It's almost surreal, like something out of a sci-fi flick, but nano-microchips invisible to the naked eye are a reality that are already being hosted in wide-range of applications. The question is, how long will it take governments and big pharma to immerse nano-microchips inside of vaccines to tag and surveil global populations?
Nanotechnology deals with structures smaller than one micrometer (less than 1/30th the width of a human hair), and involves developing materials or devices within that size. To put the size of a nanometer in perspective, it is 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair.
More than ten years ago, simple low-cost techniques improved the design and manufacture of nano-microchips. That unlocked a multitude of methodologies for their manufacture in a wide-range of applications including optical, biological, and electronic devices.
The joint use of nanoelectronics, photolithography, and new biomaterials, have enabled the required manufacturing technology towards nanorobots for common medical applications, such as surgical instrumentation, diagnosis and drug delivery.
Japan's Hitachi says it has developed the world's smallest and thinnest microchip, that can be embedded in paper to track down parcels or prove the authenticity of a document. The integrated circuit (IC) chip is as minute as a speck of dust.
Nanoelectrodes implanted in the brain are increasingly being used to manage neurological disorders. Mohammad Reza Abidian, a post-doctoral researcher at the U-M Department of Biomedical Engineering said that polymers in nanotubes "are biocompatible and have both electronic and ionic conductivity." He further stated "therefore, these materials are good candidates for biomedical applications such as neural interfaces, biosensors and drug delivery systems."
Depending on the objectives of such studies, research could theoretically pave the way for smart recording electrodes that can deliver drugs to positively or negatively affect the immune response.
Through nanotechnology, researchers have also been able to create artificial pores able to transmit nanoscale materials through membranes.
A UC biomedical engineering study appearing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, Sept. 27, 2009, successfully inserted the modified core of a nanomotor, a microscopic biological machine, into a lipid membrane. The resulting channel enabled them to move both single- and double-stranded DNA through the membrane.
Professor Peixuan Guo who led the study said past work with biological channels has been focused on channels large enough to move only single-stranded genetic material.
"Since the genomic DNA of human, animals, plants, fungus and bacteria are double stranded, the development of single pore system that can sequence double-stranded DNA is very important," he says.
Such engineered channels could have applications in nano-sensing, DNA sequencing, drug loading, including innovative techniques to implement DNA packaging mechanisms of viral nanomotors and vaccine delivery.
"The idea that a DNA molecule travels through the nanopore, advancing nucleotide by nucleotide, could lead to the development of a single pore DNA sequencing apparatus, an area of strong national interest," Guo said.
Scientists working at Queen Mary, University of London, have developed micrometer-sized capsules to safely deliver drugs inside living cells. These "micro shuttles" could hypothetically be loaded with a specific microchip controlling the dose of medication to be opened remotely, releasing their contents. Besides monitoring the dosage, the same microchip could be used to surveil the patient in conjunction with various tracking systems.
Scientists in the United Kingdom have recently reported advances towards overcoming key challenges in nanotechnology. They demonstrated how nanoparticles could move quickly in a desired direction without help from outside forces. Their achievement has broad implications, the scientists say, raising the possibility of coaxing cells to move and grow in specific directions.
Doug Dorst, a microbiologist and vaccine critic in South Wales, says these advances have an immense appeal to vaccine makers. "Biotech companies and their researchers have quickly moved most funding initiatives towards nanotechnology to increase the potency of their vaccines," he said. If microorganisms inside of vaccines can be coaxed into targeting or invading specific cells, they could achieve their goal at an accelerated rate over conventional vaccines. "Depending on which side of the vaccine debate you're on, whether pro or con, nanobots inside vaccine preparations could advance their effectiveness exponentially by either dramatically improving or destroying immunity depending on their design," he added.
Dorst claims that present day nanobot technology could just as easily be used to advance biological weapons as they can to advance human health. "For every fear that biotech propaganda proliferates about deadly diseases and how vaccines prevent them, it is one more lie to incrementally convince the masses that vaccines are effective."
