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Research finds four keys to piercing skin without hurting
Researchers at The Ohio State University believe we can learn from nature's design of the mosquito to create a painless microneedle for medical purposes.
"Mosquitoes must be doing something right if they can pierce our skin and draw blood without causing pain," said Bharat Bhushan, Ohio Eminent Scholar and Howard D. Winbigler Professor of mechanical engineering at Ohio State.
"We can use what we have learned from mosquitoes as a starting point to create a better microneedle."
In a recently published paper, Bhushan and his colleagues reported on their detailed analysis of the mosquito's proboscis -- the part that feeds on us. They identified four keys to how the insects pierce us without pain: use of a numbing agent; a serrated design to the "needle"; vibration during the piercing; and a combination of soft and hard parts on the proboscis.
Lessons from mosquitoes' painless piercing (DOI: 10.1016/j.jmbbm.2018.05.025) (DX)
(Score: 2) by JoeMerchant on Friday June 29 2018, @02:39AM (7 children)
The really impressive thing about mosquitoes is how their proboscis feels and/or smells its way into an active blood vessel.
There's a whole lot more going on in a mosquito than anybody will ever be willing to pay for in a disposable hypodermic needle.
🌻🌻 [google.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 29 2018, @03:05AM
A real-life gom jabbar would command a high price. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QrCfivcQe48 [youtube.com] (scene from Dune)
(Score: 3, Interesting) by MichaelDavidCrawford on Friday June 29 2018, @05:55AM (3 children)
I am a notoriously "tough stick". My Happy Pills might destroy my liver someday so I need regular CBC counts. That I'm a dirty old man now makes me a candidate for diabetes, heart attack and stroke. I have such great psychogenic pokydipsia that my very first symptom of hyponatremia may very well be sudden death. Last but not least I have a chronic vitamin D deficiency that even prescription Ergocalciferol won't give me strong teeth and bones.
What gets me down is not the initial stick but the way my nurses move their needles in and out and side to side as they vainly attemp to corner my vein.
In the ER one night my nurse was so stymied by my small wiggly veins that she wheeled out the heavy artillery:
A phenomenally expensive device that projected my veins onto my arm with a diode laser. It's was so powerful that as I moved my arm around it updated its image in real time.
Yes I Have No Bananas. [gofundme.com]
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 29 2018, @07:26AM (1 child)
(Score: 2) by RS3 on Friday June 29 2018, @01:11PM
Strontium and phosphorus for bones too.
(Score: 3, Interesting) by All Your Lawn Are Belong To Us on Friday June 29 2018, @03:01PM
Interesting. I am a tough stick also, often. My record in one setting was 11 sticks to get a good vein. A couple of times it has been 7. On my record they used an ultrasound to spot the vein.
It's lucky that I'm so used to that by now it usually doesn't matter - the staff are far more apoogetic to me than they need be because I know it is my veins and not their skill that is the issue at hand.
This sig for rent.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 29 2018, @06:23AM (1 child)
Since the mosquito has evolved an excellent needle, vein finding, & blood collecting mechanism, why aren't we engineering mosquitos that include various human diagnostic tests? A genetically engineered mosquito bites you under controlled conditions, takes some blood, then the mosquito turns color (or anything easy to sense) if your blood level of factor ___ is high and another color if it's low.
Or, maybe the mosquito is bred so that the anti-coagulant (aka bug saliva) doesn't leave people with an itchy bump, and after the bite the mosquito is sacrificed and the blood moved to a blood testing machine that works with tiny samples.
(Score: 1) by khallow on Friday June 29 2018, @06:43AM
And then determines what health care and life style products to sell you. I can't imagine why it wouldn't be a massively good idea. This documentary [wikipedia.org] highlights some of the high points of the idea.
(Score: 3, Insightful) by Snotnose on Friday June 29 2018, @03:39AM (6 children)
Trade a couple seconds of a pinprick for a week's worth of scratching.
Too lazy to google it, but I'm pretty sure you don't notice the mosquito using his dinner fork because she sprays a numbing agent to the skin just before saying grace.
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 5, Informative) by takyon on Friday June 29 2018, @03:47AM (2 children)
That simple Google search would have stopped you from spreading misinformation.
https://www.google.com/search?q=what+causes+mosquito+bites+to+itch [google.com] (search suggested by GOOG, I was typing "what causes mosquito pain")
https://www.terminix.com/pest-control/mosquitoes/bites/why-do-bites-itch/ [terminix.com]
https://www.medicalnewstoday.com/articles/320979.php [medicalnewstoday.com]
Not applicable to a microneedle patch.
From an eerily similar article:
Painless needle mimics a mosquito’s bite [newscientist.com]
[SIG] 10/28/2017: Soylent Upgrade v14 [soylentnews.org]
(Score: -1, Troll) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 29 2018, @05:58AM (1 child)
Did they just assume the mosquito's gender? Such bigotry... Maybe the mosquito identifies as a male?
(Score: 4, Informative) by KritonK on Friday June 29 2018, @09:52AM
According to https://www.loc.gov/rr/scitech/mysteries/mosquitoes.html [loc.gov]:
So, yes, her.
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Friday June 29 2018, @04:12AM
No need to Google: that's in the summary.
(Score: 2) by cmdrklarg on Friday June 29 2018, @05:44PM (1 child)
Best way to get rid of the itch is to run water over it as hot as you can stand for 10-15 seconds. A hot shower usually does the trick. Obviously don't use water hot enough to scald.
A washcloth soaked in hot water works for areas that are harder to get under the hot water tap, or if a shower isn't readily available.
The world is full of kings and queens who blind your eyes and steal your dreams.
(Score: 2) by Snotnose on Friday June 29 2018, @10:01PM
Just what I never wanted. Trade a week's worth of itching to a lifetime of scarring :)
When the dust settled America realized it was saved by a porn star.
(Score: 2) by ese002 on Friday June 29 2018, @07:07PM
They make much bigger holes and they don't cause pain either.