NIH today announced $129.3 million in scale-up and manufacturing support for a new set of COVID-19 testing technologies as part of its RADx initiative. NIH is awarding contracts to nine companies for technologies that include portable point-of-care tests for immediate results and high-throughput laboratories that can return results within 24 hours.
The winners of National Institutes of Health’s 9th annual Design by Biomedical Undergraduate Teams (DEBUT) challenge developed simple and low-cost diagnostics and treatments for conditions such as tuberculosis, cervical cancer, birth defects, and onchocerciasis (river blindness).
NIBIB-funded researchers have created nanoparticles for successful gene therapy of a mouse model of macular degeneration. The nanoparticle carriers have the potential to significantly expand the effectiveness of gene therapies for human eye diseases, including blindness.
NIH has launched an ambitious effort to use artificial intelligence, computation, and medical imaging to enable early disease detection, inform successful treatment strategies, and predict individual disease outcomes of COVID-19.
The National Institutes of Health is investing $248.7 million in new technologies to address challenges associated with COVID-19 testing (which detects SARS-CoV-2 coronavirus).
A new technique funded by NIBIB and developed by University of Minnesota researchers allows 3D printing of hydrogel-based sensors directly on the surface of organs, such as lungs—even as they expand and contract.
NIBIB-funded researchers at Stanford University have created an artificial neural network that analyzes lung CT scans to provide information about lung cancer severity that can guide treatment options.
Understanding the source and network of signals as the brain functions is a central goal of brain research. Now, Carnegie Mellon engineers have created a system for high-density EEG imaging of the origin and path of normal and abnormal brain signals.
Learn how NIH’s new Rapid Acceleration of Diagnostics initiative, or RADx Tech, has mobilized engineers and innovators across the country to bring accurate, rapid, and easy-to-use COVID diagnostic tests to all Americans.
Researchers at the University of Wisconsin (UW) are adapting a minimally invasive, safer approach to electrically treat pain directly at the source as part of the NIH Helping to End Addiction Long-term (HEAL) Initiative.
To counter drug resistance Penn State engineers have developed a new approach for predicting which mutation has expanded the most in a population and should be targeted to design the most effective new drug.
NIH today announced a new initiative aimed at speeding innovation, development and commercialization of COVID-19 testing technologies, a pivotal component needed to return to normal during this unprecedented global pandemic.
A team at ClearCam, Inc., with funding from the NIBIB and ties to the University of Texas at Austin, designed a device for wiping a laparoscope lens clean, much the same way that a wiper blade clears a fogged up window.
Medical physicists at the Mayo Clinic have just made a unique library of computed tomography (CT) data publicly available so that imaging researchers can study, develop, validate, and optimize algorithms and enhance imaging hardware to produce peak-quality CT images using low radiation doses.
Researchers at the University of Memphis-based Center of Excellence for Mobile Sensor Data-to-Knowledge (MD2K) have introduced a new mobile app that may support physical distancing during the COVID-19 pandemic. MD2K is supported by NIH with a grant administered by NIBIB.
Bioengineers have created a blood-drawing robot that performed as well or better than technicians. The device could increase blood draw success from difficult- to-find veins and allow healthcare workers more time to treat patients.
Bioengineers have combined standard microscopy, infrared light, and artificial intelligence to assemble digital biopsies that identify important molecular characteristics of cancer biopsy samples.
Bioengineers have created a 3D-printed scaffold designed to regenerate complex tissues composed of multiple layers of cells with different biological and mechanical properties.
The National Institutes of Health has launched a $1 million Technology Accelerator Challenge (TAC) to spur the design and development of non-invasive, handheld, digital technologies to detect, diagnose and guide therapies for diseases with high global and public health impact. The Challenge is focused on sickle cell disease, malaria and anemia and is led by NIH’s National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB).
Most medicines work by binding to and blocking the effect of disease-causing molecules. Now to accelerate the identification of potential new medicines, bioengineers have created a computer model that mimics the way molecules bind.
Promising intracellular protein-based therapeutics have been of limited use due to the difficulty of delivery into diseased cells. Now bioengineers have developed nanoparticles that can deliver these therapeutics to their targets—avoiding degradation and toxic interactions with healthy tissues.
Millions of people are treated with antibiotics each year for infections or as a preventative measure. Two teams of NIBIB-funded scientists have been working to find alternative solutions for treating bacterial infections, especially antibiotic-resistant bacteria.
A novel method produces a new class of radioactive tracers that are used for medical imaging. The method allows them to attach radioactive atoms to compounds that have previously been difficult or even impossible to label. The advance will make it easier to track medications in the body and identify tumors and other diseases.
