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Human Body Version 2.0
through our personal wireless local area network, and send
the rest of the food we eat on its way to be passed through for
elimination.
If this seems futuristic, keep in mind that intelligent machines
are already making their way into our blood stream. There
are dozens of projects underway to create blood-stream-based
biological microelectromechanical systems (bioMEMS)
with a wide range of diagnostic and therapeutic applications.
BioMEMS devices are being designed to intelligently scout
out pathogens and deliver medications in very precise ways.
For example, a researcher at the University of Illinois at
Chicago has created a tiny capsule with pores measuring only
seven nanometers. The pores let insulin out in a controlled
manner but prevent antibodies from invading the pancreatic
Islet cells inside the capsule. [1] These nanoengineered devices
have cured rats with type I diabetes, and there is no reason
that the same methodology would fail to work in humans.
Similar systems could precisely deliver dopamine to the brain
for Parkinsons patients, provide blood-clotting factors for
patients with hemophilia, and deliver cancer drugs directly to
tumor sites. A new design provides up to 20 substance-con-
taining reservoirs that can release their cargo at programmed
times and locations in the body.
Kensall Wise, a professor of electrical engineering at the
University of Michigan, has developed a tiny neural probe
that can provide precise monitoring of the electrical activity
of patients with neural diseases. Future designs are expected
to also deliver drugs to precise locations in the brain. Kazushi
Ishiyama at Tohoku University in Japan has developed micro-
machines that use microscopic-sized spinning screws to deliver
drugs to small cancer tumors. [2]
A particularly innovative micromachine developed by
Sandia National Labs has actual microteeth with a jaw that
opens and closes to trap individual cells and then implant