Staring at the Sun

 

 

Staring at the Sun by ZoranPhoto

Unlocking the creation of wearable electronic devices

 

Mon, 05/11/2015 - 11:58am University of Exeter Exeter scientists have been involved in ground-breaking research to create the world’s first truly electronic textile.An international team of scientists, including Prof. Monica Craciun from the Univ. of Exeter, have pioneered a new technique to embed transparent, flexible graphene electrodes into fibers commonly associated with the textile industry. The discovery could revolutionize the creation of wearable electronic devices, such as clothing containing computers, phones and MP3 players, which are lightweight, durable and easily transportable. The international collaborative research, which includes experts from the Centre for Graphene Science at the Univ. of Exeter, the Institute for Systems Engineering and Computers, Microsystems and Nanotechnology (INESC-MN) in Lisbon, the Univs. of Lisbon and Aveiro in Portugal and the Belgian Textile Research Centre (CenTexBel), is published in Scientific Reports. Prof. Craciun, co-author of the research said: “This is a pivotal point in the future of wearable electronic devices. The potential has been there for a number of years, and transparent and flexible electrodes are already widely used in plastics and glass, for example. But this is the first example of a textile electrode being truly embedded in a yarn. The possibilities for its use are endless, including textile GPS systems, to biomedical monitoring, personal security or even communication tools for those who are sensory impaired. The only limits are really within our own imagination.” At just one atom thick, graphene is the thinnest substance capable of conducting electricity. It is very flexible and is one of the strongest known materials. The race has been on for scientists and engineers to adapt graphene for the use in wearable electronic devices in recent years. This new research has identified that “monolayer graphene”, which has exceptional electrical, mechanical and optical properties, make it a highly attractive proposition as a transparent electrode for applications in wearable electronics. In this work graphene was created by a growth method called chemical vapor deposition (CVD) onto copper foil, using a state-of-the-art nanoCVD system recently developed by Moorfield. The collaborative team established a technique to transfer graphene from the copper foils to a polypropylene fiber already commonly used in the textile industry. Dr. Helena Alves who led the research team from INESC-MN and the Univ. of Aveiro said: “The concept of wearable technology is emerging, but so far having fully textile-embedded transparent and flexible technology is currently non-existing. Therefore, the development of processes and engineering for the integration of graphene in textiles would give rise to a new universe of commercial applications. “ Dr. Ana Neves, Associate Research Fellow in Prof Craciun’s team from Exeter’s Engineering Dept. and former postdoctoral researcher at INESC added: “We are surrounded by fabrics, the carpet floors in our homes or offices, the seats in our cars, and obviously all our garments and clothing accessories. The incorporation of electronic devices on fabrics would certainly be a game-changer in modern technology.” “All electronic devices need wiring, so the first issue to be address in this strategy is the development of conducting textile fibers while keeping the same aspect, comfort and lightness. The methodology that we have developed to prepare transparent and conductive textile fibers by coating them with graphene will now open way to the integration of electronic devices on these textile fibers.” Dr. Isabel De Schrijver, an expert of smart textiles from CenTexBel said: “Successful manufacturing of wearable electronics has the potential for a disruptive technology with a wide array of potential new applications. We are very excited about the potential of this breakthrough and look forward to seeing where it can take the electronics industry in the future.” Prof. Saverio Russo, co-author and also from the Univ. of Exeter, added: “This breakthrough will also nurture the birth of novel and transformative research directions benefitting a wide range of sectors ranging from defense to health care. “ In 2012 Professor Craciun and Professor Russo, from the Univ. of Exeter’s Centre for Graphene Science, discovered GraphExeter—sandwiched molecules of ferric chloride between two graphene layers which makes a whole new system that is the best known transparent material able to conduct electricity. The same team recently discovered that GraphExeter is also more stable than many transparent conductors commonly used by, for example, the display industry. Source: Univ. of Exeter

Out with heavy metal

 

Mon, 05/11/2015 - 11:29am

Dawn Zimmerman, Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Researchers have demonstrated a new process for the expanded use of lightweight aluminum in cars and trucks at the speed, scale, quality and consistency required by the auto industry. The process reduces production time and costs while yielding strong and lightweight parts, for example delivering a car door that is 62% lighter and 25% cheaper than that produced with today's manufacturing methods.

In partnership with General Motors, Alcoa and TWB Company LLC, researchers from the U.S. Dept. of Energy (DOE)'s Pacific Northwest National Laboratory have transformed a joining technique called friction stir welding, or FSW. The technique now can be used to join aluminum sheets of varying thicknesses, which is key to producing auto parts that are light yet retain strength where it's most needed. The PNNL-developed process also is ten times faster than current FSW techniques, representing production speeds that, for the first time, meet high-volume assembly requirements. The advancement is reported in the May issue of the Journal of Materials.

