Using nanotechnology to repair the body

Abstract

The intersection of nanotechnology and medicine is here. While nano biomedicine has led to wildly futuristic promises, it has also presented real breakthroughs in drug research, development and formulation. Two significant nanobiomedical advances will be discussed, each with the potential for great promise in treating human conditions in the very near future.

First, using nanotechnology to reverse blindness and repair the brain. For axons to regenerate after injury in the central nervous system several formidable barriers must be overcome, such as scar tissue formation after tissue injury; gaps in nervous tissue formed during phagocytosis of dying cells after injury and the failure of many adult neurons to initiate axonal extension. Using the mammalian visual system as a model, we showed that a designed self-assembling peptide nanofiber scaffold created a permissive environment not only for axons to regenerate through the site of an acute injury, but also to knit the brain tissue together, demonstrated by the return of lost vision.

Second, a nano hemostatic agent that immediately stops bleeding. Hemostasis is a major problem after trauma and during surgery; as much as 50% of surgical time can be spent packing wounds to reduce or control bleeding and there are few effective methods to stop it without causing secondary damage. We show that hemostasis can be achieved in less than 15 seconds, in multiple tissues as well as a variety of different wounds, using a self-assembling peptide, demonstrating the first time that nanotechnology has been used to stop bleeding in a surgical setting for animal models that does not rely on heat, pressure, platelet activation, adhesion, or desiccation to stop bleeding.