Category: Future Medicine

from the enough-pain-&-suffering-already dept.
Senior Associate Robert Freitas Jr., author of the partially-Foresight-funded book Nanomedicine Vol. 1, has published an article on nanotechnology in the prestigious magazine The Sciences published by the New York Academy of Sciences. He concludes: "The hope and dream is that, sometime in the not-too-distant future, those devices will be able to eliminate virtually all the common diseases of the twentieth century, and virtually all bodily pain and suffering as well." Oddly, the magazine is not online at all; Read More for order info.

from the OK-so-it's-short-notice dept.
The Center for Bioethics and Human Dignity's summer conference , Bioethics in the New Millennium, will explore the ethical issues surrounding many new technologies including nanotechnology and artificial intelligence. Note that media attendance is free, and Foresight Update needs a representative at this event. Email the editor c/o [email protected] if interested.

from the little-machines-in-your-body dept.
For nanomedicine to be accepted someday, doctors and patients will need to get comfortable with small robots working in the human body. Brian Wang writes "waterproof microrobots made of gold and polymer over silicon can work in liquid (like bodily fluids). They can move small objects 100-300 microns. 100 microns is the size of large cells. These could be used for more precise surgery. These devices are leading the way to nanobots in medicine. Report is at msnbc link "

from the a-nanogram-of-sugar-helps-the-nanomedicine-go-down dept.
Robert Freitas writes "NIH is issuing Small Business Innovation Research (SBIR) grants for projects on nanotechnologies useful to biomedicine. The grants provide funding to develop near-term nanomedical applications involving primarily engineered nanomaterials and biomaterials. While the goals are admittedly modest by MNT standards — nanomedicine with a small 'n' — at least they are experimentally accessible now. The level of federal interest in this area is clearly growing. Here, NIH appears to be bending the usual federal rules a bit to help jumpstart the 'nano' sector of biomedicine. I've excerpted the most important parts of the announcement [Read More below]; the full text is at http://grants.nih.gov/grants/guide/pa-files/PA-00-018.html."