Science

The winner and all of the nominated projects, are currently on display at the Design Museum until March 31, 2016

A micro-device lined with living human cells able to mimic the function of living organs has been declared the overall winner of the Design Museum’s Design of the Year Award for 2015.

Something of a departure from last year’s winner, the Heydar Aliyev Center, by Zaha Hadid, Human Organs-on-Chips is the competition’s first winner from the field of medicine in its eight-year history. Designed by Donald Ingber and Dan Dongeun Huh at Harvard University’s Wyss Institute, the Human Organs-on-Chips project comprises a series of chips that mimic real human organs, including a lung-on-a-chip, and gut-on-a-chip.

As we previously reported, the research could prove beneficial in evaluating the safety and efficacy of potential medical treatments, in addition to lessening demands on animal testing, accelerating drug discovery, and decreasing development and treatment costs.

“One of the most important things about the Designs of the Year award is the chance that it gives the museum to explore new territory,” says London’s Design Museum Director, Deyan Sudjic. “The team of scientists that produced this remarkable object don’t come from a conventional design background. But what they have done is clearly a brilliant piece of design.”

The winner and all of the nominated projects , are currently on display at the Design Museum until March 31, 2016.\

References:http://www.gizmag.com/

A technique known as electrospinning is showing promise as a way of providing health-food ingredients with protection as they pass through the digestive system

Packing food with nutrients, vitamins and other supplements to improve our health sounds like a simple enough idea, but protecting them as they pass through the digestive system isn’t all that easy. While various methods have been employed to encase compounds for more effective delivery, a new technique is showing great promise as a means of keeping them intact. Scientists claim that coating the ingredients in nanofibers created through a process called electrospinning can provide a better safeguard, and could lead to delivery of improved health supplements.

Electrospinning is a technique we have seen in various forms across a number of areas of scientific research. It involves drawing a fluid through an electric field which serves to break the liquid down into microscopic fibers, typically on the micro- or nanoscale. It has been used in the development of dissolving tampons designed to protect against HIV, antibacterial materials and a potential replacement for scar tissue in the heart.

Its promise in the food industry stems from the fact that it can be carried out at room temperature using wet materials, and doesn’t require overly complex chemistry. According to scientists from England’s University of Lincoln, this gives it an advantage over existing methods of encapsulating supplements, which can damage the structure and the bacteria, as it better caters to the sensitivity of the materials.

The upshot of this is a potentially improved way of controlling the release of chemicals in the body, as the supplements can be better protected while being produced and also as they make their way through the digestive system.

Despite this promise, however, it is still early days. Dr Nick Tucker from the School of Engineering at the University of Lincoln and leader of the study, is looking to build partnerships in the industry to learn more about the possibilities. He says work is needed to advance both the electrospun nanofibers themselves and ways of actually integrating them with foodstuffs.

References:http://www.gizmag.com/

Researchers have mimicked the structure of owl wings, which enables them to fly almost silently

Using fine detail microscopy, the researchers from the University of Cambridge in the US and Virginia Tech, Lehigh University and Florida Atlantic University in the US examined owl feathers in fine detail, revealing a downy covering that they say resembles a forest canopy when viewed from above. They also saw a flexible comb of evenly-spaced bristles along the wing’s leading edge, while the trailing edge shad a porous and elastic fringe.

“No other bird has this sort of intricate wing structure,” said Professor Nigel Peake of Cambridge’s Department of Applied Mathematics and Theoretical Physics, who led the research. “Much of the noise caused by a wing – whether it’s attached to a bird, a plane or a fan – originates at the trailing edge where the air passing over the wing surface is turbulent. The structure of an owl’s wing serves to reduce noise by smoothing the passage of air as it passes over the wing – scattering the sound so their prey can’t hear them coming.”

Early attempts to replicate this structure included covering a blade with a wedding veil-like material, which, despite the open structure of the material, reduced the roughness of the underlying surface and cut the surface noise by up to 30 dB.

Realizing that applying a wedding veil to a turbine or airplane isn’t feasible, the team 3D printed a prototype made of plastic and tested it on a full-sized segment of a wind turbine blade. Subjecting the blade to wind tunnel tests, the researchers saw a reduction in noise of 10 dB. Importantly, they reported no appreciable impact on aerodynamics.

The team is now planning to test the coating on a functioning wind turbine, and say that it could allow such turbines to spin faster and generate more electricity than they do currently. This is because wind turbines are currently braked to minimize noise, and letting them spin faster could mean several extra megawatts worth of electricity for an average sized wind farm.

In addition to quieter wind turbines, the researchers say the coating could also find applications on a range of different types of wings and blades – however, the coating still needs to be optimized and incorporating it into airplane wings would be far more complicated than a wind turbine blade.

The team will present the results of their study ay the American Institute of Aeronautics and Astronautics (AIAA) Aeroacoustics Conference in Dallas today.

References:http://www.gizmag.com/

The same material that gives trees their structural integrity can now be used to 3D print tiny chairs, electrical circuits, and other objects

The 3D printing revolution brings with it a harmful side effect: the special inks that it uses are derived (for the most part) from environmentally-unfriendly processes involving fossil fuels and toxic byproducts. But now scientists at Chalmers University of Technology have succeeded in using cellulose – the most abundant organic compound on the planet – in a 3D printer. They were also able to create electrically-conductive materials by adding carbon nanotubes.

To be specific, the researchers used nanocellulose obtained from wood pulp. This is the stuff that forms the scaffolding that makes trees able to stand tall. It’s available in massive quantities, plus it’s biodegradable, incredibly strong, renewable, and reusing it keeps the carbon dioxide it contains from entering the atmosphere.

Normally, 3D printing uses a heated liquid form of plastic or metal that hardens and solidifies as it cools and dries. But cellulose doesn’t melt when you heat it, so it’s not previously been considered a suitable material.

The researchers mixed the cellulose in a hydrogel of 95-99 percent water, which allowed it to go into a 3D bioprinter, and in some instances with carbon nanotubes so that it could conduct electricity. The very high water content of the resultant printer gel meant that the drying process had to be carefully controlled so as not to lose the object’s 3D structure. The scientists found that they could also allow the structure to collapse into a thin film (like a circuit).

“Potential applications range from sensors integrated with packaging, to textiles that convert body heat to electricity, and wound dressings that can communicate with healthcare workers,” says lead researcher Paul Gatenholm. “Our research group now moves on with the next challenge: to use all wood biopolymers besides cellulose.”

The researchers presented their findings at the New Materials From Trees conference in Stockholm earlier this week.

References:http://www.gizmag.com/