"We looked at the barriers preventing the use of more lightweight alloys in cars, picked what we felt was a top challenge, and then formulated a team that represented the entire supply chain to tackle it," said Yuri Hovanski, the program manager at PNNL and lead author. "The result is a proven process that overcomes the speed, scale and quality limitations of FSW that previously were showstoppers for the auto industry."

The two-phase, six-year project is funded by the DOE's Office of Energy Efficiency and Renewable Energy with in-kind partner contributions from each of the participating companies.

Aluminum can't take the heat
To create door frames, hoods and other auto parts, sheets of metal are welded together end-to-end into a "tailor-welded blank" which is then cut into appropriate sizes before being stamped into the final shape. This process allows a high degree of customization. For example, a thicker gauge of metal can be used on one side of a car part, where extra strength is needed, joined via a weld to a thinner gauge on the side where it's not.

Conventional laser welding works great to join varying thicknesses of steel, but can be problematic when applied to aluminum due to the reactivity of molten aluminum to air. Instead, manufacturers today must create several components from single sheets that are then riveted together after being stamped, resulting in additional production steps and more parts that drive up cost and weight.

"Reducing the weight of a vehicle by 10% can decrease fuel consumption by 6%-8%, so the auto industry is very interested in a welding technique such as FSW that is aluminum friendly," Hovanski said.

Mixed, not melted
A friction-stir welding machine looks and acts like a cross between a drill press and a sewing machine. Lowered onto two metal sheets sitting side-by-side, the "drill bit," or in this case pin tool, spins against both edges. As it travels along, the pin creates friction that heats, mixes and joins the alloys without melting them. By auto industry production standards, however, the process was too slow—just one-half meter welded per minute—which is why the technique has been used only in niche applications, if at all.

Supply chain success
Hovanski and colleagues at PNNL initially compared several joining techniques before selecting FSW, which was the only one to pass all of GM's rigorous weld quality specifications. Researchers then conducted a comprehensive series of lab-scale welding tests on aluminum sheets provided by Alcoa.

In all, dozens of unique tool designs with varying shapes, lengths and diameters of the pin were created. These were assessed against a variety of weld parameters, such as the depth, rotation speed and angle of the tool. Through statistical analysis, the team identified the optimal combination of tool specification and weld parameters that could consistently withstand high-speed production demands.

"What we discovered was a win-win," Hovanski said. "The faster the weld, the better the quality and strength of the join, thus the significant increase in speed."

PNNL provided the weld and tool specifications to TWB Company and GM. TWB Company then independently welded, formed and analyzed more than 100 aluminum blanks in close coordination with GM, making them the first qualified supplier of aluminum tailor-welded blanks. GM subsequently stamped their first full-sized inner door panel supplied by TWB Company—free of imperfections—from aluminum sheets in varying thicknesses.

Today, TWB Company has a dedicated FSW machine at their production facility in Monroe, MI, built around PNNL's process that is capable of producing up to 250,000 parts per year. "TWB can now provide aluminum tailor welds not only to GM, but the entire automotive industry," said Blair Carlson, a group manager at GM who con-conceptualized the project.

Next up
With over two years of funding left, the team continues to collaborate, with a focus on even faster weld speeds and the ability to maneuver around the contours and corners of complex aluminum parts, for which laser welding is not commercially feasible. The team also is modifying FSW to join different alloys, such as automotive-grade aluminum alloys with light, ultra-high strength alloys currently reserved for aerospace applications.

"Going forward, we see this process, and future versions of it, enabling completely novel combinations of materials that will revolutionize material use in the auto industry," Hovanski said.

Source: Pacific Northwest National Laboratory

Too much vitamin C: Is it harmful?

 

Answers from Katherine Zeratsky, R.D., L.D. Vitamin C (ascorbic acid) is an essential nutrient. Still, it's possible to have too much vitamin C. Vitamin C is a water-soluble vitamin that supports normal growth and development. Vitamin C also helps your body absorb iron. Because your body doesn't produce or store vitamin C, it's important to include vitamin C in your diet. For most people, a large orange or a cup of strawberries, chopped red pepper or broccoli provide enough vitamin C for the day. Any extra vitamin C will simply be flushed out of your body in your urine. For adults, the recommended dietary reference intake for vitamin C is 65 to 90 milligrams (mg) a day, and the upper limit is 2,000 mg a day. Although too much dietary vitamin C is unlikely to be harmful, megadoses of vitamin C supplements may cause: Diarrhea Nausea Vomiting Heartburn Abdominal bloating and cramps Headache Insomnia Kidney stones Remember, for most people, a healthy diet provides an adequate amount of vitamin C. Feb. 05, 2015 References Vitamin C (ascorbic acid). Natural Medicines Comprehensive Database. http://www.naturaldatabase.com. Accessed Dec. 29, 2014. Pazirandeh S, et al. Overview of water-soluble vitamins. http://www.uptodate.com/home. Accessed Dec. 29, 2014. Vitamin C. Office of Dietary Supplements. http://ods.od.nih.gov/factsheets/VitaminC-HealthProfessional. Accessed Dec. 29, 2014. See more Expert Answers

