2023-06-30 06:30:06
What biotech innovation should we not miss this month? A medical robot-pangolin combining the advantages of softness and solidity…
Miniature soft robots might represent the future of many medical procedures. Indeed, their ability to reach hard-to-reach regions of the human body would allow caregivers to act in the least invasive way possible. Unfortunately, with strengths often come limitations. Thus, a soft robot is not supposed to accommodate solid metallic materials in its composition. Result: its functionalities are necessarily reduced. So how do you achieve robotics that are both soft and solid? The answer might lie with an animal that has become sadly famous in recent years: the pangolin…
A robot-pangolin to deliver and heat
The pangolin is the only mammal to be completely covered in scales – except for its muzzle, belly and inside of its legs. Its scales are made of keratin, just like our hair and nails. A material much harder and more rigid than the underlying fabrics. In case of danger, this pine cone on legs rolls up into a ball in a flash! To keep such freedom of movement associated with great flexibility, the animal can count on the particular organization of its scales. Unlike armadillos, crocodiles and other lizards, those of the pangolin have a superimposed structure. In other words, they overlap each other. This overlap is reflected in the length of scale exposed relative to its total length, and it varies between 50 and 80% in different pangolin species.
The inspiration of the pangolin led researchers to design a robot with a superimposed structure. Credits: MPI for Intelligent Systems.
In their article published in Nature Communications on June 20, 2023, Ren Hao Soon and his colleagues at the Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems in Stuttgart (Germany) were inspired by this surprising animal to design their own medical robot. This does not exceed 2 cm – 20 mm*10 mm*0.2 mm – and breaks down into two distinct layers. First, an aluminum part – 2.5 mm*10 mm*50 µm – equivalent to “heating scales”. Then an organo-mineral polymer (carbon and silicon), PDMS (Polydimethylsiloxane), studded with magnetic particles. It is the latter that will allow researchers to interact with their robot without a direct connection. In the presence of a low frequency magnetic field, the robot will take the shape of a sphere. An optimal configuration for transporting drugs to targeted locations. On the other hand, in a high frequency magnetic field, the aluminum scales will begin to produce heat: more than 70°C in less than 30 seconds! However, heat treatment is used in cases of thrombosis or to limit or even stop bleeding.
For the moment, the tests have been limited to ex vivo porcine tissues. But in the future, robotic medical pangolins might roam the bodies of multiple patients…
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