The microbot rushes to the rescue
Micro robots in the form of fish, crabs and butterflies were taught to deliver drugs to cancer cells
Mikhail Saucers, FBM.ru
In the People's Republic of China, they made very small robots (about a tenth of a millimeter) that can respond to changes in acidity in the body and produce medicines in an acidic environment. The inside of the robots is planned to be filled with medicines to reduce the side effects of chemotherapy.
Scientific experts plan that these small simple robots will float inside the body, and when they reach an acidic environment near the tumor, they will inject medicine. Then the robot must be removed from the body. It is directed only with the help of external magnets.
So far, this method of treatment has not been tested not only on humans, but even on laboratory animals.
Engineers from China have created the simplest miniature robots without a built-in engine in the form of fish, crabs and butterflies, which can change their own shape and react to changes in the pH environment (that is, its acidity) inside the body. They were printed on a hydrogel 3D printer. There are voids inside them for filling with a medical preparation.
The result of their inventive and somewhat scientific work was published in the journal ACS Nano (Xin et al., Environmentally Adaptive Shape-Morphing Microrobots for Localized Cancer Cell Treatment).
During the tests, the micro-robots swam through artificial vessels in a Petri dish (that is, in conditions far from the planned use). The creators of these simple mechanisms were able to control them with the help of external magnets (since robots contain iron oxide particles). When they encounter an acidic environment around the tumor, they automatically release the medical product outside. In particular, fish open their mouths for this, and crabs unclench their claws.
The creators of the devices believe that such an accurate delivery of medicines can reduce the side effects of chemotherapy and significantly increase the survival rate of patients. Nevertheless, there are still many problems to be solved. At the moment, the size of the micro robot is 100 microns (one tenth of a millimeter), but in order to proceed to tests on humans or at least on animals, it is required to make them even smaller. In addition, it is necessary to provide for the possibility of tracking these devices in the body. This is not the first such project. For example, a micro robot that can print patches for organs right inside the body has already been tested in the Middle Kingdom.
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