Crossroads and Cityscapes Photography

 

 

Très inspiré par la diversité visuelle que peuvent offrir les villes du monde, Luigi Visconti photographie des carrefours fréquentés, des ensembles architecturaux ou des intérieurs vides. Que ce soit à Cuba, Miami ou Soho, le photographe livre de magnifiques clichés où l’on percevrait presque le bruit des moteurs aux heures de pointe ou le calme d’une ville endormie.

NASA introduces traffic control for crowded Mars

 

Relative shapes and distances from Mars for five active orbiter mission (Source: (Image: NASA)) Space may be big, but in our neck of the woods it's getting crowded. There are thousands of active and inactive satellites in orbit around Earth, and while Mars may not exactly be Piccadilly Circus, it now has five active satellites circling it. To prevent any unfortunate collisions around the Red Planet, NASA is working on a new traffic management system. With the arrival of NASA's Mars Atmosphere and Volatile Evolution (MAVEN) and India's Mars Orbiter Mission, Mars is becoming a busy interplanetary destination. In addition to the five active satellites, there's also the inactive NASA Mars Global Surveyor, plus a couple of natural moons, so the traffic situation is already becoming a bit tricky. According to NASA, this isn't simply a matter of extreme playing safe. The spacecraft circling Mars aren't just in the same neighborhood, they're also in similar intersecting orbits. The problem may be less complex than keeping thousands of Earth satellites out of one another's way, but it's also trickier when you consider that traffic control is hundreds of millions of miles from the task at hand. It's also more than an abstract concern. NASA says that on January 3, there were worries that within two weeks the MAVEN and Mars Reconnaissance Orbiter (MRO) would pass within two miles (3 km) of one another. Later calculations indicated that this would not occur, but it highlights part of the problem. Earth satellites can be precisely tracked, but the ones around Mars are tracked using calculations and NASA's Deep Space Network (DSN). This allows for some very accurate work ups, but when dealing with future orbits involving five satellites, there is an element of uncertainty. This means that in future the Mars orbiters need much closer tracking, which is part of DSN's job, and which NASA's new traffic management system will be able to fine tune. "It's a monitoring function to anticipate when traffic will get heavy," says Joseph Guinn, manager of Jet Propulsion Laboratory's Mission Design and Navigation Section. "When two spacecraft are predicted to come too close to one another, we give people a heads-up in advance so the project teams can start coordinating about whether any maneuvers are needed." The idea is to maintain a close watch on the existing Mars orbiters and develop methods for expanding the system as more spacecraft arrive. This collision avoidance is part of NASA's Multi-Mission Automated Deep-Space Conjunction Assessment Process, and will allow the space agency to determine whether any future risks exist far enough in advance to communicate what may happen and for new command codes to be written and transmitted for correction maneuvers. NASA says that this improvement in traffic management will not only cut down on the danger of collisions, but also allow Mars orbiters to act more closely together to jointly study Martian phenomena. Source: NASA

Optogenetic therapy shows promise for reversing acquired blindness

 

A new optogenetic therapeutic approach shows significantly more promise in returning complete sight damaged by degenerative conditions (Image: Shutterstock) Across the world many millions of people suffer from inherited conditions that progressively degenerate the light-sensing cells in their eyes, and eventually send them blind. Recently, however, researchers from the University of Bern and the University of Gottingen have developed a way to possibly reverse this damage by using a newly-developed, light-sensitive protein embedded into other cells in the retina to restore vision. Retinitis pigmentosa, age-related macular degeneration, and diabetic retinopathy are all conditions that progressively, but effectively, destroy light-sensing cells in the eye. Past treatments have attempted to reduce or stop these diseases before they progressed to full blindness using pharmaceutical methods, gene replacement therapy, or both. The results, however, have been mixed, as the treatments do little to actually fully restore sight due to a lack of low-level light sensitivity and physiological rejection. The new optogenetic therapeutic approach shows significantly more promise in returning complete sight as it implants light-sensing proteins into the remaining, deep-seated retinal cells, effectively changing them into photoreceptors and restoring vision. And, unlike earlier optogenetic therapies, it does not require abnormally high – and possibly damaging – light intensities to work. In detail, the researchers utilized the light-sensing protein, Opto-mGluR6, a chimeric protein (that is, one made up from different sources with functional properties derived from each of the original proteins) consisting of two retinal proteins that are not only physiologically compatible and unlikely to be rejected by the immune system, but are also much more resistant to bleaching and light attenuation often found in other photoreceptor proteins. By inserting this protein in the cells deeper in the retina and in the same enzymatic pathway of the original photoreceptor cells, the researchers claim to have effectively restored daylight vision to mice suffering from retinitis pigmentosa. This, the researchers further assert, has resulted in the mice having high-light sensitivity and a fast (that is, normal) transmission response restored. "We were asking the question, 'Can we design light-activatable proteins that gate specific signaling pathways in specific cells?'," said Dr. Sonja Kleinlogel of the University of Bern. "In other words, can the natural signalling pathways of the target cells be retained and just modified in a way to be turned on by light instead of a neurotransmitter released from a preceding neuron?" In incorporating the remaining cells at the upper portion of the eye’s visual detection system – as close as possible to where the photoreceptors were – the new photoreceptor proteins are able to maximize the light received by the retina. In other words, whilst the photoreceptors may not be fully replaced with original ones, those that are created are, at least, in the best position to simulate the original functionality. "The major improvement of the new approach is that patients will be able to see under normal daylight conditions without the need for light intensifiers or image converter goggles," said Dr. Kleinlogel. "And retaining the integrity of the intracellular enzymatic cascade through which native mGluR6 acts ensures consistency of the visual signal, as the enzymatic cascade is intricately modulated at multiple levels". The research was recently detailed in the journal PLOS Biology. Source: University of Bern via Eureka Alert

