Carnegie Mellon University (CMU) has collaborated with the University of Pittsburgh (Pitt) and five other institutions in other to develop a medical device that helps patients with large wounds to regrow muscle tissue. Researchers can make a major step in rapid therapy by combining artificial intelligence, bioelectronics, and regenerative medicine. This project is funded—$22 million—by the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA).
Generally, humans have ability to regenerate their small wounds, but they cannot heal big wounds which more than 20% of a muscle is damaged.
However, in the near future, the self-healing ability of humans will be improved after applying a device developed by the team. The function of this device is to modify the environment inside big wounds to make them similar to that of small wounds, so the body can heal big wounds the way it heals small wounds.
“Our patch will allow us to heal large scale wounds in half the time it would take a normal wound, with more than 70% restored functional tissue,” said Tzahi Cohen-Karni, an associate Professor at the Departments of Biomedical Engineering and Materials Science and Engineering in CMU.
The team’s device will be implanted inside wounds in order that the device can manipulate key molecules into healing damaged muscles. In this process, the device will be controlled by artificial intelligence.
Furthermore, this project has been financially supported by DARPA’s Bioelectronics for Tissue Regeneration program which aims at speeding warfighter recovery. The team consists of leading researchers in the fields of bioelectrical sensors and materials science and engineering, photonics, and bioengineering from Carnegie Mellon University, University of Pittsburgh, Northwestern University, Rice University, University of Vermont, University of Wisconsin, and Walter Reed National Military Medical Center.
This medical device has been still in the early stage of development, and it would take around two years to make it available. Afterward, the next two years will be the stage that researchers work collaboratively with surgeons at Walter Reed, who treat patients with major muscle loss, so the device will be improved until it becomes suitable for rapid therapy. Meanwhile, the researchers will also work with industry partners and the Food and Drug Administration so as to identify and clear regulatory hurdles.
Retrieved from: https://engineering.cmu.edu/news-events/news/2020/03/12-healing-wounds.html
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