damage.

This soft-matter composite material is composed of liquid metal droplets suspended in a soft elastomer. When damaged, the droplets rupture to form new connections with neighboring droplets and reroute electrical signals without interruption...