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New Israeli nanotechnology will restore the sense of touch for people who have lost it due to injury or amputation, scientists say.
A Tel Aviv University lab has developed a tiny sensor that can be implanted in fingers, toes, or any part of the body that has lost the sense of touch. It “bypasses” the broken nerves in that area and “connects” the sensation to other healthy nerves.
Biomedical engineer Dr Ben M. Maoz told The Times of Israel he came up with the idea after hearing Dr Amir Arami, a colleague at Tel Aviv University and a microsurgeon at Sheba Medical Center, say how many of his patients could not regain their sensations. Now he has successfully tested his invention on rats, reporting its success in the peer-reviewed journal ACS Nano.
“It’s super exciting because we were able to generate something that has real benefits for people with real problems, and it all started with a conversation between me and a friend,” Maoz said.
“There are prosthetic limbs already that connect to the nerves in the body, but the challenge we took on is completely different – people with hands or fingers that are working, but have lost feeling and want to feel again. sense of touch, ”he said. added.
“There is no solution for these people, but we have found one.”
A highly magnified image of the implant that restores the sense of touch for injured limbs (courtesy Tel Aviv University)
Its tiny sensor is implanted in the nerve of the injured limb and connected to a healthy nerve. The body quickly learns that the nerve receives signals from a different source and interprets them correctly, which means that the sense of touch is restored.
Maoz said the technology will have a greater impact on quality of life than initially evident, noting that touch is a critical sense in calculating the appropriate amount of pressure needed to press a button with one finger, or even to walk straight.
Dr Ben Maoz (courtesy Tel Aviv University / Jonathan Tzur)
“Simple tasks like holding keys or cell phones all require us to have a sense of touch, so that we can accurately judge the pressure we need to apply,” he said.
The device, while electronic, doesn’t need a battery because it generates power from the same movement it follows and mimics in nerve signals, Maoz said.
To complete the experiment, Maoz’s team cut sensory nerves from a rat’s paw and installed the device in some while leaving it numb in others. A tracker allowed the team to monitor the sensation in rat paws.
“The rats whose nerves had been cut and who did not have the device could not smell, while those who received the implant had the same degree of sensation as those whose nerves had not been cut”, did he declare. “This indicates that the device is working fine.”
“Then we want to test the implant on larger animals and at a later stage implant our sensors in the fingers of people who have lost the ability to feel touch,” he added. “Restoring this ability can dramatically improve the functioning of people. “
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