Organic ion transistor blocks pain signals from reaching the brain

 

Researchers have developed an organic ion transistor that effectively blocks pain signals from reaching the brains of rats (Image: iStockphoto/Fanny Ståhl)   A new type of medical device could one day put the minds of chronic pain sufferers at ease by distributing the body's own natural pain relief signals at just the right time. Developed at Linköping University in Sweden, the tiny "ion pump" is made from organic electronics and could be implanted in patients, serving to cut off pain signals in the spinal chord before they make their way to the brain. Similar to the way a pacemaker delivers electric pulses to correct an abnormal heartbeat, the ion pump would send out neurotransmitters to prevent pain signals reaching the brain. The difference is that instead of using electrodes to send pure electrical signals, the device is built with biologically compatible materials and sends chemical signals that better integrate with our internal systems – like a kind of chemical transistor. The idea is that the device stimulates the body's pain alleviators to intervene as pain signals travel through the spinal chord to the brain. The researchers put the pump to work in conscious, freely moving rats. It was engineered to send out the pain relieving neurotransmitter γ-aminobutyric acid (GABA) to four separate locations where damaged nerves meet the spinal cord. It was found to successfully block pain signals from reaching the brain and had zero side effects. "What’s unique is that we’re using organic electronics to send the body’s own chemical signals," says Daniel Simon, Assistant Professor at Linköping. "The organic materials are easily accepted by the body, and they communicate just as in biology, with charged ions." The team says the device could find its way into clinics in the next five to ten years and could even be used to push substances to other parts of the body, such as the brain, for treating conditions like Parkinson's or epilepsy. The research was published in the journal Science Advances.   Source: Linköping University

Black and White photography with an iPhone

 

Jason Peterson est un photographe américain très actif sur Instagram. Sa particularité est de photographier les villes de New York et de Chicago en noir et blanc et ce à l’aide de son iPhone. Les clichés ont la même force que s’ils étaient réalisés avec un appareil nécessitant une maîtrise technique. Les contrastes et les jeux de lumière donnent une grande intensité aux instantanés.

Simply breaking up for a while

 

Paralyzed Again

 

