Imaging tech

We're still not at the place where we can have real-time X-ray video like in "Total Recall," but that doesn't mean X-ray technology hasn't come a long way in the last 116 years.

To underline that point, researchers in the town of Maastricht in Holland have fired up an X-ray machine from 1895 and compared it with a modern machine.

As you can see in the photos to the right, things have gotten sharper. The original device was built by a local educator and doctor just weeks after the first "how to" on X-ray machines was published. It was found in a warehouse and then dusted off by researchers from Maastricht University Medical Center who wanted to show it off.

The old machine was originally produced and built in the Dutch town, and the team didn't just turn it on, they replicated as closely as possible the conditions that would have been available and used by doctors of that time.

But it's not just the better-looking images that make modern X-ray machines better, according to the BBC, but also the fact that they use 1,500 times less radiation, making them safer and cheaper. The machine wasn't just fired up for fun, but for science, by doctors who chronicle their findings in the journal Radiology.

Still, that doesn't mean that we can look down at the venerable old Dutch machine. If you hadn't been told that the image on the left came from a Victorian-era machine, would you have been able to tell? Probably not.… Read more

Facebook and boobs. The parties just can't seem to get along. Be it what kinds of pictures to allow (photos of breastfeeding and mastectomies, for instance) or what kinds of campaigns to host (even breast cancer campaigns such as I like it on have been frowned upon by other breast cancer awareness campaigns), the social network can't seem to steer clear of breastly woes.

Now the removal of U.K. Facebook user Melissa Tullett's recent double mastectomy image is raising more than a few eyebrows.

The question at hand is the exact nature of Facebook's nudity … Read more

A group of researchers who describe kicking a habit as "a war that consists of a series of momentary self-control skirmishes" have found a link between texting and controlling cravings among a group of 27 heavy smokers in Los Angeles who participated in two related studies.

In the first study, the findings of which are reported this month in the journal Psychological Science, the smokers performed a basic self-control task while three regions of their brains most involved in impulse control were scanned using fMRI. They then described their cravings and smoking patterns, and their urine and lungs … Read more

Viruses are small. Very small. There are millions of types, and the 5,000 or so that have been studied in detail are typically between 10 and 300 nanometers (one-billionth of a meter) in diameter.

Because the wavelengths of visible light range from roughly 300 to 800 nanometers, viruses aren't exactly visible under normal lighting. Only optical fluoresce microscopes can see inside a virus, and then only indirectly, using dye, which cannot actually penetrate a virus.

So the "microsphere nanoscope" developed by scientists at the University of Manchester's School of Mechanical, Aerospace, and Civil Engineering in the U.K. and described in the journal Nature Communications is remarkable on two counts: It breaks the world record of direct imaging under normal lights by 20 times, viewing objects as small as 50 nm wide, and what's more, the tech behind it imposes no theoretical limit in the size of feature that can be seen.

This incredible jump in capacity could allow humans to see inside human cells and even live viruses for the first time, which in turn could give us many new insights into their structures and behaviors.… Read more

Forget about roses. If you really want to nail it tonight, try this on for size:

Darling, when you touch my face like that, my dorsolateral middle frontal gyrus is but one region that releases a variety of chemicals into my blood stream, thus beginning their incredibly rewarding--and speedy--journey to my nether regions and resulting in undulating pleasures.

So say researchers at Syracuse University who found, in their 2010 MRI study, "The Neuroimaging of Love," that falling in love takes about a fifth of a second, looks neurologically similar to getting high on cocaine, and affects sophisticated cognitive … Read more

Pacemaker patients who opt for magnetic resonance imaging risk serious complications, including damage to the pacemaker's parts or a change in the device's ability to consistently trigger a heartbeat (called pacing capture threshold). That is, until now.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration has just approved Medtronic's Revo MRI SureScan pacemaker for use in the U.S.; in doing so, the SureScan has become the first and only pacemaker in the country approved as MR-Conditional.

Minneapolis-based Medtronic says it will begin shipping the pacing system--which costs between $5,000 and $10,000--immediately.

"[This] is a … Read more

There is no shortage of health-related apps. Some 1,500 cater to professional caregivers and laypersons alike for a range of purposes, from counting calories to learning anatomy or pulling up drug dosage recommendations.

But Mobile MIM is the first mobile app to be cleared (just last week) by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration that allows physicians to make medical diagnoses using images transmitted to their iPhones or iPads.

The app transmits several image types, including those from computed tomography (CT), magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), and nuclear medicine technology such as positron emission tomography (PET). Using software developed by Cleveland-based MIM Software, Mobile MIM allows for not just viewing of medical images, but also displaying measurement lines, annotations, and areas of interest.

While the app is indicated for use only in the absence of a workstation, it's pretty clear that the ability to view radiology images on the go could result in, shall we say, dusty workstations.… Read more

Five melanoma patients at Memorial Sloan-Kettering Cancer Center in New York are about to become subjects in the first human clinical trial approved by the Food and Drug Administration that uses inorganic material in the same way as a drug.

Dubbed Cornell dots (or "C dots" for short), the brightly glowing nanoparticles are silica spheres less than 8 nanometers (one-billionth of a meter) in diameter that hold dye molecules. Those spheres are basically glass, chemically inert and small enough to pass through the body and out in a urine stream, and for clinical use are coated with polyethylene glycol … Read more

Researchers in Germany are reporting two thumbs up for their first clinical trial testing a remote-controlled capsule endoscope in the stomachs of healthy volunteers.

To screen for gastric cancer, physicians often use conventional endoscopy (replete with tubing) to analyze changes in the lining of stomachs, but the uncomfortable procedure, which carries the risk of punctured organs and infection, can result in some patients opting not to have the exam done.

Ingestible capsule endoscopies, with pill-sized video capsules, can record and transmit images in real time without a single incision point. The main issue is that the capsule isn't always … Read more