Columbia team develop biocompatible micromachines

Working with biocompatible hydrogels, Biomedical Engineering Professor Sam Sia at Columbia Engineering has invented a new technique that is said to stack the soft material in layers to make devices that have three-dimensional, freely moving parts.

The study - titled “Additive manufacturing of hydrogel-based materials for next-generation implantable medical devices,”, published online in Science Robotics  is said to demonstrate a fast manufacturing method Sia has dubbed “implantable microelectromechanical systems” (iMEMS).

By exploiting the unique mechanical properties of hydrogels, the researchers developed a locking mechanism for precise actuation and movement of freely moving parts, which can function as valves, manifolds, rotors, pumps, and drug delivery systems.

They were able to tune the biomaterials within a wide range of mechanical and diffusive properties and to control them after implantation without a sustained power supply, such as a battery. They then tested the payload delivery in a bone cancer model and found that the triggering of releases of doxorubicin from the device over 10 days showed high treatment efficacy and low toxicity, at 1/10^th of the standard systemic chemotherapy dose.