Components installed inside Freehand patients fared better than the ones on the outside. The diagram above shows how wires ran from one shoulder to a control unit and from that unit to a transmitting coil. We have the technology to dramatically increase the independence of people with spinal-cord injuries. The problem is bringing it to market and keeping it there. By Brian Bergstein on April 9, 2015 One night in 1982, John Mumford was working on an avalanche patrol on an icy Colorado mountain pass when the van carrying him and two other men slid off the road and plunged over a cliff. The other guys were able to walk away, but Mumford had broken his neck. The lower half of his body was paralyzed, and though he could bend his arms at the elbows, he could no longer grasp things in his hands. Fifteen years later, however, he received a technological wonder that reactivated his left hand. It was known as the Freehand System. A surgeon placed a sensor on Mumford’s right shoulder, implanted a pacemaker-size device known as a stimulator just below the skin on his upper chest, and threaded wires into the muscles of his left arm. On the outside of Mumford’s body, a wire ran from the shoulder sensor to an external control unit; another wire ran from that control unit to a transmitting coil over the stimulator in his chest. Out of this kludge came something incredible: by maneuvering his right shoulder in certain ways, Mumford could send signals through the stimulator and down his left arm into the muscles of his hand. The device fell short of perfection—he wished he could throw darts with his buddies. But he could hold a key or a fork or a spoon or a glass. He could open the refrigerator, take out a sandwich, and eat it on his own. Mumford was so enthusiastic that he went to work for the manufacturer, a Cleveland-area company called NeuroControl, traveling the country to demonstrate the Freehand at assistive-technology trade shows. Mumford was in Cleveland for a marketing meeting in 2001 when he got news that still baffles him: NeuroControl was getting out of the Freehand business. It would focus instead on a bigger potential market with a device that helped stroke victims. Before long, NeuroControl went out of business entirely, wiping out at least $26 million in investment. At first, Mumford remained an enthusiastic user of the Freehand, though one thing worried him: the wires running outside his body would sometimes fray or break after catching on clothing. Each time, he found someone who could reach into his supply of replacements and reconnect the system. But by 2010, the last wire was gone, and without the prospect of tech support from NeuroControl, the electrical equipment implanted in Mumford’s body went dormant. He lost the independence that had come from having regained extensive use of one hand. “To all of a sudden have that taken away—it’s incredibly frustrating,” he says. “There’s not a day where I don’t miss it.” Mumford’s voice rises in astonishment as he tells the tale. “I have a device implanted in my body that was considered to be one of the best innovations or inventions of that century,” he says. “The last thing you think is that the company is going to go out of business, and not only is it going to go out of business, but you’re not even going to be able to buy parts for that. That seems insane!” “It was all legal. Whether it was ethical or not is another question.” Around 250 people are believed to have gotten the Freehand from NeuroControl, and Mumford was far from the only one heartbroken by the company’s failure. Their experience is a cautionary tale now for any implantable medical device that might serve “orphan markets”—relatively small groups of people. Although advances in brain-machine interfaces and electrical–stimulation devices are generating marvelous research results in people with paralysis—some are using their thoughts to control robotic arms, and others are taking tentative steps—it’s possible those breakthroughs won’t last long on the market, assuming they can be commercialized at all. Limp limbs can be reanimated by technology, but they can be quieted again by basic market economics. The initial flourish The technology in Mumford’s body began to be developed in the 1970s. The lead inventor, P. Hunter Peckham, a biomedical engineer at Case Western Reserve University in Cleveland, wanted to see whether electrical stimulation would reverse atrophy and ultimately restore function to paralyzed muscles. First in animals and then in people, Peckham and colleagues used hypodermic needles to inject tiny coils of wire into muscles, near nerves. They could then send mild pulses of electricity through these wires and stimulate the muscles, changing their very structure. Over time, by putting the wires in the right places and precisely tuning the bursts of electricity, the researchers could coördinate the muscles’ movements—re–creating, among other things, the normal grasp of a hand. Eventually the scientists figured out how to implant the technology into patients and let them operate it themselves, outside the lab, by means of a joystick-like unit mounted to the shoulder. The first version of what would become the Freehand system was installed in a patient in 1986. Peckham and five other investors founded NeuroControl seven years later with technologies licensed from Case Western. When the U.S. Food and Drug Administration approved the Freehand in 1997, it was a milestone. It was not the first commercial bionic device—pacemakers and cochlear implants already existed—but it was the first that helped paralyzed patients regain some use of the hands. In fact, it was the first one that used electrical stimulation to make joints