For 20% of patients suffering from depression who are not helped by drugs such as Prozac, electroshock therapy is traditionally the last resort. Recently, research has begun around the world on a promising new alternative method, transcranial magnetic stimulation (TMS). With the TMS technique, electromagnetic windings are reinforced on the scalp. The magnetic impulses they create generate weak electrical currents in the brain, which stimulate nerve cells in areas affected by depression. At the same time, no damage is done to the gray matter. This spring, this treatment method received a wide response thanks to the Israeli company Brainsway, which announced successful trials of its new modification, deep TMS. “The magnetic fields of standard TMS devices penetrate the cerebral cortex by about a centimeter,” says Uzi Sofer, director of the company, “and the electrical windings of a deep TMS device can stimulate neurons lying in the brain at a much deeper depth. To do this, the magnetic field is projected into the depths of the brain from several points located on the skull at once.” This means that for the first time, doctors have the opportunity to target the limbic system hidden deep in the brain, which plays an important role in regulating mood. The new device is undergoing clinical trials, and some patients suffering from depression who have been exposed to deep TMS have improved their condition. Brainsway is currently seeking approval of its device from the FDA (Food and Drug Administration). Meanwhile, Sofer is trying to evaluate the applicability of deep TMS for the treatment of Parkinson’s disease and other neurological pathologies that affect areas of the brain hidden deep under the cortex.

Let’s say we have an injury area, and we need to replace the missing tissue in it. If we turn to stem cells for this, we will need some kind of substrate, the basis on which they should grow. Artificial materials such as plastic are not suitable for this, because the body detects them and rejects them as an alien substance. Ravi Kane, a biological engineer from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York, decided to work around this problem. He used alginate, a complex hydrocarbon compound that is part of brown algae, as the basis for the growth of stem cells. Microscopic granules (microspheres) of alginate are glued to the substrate using the alginate-decomposing enzyme alginate lyase. As a result, such a substrate, once inside the tissues, gradually resolves, and the rate of resorption can be adjusted. Kane hopes that structures made from algae will allow doctors to implant stem cells directly into damaged tissues, for example, healthy bone stem cells at the site of a fracture, and nerve stem cells directly into those areas of the brain that have suffered from Alzheimer’s disease. In the future, similar structures will make it possible to kill two birds with one stone by embedding both stem cells and drugs in the right place at once.

All over the world, scientists are working day and night on new cancer treatments, including more effective chemotherapy and improved bone marrow transplantation methods. Thomas Kensler, a biochemist at Johns Hopkins Medical Center, set out to question the relevance of all recent successes. Joining forces with colleagues from Dartmouth College, Kensler first set out to find ways to prevent the formation of malignant tumors themselves. Cancer can be considered as the result of a combination of certain conditions. Abnormal cells must cluster in the wrong place at the wrong moment, and the intercellular connection must be disrupted, which usually prevents uncontrolled cell differentiation and unrestrained reproduction. In the laboratory, Kensler was able to interrupt this sequence of adverse events by treating healthy tissues with the CDDO-Im chemical compound. This drug is produced from plant-based acids and is able to activate natural enzymes that remove toxic compounds from cells that cause DNA mutations. CDDO-Im will not be available to patients for several more years, but when it becomes available, says Kensler, “it is easy to imagine how doctors will prescribe it to healthy people based on their hereditary predisposition or the specific environmental conditions in which they need to stay. Our goal is to prevent the very first cancer cells from getting out of control.”

There are bacteria and viruses that are particularly resistant to medical influences, such as the human immunodeficiency virus or the common staphylococcus. Antibiotics and antiviral drugs are used to combat them, although they have serious drawbacks. Antiviral drugs cause damage to the pancreas and liver, and antibiotics are useless against the multiplying strains that are not amenable to drug treatment. K.T. Tsen, a physicist from Arizona, in search of a way out of this impasse, has developed a multi-purpose device that guarantees final victory. It is an ultrafast infrared laser that targets bacteria and viruses without damaging surrounding tissues. The novelty of his approach lies in the fact that this laser deals with pathogenic organisms by purely mechanical means, without involving either chemical or biological factors. “With the help of a laser, we cause strong vibrations in the protein shell of a bacterium or virus and bring them to such an extent that weak bonds in the viral capsid or in the cell wall collapse.” Since mammalian cells do not have such shells, this method destroys uninvited aliens, while the patient’s body is not damaged. No large-scale clinical studies of this method have yet been conducted, although preliminary in vitro experiments show that laser exposure effectively destroys the human immunodeficiency virus. “Judging by our first successes,” says Tsen, “it’s safe to say that in a year or two our lasers will be available in hospitals.”

If you want to clean your vessels of sclerotic plaques, you can use a technique similar to that used by a plumber when cleaning the sewer. However, for this procedure you will have to stay in the hospital for a long time. In Israel, at the Technion Institute, engineer Oded Salomon has developed an autonomous mechanism the size of a mosquito — this machine is capable of performing such surgical operations without significant incisions, so it does not take much time for the patient to fully heal wounds. In the 1980s, there was a computer game called “Surgeon with laser — micro-surgery.” Inspired by her idea, Salomon designed a robot with a diameter of 1 mm and named it ViRob. The hooked metal legs of this robot cling to the inner surface of veins and arteries, and the blades embedded in them cut off small pieces of tissue from the surface of blood vessels. Usually, when working with a surgical probe, the doctor holds its outer handle protruding from an incision in the body. ViRob does not need mechanical connections. After it is inserted into the vein, the surgeon controls the speed and direction of its movement by adjusting the frequency of the external magnetic field. “Since the ViRob does not need external manual control, it can get into nooks and crannies that were previously inaccessible,” says Salomon. “Now operations can be performed even remotely when the patient is at home.” The author suggests that in five years specialists will be able to use this device for practical needs such as biopsy or restoration of blood vessels. The article was published in the Popular Mechanics magazine (No. 7, July 2008).