Doctors need better ways to detect and monitor heart disease, the leading cause of death in industrialized countries. Researchers have developed an improved optical imaging technique that found differences between potentially life-threatening coronary plaques and those posing less imminent danger for patients with coronary artery disease. Their method may give cardiologists additional data to identify patients at higher risk of future heart attacks and help them improve medical therapy.
Made with extracellular matrix (ECM) from pig brains and seeded with tumors from patients, the system is revealing tumor/ECM interactions that aid tumor growth, providing potential targets for new therapies.
Researchers have designed a more precise and versatile genome editing system, named prime editing, that harnesses the power of CRISPR-Cas9 in combination with another protein, reverse transcriptase, to directly edit DNA in human cells.
Mothers and children in low resource communities often suffer from micronutrient deficiencies. Now researchers have developed a system that can be used for tests to rapidly identify blood micronutrient levels in remote areas with limited healthcare infrastructure.
The annual awards ceremony at the National Academy of Engineering was highly unusual in that, of the 12 broad engineering categories represented at NAE – from chemical to mechanical and civil to electrical – three 2019 NAE awards were in biomedical engineering.
Cancer in the ovaries often metastasizes to the surrounding tissues, but is too small to be detected. Now a label-free microscopy technique is able to identify these regions with great accuracy, enabling early removal of these microscopic malignancies.
Macrophages are white blood cells that accumulate in tumors, and aid cancer progression. Now scientists have identified a surface protein found only on the macrophages residing in tumors, exposing a target for precise tumor treatments.
Paralyzing damage in spinal cord injury is often caused by the zealous immune response to the injury. NIBIB-funded engineers have developed nanoparticles that lure immune cells away from the spinal cord, allowing regeneration that restored spinal cord function in mice.
A new spectroscopic technique reveals that glucose use in live cells provides valuable information about the functional status of cells, tissues, and organs. Shifts in a cell’s use of glucose can signal changes in health and progress of disease.
Scientists have taken a common, yet laborious lab test and redesigned it to be performed in small 3D printed pipette tips used to measure and transfer fluids in the laboratory.
An ultrasound imaging technique called passive cavitation imaging was able to create an image and estimate the amount of a drug that crossed the blood-brain barrier to reach a specific location in the brain, according to a study by NIBIB-funded bioengineers at Washington University.
Bioengineers used bone engineered in 3D-printed mold and grown alongside the ribs of sheep to successfully replace a portion of the animals’ jaw bones. They hope to develop the tissue regenerative procedure for human application .
A team of NIBIB-funded bioengineers at Rennselaer Polytechnic Institute developed an AI technique to rapidly convert low-dose CT scans to superior images compared to a conventional technique. Low-dose CT minimizes x-ray radiation to a patient.
Bioengineers have developed a 3D printing technique that creates the interacting networks for transport of air, blood, and other bodily fluids—a major step toward 3D printed replacement organs.
A new report, with contributions from the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering (NIBIB), part of the National Institutes of Health, provides a roadmap for translational research on artificial intelligence (AI) in medical imaging. The report, published in the May 28, 2019, Journal of the American College of Radiology.
A team of NIH-funded researchers at Stanford University Medical School has found that children with autism improved measurably on a test of socialization and learning when their therapy included an at-home intervention with Google Glass. The smart system of eye wear and mobile-phone-based games helped the children with autism understand emotions conveyed in facial expressions.
NIBIB-funded researchers used photoacoustic imaging for rapid measurement of metabolic rate of individual cells from breast tumors—information that can help guide treatment strategies.
NIBIB researchers have designed a nanoparticle that generates radiation-induced oxygen free radicals in the low-oxygen center of tumors, dramatically increasing tumor destruction.
NIBIB-funded researchers have designed a new class of two-dimensional (2D) nanomaterials that are disc-shaped and flat on the surface, similar to a coin, to aid in treatments for cartilage repair.
NIBIB-funded researchers at the University of Minnesota (UMN) created a new, dynamic 3D bioprinted tumor model in a laboratory dish to screen anticancer drugs and study the spread of cancer and primary site tumor growth.
A million Americans with injury or age-related disabilities need someone to help them eat. Now engineers have taught a robot to pick up food with a fork and gingerly deliver it to a person’s mouth.
Biomedical engineers have developed a smartphone app for anemia screening that can assess blood hemoglobin levels through the window of the user’s fingernail. The medical results are based on the coloration of the fingernail bed; the quick and pain-free screening could benefit a vast number of people who are affected by anemia around the world.