move—and to this day it remains the only one ever released. To see how it worked, watch this promotional video made by the company in the 1990s. Here’s Mumford marveling at the system’s power: Independent research showed that even at a cost of around $60,000 (for the device and the necessary surgery), the Freehand saved money in the long run by reducing a patient’s need for attendant care. But while the technology was impressive, the Freehand got stuck in a small niche. Although there are 250,000 people with spinal-cord injuries in the United States alone, the Freehand worked only for people whose paralysis stemmed from an injury to a certain area—between the fifth and sixth vertebrae of their cervical spine. That’s because a break in that location left them with enough shoulder and elbow mobility to trigger the Freehand’s grasp-and-release function. Although NeuroControl estimated its potential market at more than 50,000 people in the United States, not all of them were willing or healthy enough to endure the major operation that was required to implant the device and all those wires. Most important, the potential market was further narrowed by the fact that some private insurers and Medicare, the U.S. government insurance program for the elderly and the disabled, would not always cover the full cost. Rehabilitation clinics and hospitals were already likely to be conservative about recommending a novel implantable system to patients. But given that they might absorb any uncovered costs from the procedure, many medical centers were more reluctant to advocate the technology than NeuroControl had hoped. Lacking momentum, NeuroControl stopped selling the product. “The investors had expected that it would penetrate a much larger volume of the overall spinal-injury population,” says Geoff Thrope, who was NeuroControl’s director of business development. “We were able to make dozens of implant sales per year. You need to be in the hundreds, if not thousands, to have it make sense.” But the decision still rankles Peckham, who resigned from NeuroControl’s board as a result. With some more time, he says, NeuroControl might have seen its way through to a sustainable business. It had 19 patients enrolled in a clinical trial in England; one more would have given it the 20 necessary to allow the British national health-care system to move toward covering the cost of the Freehand. The U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs was likely to follow suit, he says. The problem was that other board members—primarily venture capitalists who “decided they were not seeing the return on the investment they had anticipated”—were impatient. “It was all legal,” Peckham says. “Whether it was ethical or not is another question. Well, I guess it depends upon what your ethics are, right?” Wires in the warehouse You don’t have to dig into archival footage to see the Freehand in action. A few miles from where Mumford lives in the Denver suburbs, I met Scott Abram, an accountant for the U.S. Department of the Interior. Abram broke his neck in 1989, at age 17, when he dived into a shallow river on a high school field trip. He got the Freehand a decade later and still uses it for certain tasks. When we had lunch in a restaurant, he ordered a chicken sandwich. By activating the Freehand with shrugs of his left shoulder, he was able to manipulate his right hand in ways that helped him bring the sandwich to his mouth and down to the plate. All the while, a pager-like control unit on the left side of his wheelchair was still doing what it has done for 15 years: telling the stimulator in his chest which wires in his right arm needed jolts of electricity. Abram knows full well what Mumford went through when the wires on the outside of his body needed to be replaced. It happens to him, too. There’s one key difference, though: several years ago, Abram managed to track down Kevin Kilgore, one of the researchers who developed the technology with Peckham in Cleveland. And Kilgore has been sending him wires over the years. The situation mystifies and upsets Kilgore as much as anyone. When NeuroControl was in business, it supplied the Freehand to surgeons who installed it and served as the patients’ point of contact. From the perspective of patients like Mumford, the researchers who had originally invented the technology were not in the picture at all. When NeuroControl folded, nearly everything about it fell into a black hole. Not only did it fail to arrange technical support for its customers, but its website and phone number went out of service, leaving both the surgeons and the patients in the dark about what they might do next. Kilgore and Peckham say the company even refused to give them a list of patients who had gotten the implants. To this day the engineers say they don’t know exactly how many there were. For Damion Cummins of Monroe, Louisiana, the company’s demise had a surreal aftermath. He had gotten the Freehand after being paralyzed in a high school football game. But it didn’t consistently work as well as he hoped, and he stopped using it after less than two years. Stopping was easy enough—he no longer asked someone to tape the awkward external wires to the device in his chest. But as the years went on, he wondered about that dormant electrical equipment, some of which you can feel right under his skin. “Is it going to disintegrate or break off?” he asked himself. “Should I worry about that?” He thought about going to see the surgeon in Shreveport who had implanted the Freehand, but the doctor had moved to California. Cummins says he spent a few years feeling uneasy about the electronics in his body before he finally tracked down the surgeon and called