blood

Researchers in Canada say they've built a device that will help them study changes in red blood cells caused by the most common species of malaria parasites, plasmodium falciparum, which causes the most lethal form of a disease that claims almost a million lives every year.

The microfluidic device, which is just 1 x 2 inches, is not a diagnostic tool but rather a way to test potential treatments--a crucial step in the fight against malaria, which is constantly evolving to develop resistance to drugs.

Typically, human red blood cells squeeze through capillaries that are narrower than the cells … Read more

As implantable medical devices become smaller and less power hungry, they are taking on a variety of new roles. What began as largely stationary objects, such as pacemakers and cochlear implants, are becoming small enough to actually pass through our bodies (i.e. in the form of pills) to deliver drugs and perform diagnostics.

Now, a new class of medical devices is emerging that adds a twist to the traditional implant: the devices are so small that they can travel through our bloodstream, not to mention are powered wirelessly via electromagnetic radio waves, according to Stanford electrical engineer Ada Poon.

By moving through the bloodstream, these tiny implants will be able to perform minor surgeries such as removing blood clots, Poon told an audience at the International Solid-State Circuits Conference in San Francisco this week.… Read more

Glucose levels are 100 times more concentrated in blood than in saliva, which is why in spite of many efforts to use saliva, diabetics are still pricking themselves to get accurate glucose readings.

But now, harnessing the power of nanotechnology, engineers at Brown University say they've designed a biochip that can measure glucose levels in saliva almost as accurately as current devices can measure levels in blood.

To do this, the engineers etched a complicated array of thousands of plasmonic interferometers (no, this is not an episode of Farscape) onto a fingernail-size biochip. This means they were essentially using … Read more

A team of physicists and engineers out of the University of California at Davis are taking the iPhone 4 to new heights--and they're not talking about No. 5.

Using materials that cost about as much as a typical app, they tricked out an iPhone with a few new tools, including a microscope, which--with the phone's camera--could identify features as small as 1.5 microns. That's small enough to identify different blood cell types.

"Field workers could put a blood sample on a slide, take a picture, and send it to specialists to analyze," says Sebastian Wachsmann-Hogiu, a physicist at the Center for Biophotonics, Science and Technology and lead author of the research to be presented in mid-October at the Optical Society's Annual Meeting in San Jose, Calif.

In rural clinics in developing nations, which tend to have limited if any lab equipment, these decked-out iPhones could help nurses and doctors diagnose a range of blood diseases by not only imaging blood cells but sending data in real time to colleagues anywhere around the world for further analysis.… Read more

If you think that engineering functional human body parts using a printer and laser is a sign of the end of time, you might want to proceed with caution. If you think such a development portends the saving of lives, read on.

Because researchers from an interdisciplinary group of five Fraunhofer institutes in Germany are announcing their successful creation of completely functional blood vessels using 3D printing and intense laser impulses.

First, advances in 3D printing have enabled researchers to print organs inexpensively and quickly using a modified inkjet printer. As in, very modified.

Using special inks, the researchers were … Read more

Researchers at the Imperial College London and the University of Oxford are reporting in the journal PLoS Biology that they can see the inner workings of white blood cells at the highest resolution ever documented.

To do this, the team immobilized a white blood cell using a pair of optical laser tweezers and watched with a super-res microscope as the so-called Natural Killer cell's actin filaments parted, creating a tiny portal through which enzyme-filled granules passed to kill targeted diseased tissue.

If you think the resulting image (at right) doesn't look super-res, consider the zoom. The place where … Read more

The V-Moda Revamp earbuds are a collaboration between V-Moda and HBO for the bloodsucking show "True Blood," but you don't have to be a fan to enjoy them. Aside from a couple small logos on the earbud pieces and the syringe-shaped remote control on the wire, nothing about them looks particularly vampiric.… Read more

When it comes to fantasy shows on HBO right now, I'm more of a "Game of Thrones" kind of guy, but I've been hearing a lot of chatter about the new season of "True Blood" as well. As V-Moda continues to offer more personalized headphones, the company's latest addition to the lineup is a partnership with HBO to bring "True Blood" fans a special-edition V-80 on-ear headphone.

The hardware features dual "ear shield" covers that pop off and allow the user to customize the design to go along with favorite images from the show, including a night club, Fagtasia, and the Japanese symbols you see on the "Tru Blood" beverage. V-Moda goes a step further and even lets you choose your own blood type to laser etch onto the earpiece, bringing you that much closer to the action.

In terms of the headphones themselves, the V-80 model is V-Moda's lightweight mobile headphone that features dual 40mm drivers and an extra bass push without the hassle of popping in extra batteries (looking at you, Monster). Other accolades for the V-80 include a Kevlar-wrapped cable, integrated remote control and microphone, and a "True Blood" exclusive "exoskeleton" protective case with a blood vial zipper.

The True Blood V-80 headphones are available now at the HBO online store and other online retailers for $230.

More pictures of the True Blood V-80s after the break.… Read more

If you don't believe cord cutting exists and that there isn't any competition between Netflix and cable programmers, then you needn't read on.

If on the other hand, you at least see the potential for Netflix to some day snatch customers away from the cable guys, then take note: this weekend HBO expects to see the 3 millionth download of the HBO Go app, which debuted on May 2, a company spokesman told CNET. There are 28 million HBO subscribers in the United States so the 3 million downloads would indicate that roughly 10 percent of the … Read more