A Panoramic View of Your Insides

deepcleanfun writes "Researchers from New Mexico and Taiwan have invented a tiny probe — about the size of a rice grain — equipped with an ultrasound scanner that can travel through veins and arteries, taking ultrasound images of its surroundings. Unlike previous probes that travel through the body, which provide a view from only one direction at a time, the new device has seven imagers integrated onto the hexagonal prism that can see nearly everywhere at once."

Comments

Still untested though

[Fred_A]

Apparently they haven't even gotten around to testing it on animals yet. But they say it works great in a glass of water. The news might be a bit premature.
No nice pics either.

Re:Still untested though

[ShiningSomething]

They don't take pictures: it's an ultrasound. So it's not limited to looking around it, it can see beyond the blood vessels, in places that are hard to ultrasound from outside the body. From TFA:

Ultrasound scanners are normally used to peer into the body from the outside, in order to examine unborn babies or look for tumours, for example. Enabling these devices to penetrate deep inside the body, and to provide accurate images at this depth, is difficult because longer wavelengths are required, which dramatically reduce resolution.

So you get the ultrasound machine inside the body, right next to what you want to study. Since sonograms usually look at flows (you see heartbeats, bloddflows, etc), having input from different directions at the same time is much better than having a sequence of sonograms. So that's why it's an improvement.

Re:Still untested though

[Cornflake917]

They don't take pictures: it's an ultrasound. You can usually use the information from the ultrasounds to get pictures though.

Re:Still untested though

[davidfromoz]

There are devices that do this kind of thing already. They are called Intravascular Ultrasound. They are mounted on a catheter and they generate a 360 degree view. Its largely used for looking at vessel lining, though some work has been done with it in the heart chambers.

To my knowledge, which may be wrong, they do not measure flow (Doppler), it would usually not be effective since the plane of the image is perpendicular to the catheter. Since flow is normally parallel to the catheter the Doppler effect could not be used effectively. Anyway there are other catheter based devices that can measure flow I think. (the forward firing feature of this transducer might be used for Doppler measurements).

The only really interesting thing I see about this is the potential to have it no attached to the catheter. Swallowing or perhaps insertion near a site. But since this is a press release, they are only working in a glass of water and they make no statement about how to get the data out when its not attached to a catheter I'd have to say this is pie in the sky at this stage.

Origami style manufacturing.

[140Mandak262Jamuna]

Origami is the art of making figures by folding paper. They seem to have fabricated the sonar emitters in a flat piece and folded it into a hexagon. That seems to be the key to get multiple views.

Without pics

[jav1231]

Without pics you weren't IN my insides!

How does this not kill you?

[RandoX]

Isn't having solid stuff in your bloodstream bad?

Re:How does this not kill you?

[Otter]

It's on a catheter, not floating around.

Martin Short...

[butterwise]

...has generously offered to pilot the device.

different strokes

[gEvil (beta)]

Some people make tiny rice-sized probes to look at someone's insides while others simply go the Goatse route...

Re:We have seen the enemy, and it is us.

[wattrlz]

There's a highly paid professional standing by the bedside manipulating the catheter by hand eg: twisting, pushing, and tugging a little tube to which the device is attached.

Colonoscopies

[Anonymous Coward]

For those of you of colonoscopy age... I asked my doctor if he could do my last two colonoscopies using only the pain-killer fentanyl, and omitting Versed (midolazam). The latter is a sedative and muscle-relaxant, but it induces drowsiness and often produces retrograde amnesia, i.e. you are conscious and awake but afterwards don't remember what happened.

I'm glad I did. I did not experience any serious pain; at two points, presumably when going around corners, I felt something like a bad gas pain lasting only a couple of seconds. I found it fascinating seeing what the inside of my gut looked like, very different from what I expected, and very reminiscent of "Fantastic Voyage" for those who remember that film.

They had two flat TV monitors suspended from the ceiling, one for the doctor and one for the nurse, and it was very easy for the patient (me) to watch as well. The images were much sharper and detailed than I expected.

It's something to consider, assuming you're not creeped out by the very idea of the colonoscopy in itself.

Yes, it goes in the blood stream

[MrMunkey]

People... the only thing that is different about this than other instruments already in use today is that it can view in more than one direction simultaneously. How do you think an angiogram is performed? They stick the think in through the artery in your leg, and fish it up to the spot where the blockage is. Sure, it sounds scary, but it's done every day. I think this is a great improvement to help doctors.

Re:Yes, it goes in the blood stream

[Laughing Pigeon]

No, some liquid which shows up on X-ray is put into the artery through the catheter, the catheter does not have to be shifted up to the location of the blockage/. On the photograph one will see where it gets narrow, the black line produced by the contrast fluid gets thinner.

Re:We have seen the enemy, and it is us.

[jadin]

Crikey, none of you watch House?

Re:Bloodstream?

[Jaidan]

It will be attached to the end of a "wire like endoscope" So no it's navigation won't be so much of a problem...They go so far as to say they will by able to pass it up into blood vessels in the brain to measure blood flow. Kinda weird, I would be bothered by the idea of a wire in my brain.

Patents and Inventions

[EvilGrin5000]

---begin sarcastic comment---

Isn't there someone that holds the "Origami Hexagon Fold" Patent that is going to sue them?

How about someone holding the "Using waves to view internal organs in a human body" Patent?

Or maybe the "Etching of ultrasound emitting device on silicon wafers" patent?

---end sarcastic comment---

Seriously,

if this invention grows to be used in humans, it will really provide some serious insights on disease prevention and diagnosis. I just hope that the patent morons don't destroy another inventive design much like they did with poor Vonage.

Can it be..

[sw155kn1f3]

.. used on Uranus :)?
Can't resist.