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Heartbeats tapped for power generator implant
A minuscule electricity generator implanted in the body could power an early-warning system for hypoglycaemia – or other medical conditions – from a heartbeat. A “nanogenerator” has been implanted in a live rat and has generated electricity from the animal’s beating heart. In future it could run in-vivo sensors.
Zhong Lin Wang at the Georgia Institute of Technology in Atlanta knew that at the nanoscale carefully constructed wires of zinc oxide could act as piezoelectric materials – materials that convert mechanical energy into electricity. So with colleagues he set about creating a fl exible generator that could harvest energy from natural actions such as breathing or heartbeats.
This 2 millimetre by 5 millimetre rectangular device was then attached to a rat’s diaphragm muscle using tissue adhesive. “The device is so tiny, you can barely see it by eye,” says Wang.
12 Quantum Health
With each breath, the rat’s implant stretched and twisted, deforming the nanowires and generating up to 4 picoamps of current at a potential of 2 millivolts. Wang then implanted a similar device on a different rat’s heart, generating around 30 picoamps at 3 millivolts.
While the amount of energy generated is small, Wang thinks he can scale up its output enough to power simple implantable nanosensors – blood pressure or glucose sensors, for instance – that have modest power requirements and don’t need a continuous supply.
Journal reference: Advanced Materials, DOI: 10.1002/adma.200904355
Source:
New Scientist:
www.newscientist.com
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