Photos The New Design
Lastly, the polymer is treated with a chemical that removes a very thin layer from the surface. That changes the pressure and at a critical point, the mounds all snap into a concave shape. "This is completely novel. There are definitely surfaces that people apply voltages to that release drugs from individual wells, but not surfaces that have the snapping effect. I've never seen anything like that before," said Jeffrey Karp, director of the Laboratory for Advanced Biomaterials and Stem Cell-Based Therapeutics at Harvard University in Cambridge, Mass. "I don't think there are limitations in terms of what can be done. The next stage is really picking an application and moving into product development. It's a great milestone," said Karp. Right now each depression is about the diameter of a human hair; Crosby would like to reduce the size, so that each dome would be hundreds of times smaller. Eventually Crosby and his team would like to reverse the process, too, so that the polymer starts off as a series of depressions that pop into mounds in the presence of heat, light, or voltage. Related Links: |
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