him. “Should I have it taken out?” Cummins asked. “No, as long as nothing’s bothering you,” the doctor said. It’s painful for Kilgore to hear about the isolation that Cummins felt. About five years ago Kilgore got a $75,000 grant from Paralyzed Veterans of America, a nonprofit group, to follow patients with electrical-stimulation implants over an extended period. He spent much of the money buying up one of the few chunks of NeuroControl that hadn’t completely vanished: its inventory of wires, stimulator coils, controllers, batteries, and other Freehand parts, which another Ohio company had bought and was keeping in a warehouse. With that stockpile, Kilgore reached out to the Freehand patients he and his colleagues did know of—a few dozen people in Ohio—and set up an online users’ group in hopes of finding more. In 2009, Kilgore and other researchers tracked down 65 Freehand recipients and determined that more than half were still using the device. Today he estimates that he has enough parts to keep such patients going for a few more years. But eventually, he says, “the ultimate fix” is for the patients to get something better. Nearly 30 years after the birth of the Freehand, the Case Western team has improved the technology significantly. Among other things, they have made the control unit small enough to be implanted in the body, eliminating the need for external wires that can snag and break. The device can also do more than restore grasping ability. It can be networked, as they put it, to send electrical stimuli to many more muscles—providing upper-body support, for example, or bowel and bladder control. The researchers have gotten some paralyzed people to stand and take halting steps with the help of a walker. The essential economic dilemma remains, though: without a company to market this technology widely, the pool of potential recipients is limited to people who live in or can afford to travel to Cleveland. And if it’s not a commercial product, insurance companies won’t cover the cost of the device. That means the researchers have to rely on grant money to get these technologies into patients. “I can do five implants a year on grants,” Kilgore says. “But I get 100 phone calls a year.” Even hundreds of patients a year might not make for a big enough market to entice private investors. But Kilgore and Peckham think they may have figured out a solution. Deepening the pool They are convinced that avoiding a repeat of the NeuroControl fiasco with many future implantable technologies will require a nonprofit/for-profit partnership. They’ve formed the nonprofit: the Institute for Functional Restoration at Case Western. Its mission is to usher technologies through regulatory approval; after that it could market the devices itself or license them to for-profit companies. Ideally, if such a company failed, the nonprofit—funded mainly by a private foundation—could keep supporting patients. The first technology the institute will handle will be the networked device that is the descendant of the original Freehand. The organization has grants to begin a clinical trial and even to develop a manufacturing facility for the devices. It also has a waiting list of potential patients. But it has yet to sign up any companies as for-profit partners—companies that, as Peckham puts it, are “not trying to meet some venture expectations of how fast you return their investment.” In theory, there could be many potential partners. As it happens, the neurostimulation business is enjoying a renaissance, especially in Cleveland, given the abundance of technologies to license from Case Western, the Cleveland Clinic, and other centers there. Several of the companies are staffed with alumni from NeuroControl, including Thrope, who now heads NDI, a firm that invests in neurotechnologies. Thrope says partnering with a nonprofit would be attractive to companies that don’t want to bear the risks inherent in taking a new technology through years of testing and regulatory approval. If the nonprofit can handle that part and then turn things over to a for-profit company, Kilgore and Peckham’s model “has some worthiness to it,” he says. But even with that risk removed, Thrope is quick to add, not a lot of companies are interested in selling products that only a small group of people can use. Instead, he says, he and other investors are eager to find opportunities to address what doctors call multiple “indications,” meaning they can treat more than one condition. He mentions Second Sight, a publicly traded maker of a $140,000 retinal implant that can restore sight to people with a hereditary form of blindness. The potential market is quite big—perhaps 1.5 million people worldwide and 100,000 in the United States—but even so, Second Sight is already testing ways to deepen the pool of patients by treating other forms of blindness. Thrope says his firm, which he founded in 2002, rarely jumps in to invest in a neurotechnology until it has been developed beyond its initial stage and can treat a second or third indication. It’s “reversing the formula we used in NeuroControl,” Thrope says. “We’ve tried to avoid breakthrough technologies if possible.” Avoiding breakthroughs: that seems to go against our tendency to imagine that technology will fix so many broken things, our bodies included. But consider the perspective of Damion Cummins. He says he endured multiple surgeries to get the Freehand because anything that could improve his daily life was worth a shot. He accepted the idea that it might not work. But when I asked him if he would have gotten the implant if he had realized there was a chance NeuroControl could fold, he replied: “If I had known that, then I definitely would not have.”

