Air Force Treating Wounds With Lasers and Nanotech 92
An anonymous reader passes along a piece up on Wired's Danger Room about advanced medical tech that's being used in the military, but is not available generally due to the lack of FDA approval. "Forget stitches and old-school sutures. The Air Force is funding scientists who are using nanotechnology and lasers to seal up wounds at a molecular level. It might sound like Star Trek tech, but it's actually the latest in a series of ambitious Pentagon efforts to create faster, more effective methods of treating war-zone injuries. ... Instead of being sealed up with a needle and thread, a patient's wound would be coated in a dye, then exposed to green light for 2-3 minutes. The dye absorbs the light and catalyzes molecular bonds between the tissue's collagen. The bonds instantly create a seal that's watertight, which prevents inflammation or risk of infection, and speeds up the formation of scar tissue."
What? (Score:3, Interesting)
Superglue is too fast now?
Bad Summary (Score:5, Interesting)
Before there are rants on the unapproved use of medical procedures on the troops, as suggested by the summary, read the article. It states they are only doing clinical trials, and mention the difficulty in getting FDA approval.
Re:The future is awesome (Score:4, Interesting)
except maybe more Vitamin D than you're probably getting
Recently discovered this myself.
Had some lab work done not too long ago... Turns out I've got almost no Vitamin D in me. "trace amounts" is what the Doctor said. He was horrified and put me on some supplements pretty quickly. Told me to get outside in the sun, eat better, etc.
I had no idea just how many horrible things can happen when you're low on Vitamin D.
And, according to my doctor, just about everyone is deficient to one degree or another. And it's especially bad around here in the winter (less sunlight and people don't like to go out in the cold).
Amazing.