Tag: sound waves

Categories : Injury & Trauma NeurologyTags : Leave a comment

Scientists Test a Soundwave Treatment for Persistent Concussion Symptoms

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Coup and contrecoup brain injury. Credit: Scientific Animations CC4.0

Recent research has indicated that acoustic stimulation of the brain may ease persistent symptoms in individuals who experienced mild traumatic brain injury in the past.

The study, which appears in Annals of Clinical and Translational Neurology, included 106 military service members, veterans, or their spouses with persistent symptoms after mild traumatic brain injury sustained three months to 10 years ago. Participants were randomised 1:1 to receive either 10 sessions of engineered tones linked to brainwaves (intervention), or random engineered tones not linked to brainwaves (sham control). All participants rested comfortably in the dark in a ‘zero-gravity’ chair, eyes closed and listening to the computer-generated tones via earbud-style headphones. The primary outcome was change in symptom scores, with secondary outcomes of heart rate variability and self-reported measures of sleep, mood, and anxiety.

Among all study participants, symptom scores clinically and statistically improved compared with baseline, with benefits largely sustained at three months and six months; however, there were no significant differences between the intervention and control groups. Similar patterns were observed for secondary outcomes.

The results indicate that although acoustic stimulation is associated with marked improvement in postconcussive symptoms, listening to acoustic stimulation based on brain electrical activity, as it was delivered in this study, may not improve symptoms, brain function, or heart rate variability more than randomly generated, computer engineered acoustic stimulation.

“Postconcussive symptoms have proven very difficult to treat, and the degree of improvement seen in this study is virtually unheard of, though further research is needed to identify what elements are key to its success,” said corresponding author Michael J. Roy, MD, MPH, of Uniformed Services University and the Walter Reed National Military Medical Center, in Bethesda.

Source: Wiley

Categories : Medical Research & Technology Regenerative MedicineTags : Leave a comment

Sound Waves Used to Regrow Bone

On By ModernMedia
Image by Pawel Czerwinski on Unsplash

In a significant advance for the field of tissue engineering, researchers have used sound waves to turn stem cells into bone cells, a technology which may help regrow bone lost by cancer or disease.

Described in the journal Small, the innovative stem cell treatment from researchers at RMIT University offers a smart way forward for overcoming some of the field’s biggest challenges, through the precision power of high-frequency sound waves.

Tissue engineering is an emerging field that aims to rebuild bone and muscle by harnessing the human body’s natural ability to heal itself. A key challenge in regrowing bone is having sufficient amounts of bone cells that can thrive once implanted in the target area.

So far, turning stem cells into bone cells has needed complicated and expensive equipment, making widespread clinical use unrealistic.

The few clinical trials trying to regrow bone mostly used stem cells painfully extracted from a patient’s bone marrow.

In a new study published in the journal Small, the RMIT research team showed stem cells treated with high-frequency sound waves turned into bone cells quickly and efficiently.

Importantly, the treatment was effective on multiple types of cells including fat-derived stem cells, which are far less painful to extract from a patient.

Co-lead researcher Dr Amy Gelmi said the new approach was faster and simpler than other methods.

“The sound waves cut the treatment time usually required to get stem cells to begin to turn into bone cells by several days,” said Dr Gelmi. “This method also doesn’t require any special ‘bone-inducing’ drugs and it’s very easy to apply to the stem cells.

“Our study found this new approach has strong potential to be used for treating the stem cells, before we either coat them onto an implant or inject them directly into the body for tissue engineering.”

The high-frequency sound waves used in the stem cell treatment were generated on a low-cost microchip device developed by RMIT.

Co-lead researcher Distinguished Professor Leslie Yeo and his team have spent over a decade researching the interaction of sound waves at frequencies above 10MHz with different materials.

The sound wave-generating device they developed can be used to precisely manipulate cells, fluids or materials.

“We can use the sound waves to apply just the right amount of pressure in the right places to the stem cells, to trigger the change process,” Prof Yeo said.

“Our device is cheap and simple to use, so could easily be upscaled for treating large numbers of cells simultaneously – vital for effective tissue engineering.”

The next stage in the research is investigating methods to upscale the platform, working towards the development of practical bioreactors to drive efficient stem cell differentiation.

Source: RMIT