Diagnosis, Delivery and Direction Implants Using New Technologies

1
Diagnosis, Delivery and Direction Implants Using
New Technologies

• Alan Murray
• Professor of Neural Electronics

2
Agenda

• Diagnosis
• Sensors on chip and the engineering issues they
  raise
• Delivery (drug)
• Drug storage and release structures and the
  engineering issues they raise
• Direction
• Cell guidance

3
Devices and diagnosisShapes and Sizes?
1µm 10-6 (1/1000000th) of 1 metre Or 1 million
µm 1metre Roughly 10,000 hairsbreadths/metre
4
Diagnosis - Sensors

• From earlier work on an ingestible chip
• Temperature
• easy
• Conductivity
• fairly easy
• pH
• tricky
• O2 concentration
• trickier

5
Implantable Microsystems for Personalised
Anti-Cancer Therapy (IMPACT)
Chip ? tumour microenvironment Measure hypoxia
(O2concentration) and other markers of tumour
activity Radiotherapy planning Chemotherapy
planning? Chemotherapy delivery?
6
IMPACT (EPSRC Proposal, 5.3M)
Implantable Microsystems for Personalised Anti-Can
cer Therapy (IMPACT) Interview, EPSRC Towers,
22nd Feb (JL)
Professor Alan Murray -School of
Engineering Professor Mark Bradley - School of
Chemistry Professor Steve McLaughlin
Engineering, Heriot-Watt Professor Ian Kunkler -
Edinburgh Cancer Research Centre Professor David
Argyle - Veterinary Clinical Studies Professor
Joyce Tait - Innogen Centre - Science,
Technology and Innovation Studies
5 years in the making
7
Look no wires
8
Devices and diagnosisDrug delivery

• So far chips can be
• tiny
• wireless
• Chips can contain
• Sensors
• O2, pH, conductivity, temperature
• biomarkers
• Chips can also store and release liquid

9
DirectionCell guidance
Neurones, glia also stem cells, kidney cells
10
Potential benefits

• Personalised therapy
• Treatment at home
• Optimised timing/location of therapy
• Chemotherapy released local to tumour
• Maximise tumour damage
• Minimise collateral/systemic damage
• Rebuild broken nervous system components

11
Future trends

• More, better, smaller sensors
• More and better algorithms for making sense of
  sensors
• Better security
• Flexible substrates

12
Some Issues

• Insertion
• Stereotactic is possible long thin chips
• Bio-fouling
• Bodys reaction to foreign objects
• Wireless communications
• Radio/ultrasound
• Signals from sensors/to drug-delivery
• noisy and not 100 accurate
• Security
• Need to deliver therapy at the tumours
  (in)convenience, not on a regular schedule

13
But these are only the scientists concerns

• We NEED a wider view
• Hence the inclusion of social scientists and
  potential patients in the IMPACT proposal
• Hence my being here today