Military field biomedicine: plans of the US Department of Defense
The American defense industry has revealed plans for the development of military medicine
Andrey Velichko, Computer
The most promising and even intriguing projects concern artificial eyes, autonomous diagnostic devices, a new type of tissue, portable blood purification systems and wound healing mechanisms.
New Vision
One of the most expensive items in the medical section of the budget of the Office of Advanced Research of the US Department of Defense (DARPA) is the Neovision2 system, for which $ 43.5 million has been allocated. Combining the achievements of neuroscience and microelectronics, scientists hope to create sensors that mimic the vision of humans and highly developed animals. The key should be the ability to recognize and systematize information about newly seen objects.
So far, researchers have managed to obtain an imitation of the mammalian visual pathway, a mechanism for transmitting data from the retina to the brain. The finished product should appear in 2012.
Autonomous field diagnostics The Autonomous Diagnostics to Enable Prevention and Therapeutics (ADEPT) program is aimed at diagnosis and treatment in extreme conditions.
DARPA specialists intend to create simple devices for detecting disease markers and analyzing them at the molecular level. Part of the total amount of $25 million will be spent on studying ways to extract and store samples of blood and other bodily fluids of fighters right on the battlefield.
Tissue Engineering
The Scaffold-Free Tissue Engineering project, worth $8.5 million, aims to use magnetism and electricity so that artificial body tissues can "mask" until they are fully implanted. Now collagen "scaffolding" is used for tissue "construction", but they wear out and may not resist the attack of the human immune system.
By 2012, a 3D model of skeletal muscles should be obtained, which will demonstrate the process of growth of blood vessels and neurons inside artificial tissues.
Antibacterial dialysis
The idea of the Dialysis-Like Therapeutics project, which is estimated at $ 10 million, is to develop a device for performing a blood purification procedure similar to hemodialysis. It is planned to pass the patient's blood through the machine, filtering out the bacteria that cause sepsis (otherwise, complications, or even death, cannot be avoided). By next year, it is planned to create a system for detecting and "trapping" such microorganisms.
Field biomedicine
Another comprehensive program of Tactical Biomedical Technologies aims to develop field biomedicine, namely the creation of a method to stop bleeding. The problem is especially relevant in the case of internal bleeding, which can only be prevented surgically. But it is not always possible to deliver a wounded soldier to the hospital.
The solution may be the so—called hemostatic agents - substances that promote blood clotting. Based on them, the researchers want to develop a material that will be injected into the body and "seal up" damaged vessel walls. $98 million has been subsidized for this important project, which DARPA hopes will save thousands of military personnel's lives, since 2007.
Prepared by Wired: Darpa's 5 Radical Plans for Military MedicinePortal "Eternal youth" http://vechnayamolodost.ru