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Bed of Needles
27 May 2015

Bed of Needles

Researchers developing life-changing pharmaceuticals often face a challenge: how to actually put their chemicals inside living cells? One new method (pictured) sounds like something out of a horror movie. Human cells (coloured pink) were dropped onto a bed of razor-sharp needles, 9000 times smaller than a bed of nails. These ‘nanoneedles’ (green) pierce each cell’s membrane in thousands of places, injecting tens of thousands of cells at once with biomolecules like DNA and proteins. Remarkably, the cells remain alive and healthy after their ordeal, and continue to grow once the biodegradable nanoneedles have melted away. Sculpted out of silicon using a technique called photolithography, nanoneedles have been tested on living tissues as well. Pressed into a mouse’s skin and muscle, they delivered biomolecules encouraging new blood vessels to grow. There’s every hope that nanoneedles could perform similar jobs in human tissues – just imagine having a hundred thousand needles at once!

Written by John Ankers

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BPoD stands for Biomedical Picture of the Day. Managed by the MRC Laboratory of Medical Sciences until Jul 2023, it is now run independently by a dedicated team of scientists and writers. The website aims to engage everyone, young and old, in the wonders of biology, and its influence on medicine. The ever-growing archive of more than 4000 research images documents over a decade of progress. Explore the collection and see what you discover. Images are kindly provided for inclusion on this website through the generosity of scientists across the globe.

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