Apple Has Plans for Your DNA

 

The iPhone could become a new tool in genetic studies. Why It Matters Gene research is held back by medical privacy rules and limited data sharing. Of all the rumors ever to swirl around the world’s most valuable company, this may be the first that could involve spitting in a plastic cup. Apple is collaborating with U.S. researchers to help launch apps that would offer some iPhone owners the chance to get their DNA tested, many of them for the first time, according to people familiar with the plans. The apps are based on ResearchKit, a software platform Apple introduced in March that helps hospitals or scientists run medical studies on iPhones by collecting data from the devices’ sensors or through surveys. The first five ResearchKit apps, including one called mPower that tracks symptoms of Parkinson’s disease, quickly recruited thousands of participants in a few days, demonstrating the reach of Apple’s platform. “Apple launched ResearchKit and got a fantastic response. The obvious next thing is to collect DNA,” says Gholson Lyon, a geneticist at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory, who isn’t involved with the studies. Nudging iPhone owners to submit DNA samples to researchers would thrust Apple’s devices into the center of a widening battle for genetic information. Universities, large technology companies like Google (see “Google Wants to Store Your Genome”), direct-to-consumer labs, and even the U.S. government (see “U.S. to Develop DNA Study of One Million People”) are all trying to amass mega-databases of gene information to uncover clues about the causes of disease (see “Internet of DNA”). In two initial studies planned, Apple isn’t going to directly collect or test DNA itself. That will be done by academic partners. The data would be maintained by scientists in a computing cloud, but certain findings could appear directly on consumers’ iPhones as well. Eventually, it’s even possible consumers might swipe to share “my genes” as easily as they do their location. An Apple spokeswoman declined to comment. But one person with knowledge of the plans said the company’s eventual aim is to “enable the individual to show and share” DNA information with different recipients, including organizers of scientific studies. This person, like others with knowledge of the research, spoke on condition of anonymity because of the company’s insistence on secrecy. One of these people said the DNA-app studies could still be cancelled, but another said Apple wants the apps ready for the company’s worldwide developers’ conference, to be held in June in San Francisco. Sophisticated data Starting last year, Apple began taking steps to make its devices indispensable for “digital health.” Its latest version of the iOS operating system includes an app called Health, which has fields for more than 70 types of health data—everything from your weight to how many milligrams of manganese you eat (as yet, there’s no field for your genome). Apple also entered a partnership with IBM to develop health apps for nurses and hospitals, as well as to mine medical data. Now Apple is closely involved in shaping initial studies that will collect DNA. One, planned by the University of California, San Francisco, would study causes of premature birth by combining gene tests with other data collected on the phones of expectant mothers. A different study would be led by Mount Sinai Hospital in New York. Atul Butte, leader of the UCSF study and head of the Institute for Computational Health Sciences, said he could not comment on Apple’s involvement. “The first five [ResearchKit] studies have been great and are showing how fast Apple can recruit. I and many others are looking at types of trials that are more sophisticated,” Butte says. Noting that the genetic causes of premature birth aren’t well understood, he says, “I look forward to the day when we can get more sophisticated data than activity, like DNA or clinical data.” To join one of the studies, a person would agree to have a gene test carried out—for instance, by returning a “spit kit” to a laboratory approved by Apple. The first such labs are said to be the advanced gene-sequencing centers operated by UCSF and Mount Sinai. The planned DNA studies would look at 100 or fewer medically important disease genes (known as a “gene panel”), not a person’s entire genome. These targeted tests, if done at large scale, would not cost more than a few hundred dollars each. Like the ResearchKit apps released so far, the studies would be approved by Apple and by an institutional review board, a type of oversight body that advises researchers on studies involving volunteers. The ResearchKit program has been spearheaded by Stephen Friend, a onetime pharmaceutical company executive and now the head of Sage Bionetworks, a nonprofit that advocates for open scientific research. Friend’s vision for a data “commons” in which study subjects are active participants in scientific research was enthusiastically embraced by Apple starting in 2013. Friend, whom Apple describes as a medical technology advisor, declined an interview request through an assistant. Silicon Valley companies are intent on using apps and mobile devices to overrun what Friend has called the “medical-industrial complex.” The problem is that hospitals and research groups are notorious for hoarding data, in many cases because they are legally bound to do so by state and federal privacy regulations. But no law stops individuals from sharing information about themselves. Thus one reason to “empower patients,” as rhetoric has it, is that if people collect their own data, or are given control of it, it could quickly find wide use in consumer apps and technologies, as well as in science. One study that could get a boost from the iPhone is the Resilience Project, a joint undertaking by Sage and Mount Sinai to discover why some people are healthy even though their genes say they should have serious inherited diseases like cystic fibrosis. That project has already scoured DNA data previously collected from more than 500,000 people, and as of last year it had identified about 20 such unusual cases. But the Resilience Project was having difficulty contacting those people because their DNA had been collected anonymously. By contrast, recruiting people through iPhone apps could make ongoing contact easy. Hard to handle By playing this role in gene studies, Apple would join a short list of companies trying to excite people about what they might do with their own genetic information. Among them are the genealogy company Ancestry.com, the Open Humans Project, and 23andMe, a direct-to-consumer testing company that has collected DNA profiles of more than 900,000 people who bought its $99 spit kits. That is one of the largest DNA data banks anywhere, but it took 23andMe nine years of constant media attention, such as appearance on Oprah, to reach those numbers. By comparison, Apple sold 60 million iPhones in just the first three months of this year, contributing to a total of about 750 million overall. That means DNA studies on the ResearchKit platform could, theoretically, have rapid and immense reach. But DNA data remains tricky to handle, and in some cases what people can be told about it is regulated by the U.S. Food & Drug Administration. One study launched this year by the University of Michigan, Genes for Good, uses a Facebook app to recruit subjects and carry out detailed surveys about their health and habits. In that study, participants will be sent a spit kit and will later gain access to DNA information via a file they can download to their desktops. So far about 4,200 people have signed up, says Gonçalo Abecasis, the geneticist running the research. Abecasis says that the project will tell people something about their ancestry but won’t try to make health predictions. “There is tension in figuring out what is okay as part of our research study and what would be okay in terms of health care,” he says. “You can imagine that a lot of people have a good idea how to interpret the DNA … but what is appropriate to disclose isn’t clear.” One issue facing Apple is whether consumers are even interested in their DNA. So far, most people still have no real use for genetic data, and common systems for interpreting it are lacking as well. “In 10 years it could be incredibly significant,” says Lyon, the Cold Spring Harbor geneticist. “But the question is, do they have a killer app to interact with their [DNA] quickly and easily.” Some people have ideas. Imagine you could swipe your genes at a drugstore while filling a prescription, getting a warning if you’re predicted to have a reaction to the drug. Or perhaps an app could calculate exactly how closely related you are to anyone else. But Lyon believes that right now the story is mostly about helping researchers. “They need people to donate their DNA,” he says. “One incentive is to have it on their phone where they can play with it.”