The worry for Dorst is that one day vaccines "will do what they've always been intended for...control of the global populace." FULL STORY
Nanotechnology deals with structures smaller than one micrometer (less than 1/30th the width of a human hair), and involves developing materials or devices within that size. To put the size of a nanometer in perspective, it is 100,000 times smaller than the width of a human hair.
More than ten years ago, simple low-cost techniques improved the design and manufacture of nano-microchips. That unlocked a multitude of methodologies for their manufacture in a wide-range of applications including optical, biological, and electronic devices.
The joint use of nanoelectronics, photolithography, and new biomaterials, have enabled the required manufacturing technology towards nanorobots for common medical applications, such as surgical instrumentation, diagnosis and drug delivery.
Japan's Hitachi says it has developed the world's smallest and thinnest microchip, that can be embedded in paper to track down parcels or prove the authenticity of a document. The integrated circuit (IC) chip is as minute as a speck of dust.
Nanoelectrodes implanted in the brain are increasingly being used to manage neurological disorders. Mohammad Reza Abidian, a post-doctoral researcher at the U-M Department of Biomedical Engineering said that polymers in nanotubes "are biocompatible and have both electronic and ionic conductivity." He further stated "therefore, these materials are good candidates for biomedical applications such as neural interfaces, biosensors and drug delivery systems."
Depending on the objectives of such studies, research could theoretically pave the way for smart recording electrodes that can deliver drugs to positively or negatively affect the immune response.
Through nanotechnology, researchers have also been able to create artificial pores able to transmit nanoscale materials through membranes.
A UC biomedical engineering study appearing in the journal Nature Nanotechnology, Sept. 27, 2009, successfully inserted the modified core of a nanomotor, a microscopic biological machine, into a lipid membrane. The resulting channel enabled them to move both single- and double-stranded DNA through the membrane.
Professor Peixuan Guo who led the study said past work with biological channels has been focused on channels large enough to move only single-stranded genetic material.
"Since the genomic DNA of human, animals, plants, fungus and bacteria are double stranded, the development of single pore system that can sequence double-stranded DNA is very important," he says.
Such engineered channels could have applications in nano-sensing, DNA sequencing, drug loading, including innovative techniques to implement DNA packaging mechanisms of viral nanomotors and vaccine delivery.
"The idea that a DNA molecule travels through the nanopore, advancing nucleotide by nucleotide, could lead to the development of a single pore DNA sequencing apparatus, an area of strong national interest," Guo said.
Scientists working at Queen Mary, University of London, have developed micrometer-sized capsules to safely deliver drugs inside living cells. These "micro shuttles" could hypothetically be loaded with a specific microchip controlling the dose of medication to be opened remotely, releasing their contents. Besides monitoring the dosage, the same microchip could be used to surveil the patient in conjunction with various tracking systems.
Scientists in the United Kingdom have recently reported advances towards overcoming key challenges in nanotechnology. They demonstrated how nanoparticles could move quickly in a desired direction without help from outside forces. Their achievement has broad implications, the scientists say, raising the possibility of coaxing cells to move and grow in specific directions.
Doug Dorst, a microbiologist and vaccine critic in South Wales, says these advances have an immense appeal to vaccine makers. "Biotech companies and their researchers have quickly moved most funding initiatives towards nanotechnology to increase the potency of their vaccines," he said. If microorganisms inside of vaccines can be coaxed into targeting or invading specific cells, they could achieve their goal at an accelerated rate over conventional vaccines. "Depending on which side of the vaccine debate you're on, whether pro or con, nanobots inside vaccine preparations could advance their effectiveness exponentially by either dramatically improving or destroying immunity depending on their design," he added.
Dorst claims that present day nanobot technology could just as easily be used to advance biological weapons as they can to advance human health. "For every fear that biotech propaganda proliferates about deadly diseases and how vaccines prevent them, it is one more lie to incrementally convince the masses that vaccines are effective."
The worry for Dorst is that one day vaccines "will do what they've always been intended for...control of the global populace." FULL STORY
