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'Bionic' Nerve To Repair Damaged Limbs and Organs
University of Manchester researchers have transformed fat tissue stem cells into nerve cells -- and now plan to develop an artificial nerve that will bring damaged limbs and organs back to life. In a study published in October's Experimental Neurology, Dr Paul Kingham and his team at the UK Centre for Tissue Regeneration (UKCTR) isolated the stem cells from the fat tissue of adult animals and differentiated them into nerve cells to be used for repair and regeneration of injured nerves. They are now about to start a trial extracting stem cells from fat tissue of volunteer adult patients, in order to compare in the laboratory human and animal stem cells.
It's interesting to think that in Larry Niven's "Gil 'The Arm' Hamilton" stories (collected in Flatlander ) and other Known Space books organ transplants were supposed to be the rage, before eventually being supplanted by alloplasty, "gadgets instead of organs", long after. At the rate science is progressing, viable artificial solutions are going to be found for many things before transplantation would be possible.
What I wonder, though, is whether these artificial solutions will be allowed to be so much better than the original human part. If you have to replace someone's arm, why not do it with a space-age fiber that would allow him to lift hundreds of pounds single-handedly?
'Bionic' Nerve To Repair Damaged Limbs and Organs
Unfortunately, it costs 6 million dollars, and makes a very distinctive sound when in use.
The theory of relativity doesn't work right in Arkansas.
If you can afford whatever this will cost once its patented you can afford a hooker to simply jack you off once an hour, every hour for the rest of your life.
Using openSUSE instead of Windows since 9th of October, 2007 and liking it.
Your spine would long give in if it is not muscled/solid enough to lift those hundreds of pound. Sure some people do lift as much , but they are trained for it, and as far as I know are not adverse to accident. Then also there is the center of gravity, unless you lift your 100's of pound like an those alter-lifting pros do, you could have serious problem when your gravity center is suddenly out of the body. Which naturally limit what you can take on, although the second one is probably a detail in comparison to the first one.
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I'd be interested to know if this would be helpful for people with ALS, where nerves slowly degenerate.
It might not be a cure to the fundamental problem, but might extend a life.
What about the possibility of enhanced limbs - not so much that they could LIFT hundreds of pounds but perhaps they were more dexterous? Able to move faster or with more precision? Wrists that could literally rotate 360 degrees? Sensors embedded in your fingers to detect certain things.
This is more entering the bionic range and is not really the topic of the article, which I have not read yet but once you open the flood gates to "new" ideas that are not organic in nature, you have a huge world of things to choose from. The downside may be that they are not all that great in the first place. There are millions of ways TO evolve. But not all of them are very good, as Spore should point out.
Other issues: interfacing with the body. A deer's antlers are great at this. Catheters are not. Infection is hard to keep at bay. Rejection / encapsulation. The body DOES NOT LIKE stuff inside it that it doesn't recognize. It will either encapsulate it or attack it. Either way, it causes irritation and could leach out into the body. Not something you really want to have happen.
Also, MRIs will be harder to take.
Another thing that people don't realize is that limbs, while not essential for life do support the body. Bones, aside from producing red blood cells, also excrete hormones, as we are also learning about adipose (fat) tissue as well. So just because a human limb may appear inferior at first glance, we still have a ways to go before we are actually able to replace human limbs with something truly superior.
Something that's always intrigued me about stem cell research is the concept of genetic memory. Considering the implications that this theory has on the theory of evolution, I wonder if mixing and matching stem cells, and thereby mixing genetic memories, would fuck the evolutionary process. It's the type of result that we probably wouldn't see for thousands (or tens of thousands) of years.
Eventually though, I would imagine that it would be like the episode of Star Trek Enterprise when they find the race of people who are basically falling apart genetically and they have no idea why.
And then of course the old addage "Overspecialize and you breed in weakness" has many powerful implications in this as well.
Maybe I wouldn't be so scared if we weren't still completely reversing our dietary ideals every 3 years. If we can't even nail down a healthy diet (pyramid points up or down now?!), how the hell can we figure out what the ramifications of stem cell research would be on our evolutionary process?
Would be awesome to have some heat/cold sensors to be able to somehow "detect" if something is too hot or cold!
Maybe some sort of "tactile feedback" mechanism as well so you could feel some kind of "force" if you for example come into contact with a physical object.
c++;
It would also be awesome to have a device for people to detect if someone is trying to make a joke on slashdot.
Maybe you could browse in 'humour impaired' mode (or just 'really really tired' mode), where jokes could by highlighted for users benefit...
If only they could come up with a Bionic Scriptwriter and Bionic Actress With Personality to save the god-awful Bionic Woman series....
Had some high hopes for that one... what a waste.
It seems all the successful new treatments with stem cells that we keep hearing about use the adult type, which also have the great advantage of not causing rejection. It makes me wonder why there is so much pressure to use embryonic stem cells, when the research with the adult type is so promising and is far from being exhausted. Perhaps it is because the adult cells, being collected from the patient him/herself, don't need to be bought, so there is no profit incentive, while embryonic stem cells hold the promise of a very lucrative new pharmaceutical/medical market?
There's nothing bionic about it. They are using a man-made tube to help a real nerve grow from stem cells. There's no electronics, not even any moving parts. It doesn't augment or affect the nerve in any artificial way. The end result is... A normal nerve.
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I'd put up with it if my MS was alleviated. (And don't worry too much about the cost, I'll find a way to pay for it. [I'll be able to work. {Insert rant about insurance companies that will let you die before they pay and gu'mint agencies that won't help you until you're destitute from having to sell off EVERYTHING, (your house, your car, your furniture, your jewelry, your computers, your retirement savings, your grave [I'm not fuckin' kidding!]) ... right here.}])
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I do some weightlifting and read up on this very topic some years ago (so take this info with a grain of salt). As far as i can remember the dorsal spine can take about 700kg and the ventral about 500kg. if you do squats or deadlifts it is very important to stress only the dorsal part of the spine, no hunching. here is a good link about squats: hhttp://www.exrx.net/Kinesiology/Squats.html , it's pretty hard to get the technique right.