MIT researchers have developed an ingestible robot that can unfold itself and be steered throughout the body using a magnetic field:
MIT researchers and associates have developed a tiny "origami robot" that can unfold itself from a swallowed capsule and, steered by a physician via an external magnetic field, crawl across the stomach wall to operate on a patient. For example, it can remove a swallowed button battery or patch a wound.
Every year, 3,500 swallowed button batteries are reported in the U.S. alone. Frequently, the batteries are digested normally, but if they come into prolonged contact with the tissue of the esophagus or stomach, they can cause an electric current that produces hydroxide, which burns the tissue.
Also at MIT News.
Ingestible, Controllable, and Degradable Origami Robot for Patching Stomach Wounds
(Score: 1, Insightful) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2016, @02:40PM
Frequently, the batteries are digested normally ...
Maybe this should read:
Frequently, the batteries are passed normally ...
I'm not sure what normal battery digestion encompasses, but I'm pretty sure it'd burn my tissue!
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Thursday May 19 2016, @02:46PM
So the robot grabs the battery, and now you habe a robot + battery in there, how is that better?
(Score: 3, Funny) by Scruffy Beard 2 on Thursday May 19 2016, @03:04PM
Well, if the battery is stuck, and not moving, the robot can jiggle it.
The robot also appears to be made of paper, which will quickly degrade in the stomach.
(Score: 2) by rts008 on Thursday May 19 2016, @08:52PM
I see you are starting a collection [up]there.
Don't start a stamp collection. ;-)
(Score: 3, Informative) by butthurt on Friday May 20 2016, @01:23AM
This origami machine contains a magnet. Instead of this device, a magnet on a string would suffice, I imagine, for retrieving button cells from the stomach. If the magnet came loose from the string, it would pass through the digestive system more comfortably than a magnet encased in pointy plastic. Tethered magnets have been used for liver surgery through the vagina. [europepmc.org]
This origami object was announced last May [ieee.org].
(Score: 2) by urza9814 on Friday May 20 2016, @03:11PM
First of all, if I'm the patient I'd much rather swallow a pill than have a cable running down my throat. Secondly, you can steer this robot; you can't steer a magnet on a string. That's important, since it's a magnet and it can (and the intention is it WILL) get stuck to things.
It's not much problem if someone swallows one magnet, but if they swallow two it gets quite hazardous as the magnets can pinch a piece of intestine between them. The magnets get stuck, the tissue gets starved of oxygen, and the magnets can even puncture it. A battery and a magnet would probably have the same potential issues, with the added hazard of electric current from the battery. So if you lose your magnet on a string or it attracts the battery from the wrong location, then the patient would need emergency surgery to remove both. Surgery or this "robot" pill. Or even if you don't lose it, if you've got a battery/tissue/magnet sandwich and you go to pull that magnet back up, you could rip a hole in your patient in the process!