A surgical device inspired by parasitic wasps could make it easier and less painful to remove certain tumours and blood clots.
Parasitic wasps inject their eggs through a long, thin, tubular organ called an ovipositor into living hosts, such as spiders and caterpillars. The organ鈥檚 blade-like valves, which run the full length of the tube, slide up and down alternately, pushing the eggs into the wasp鈥檚 victims using friction.
Aim茅e Sakes at Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and her colleagues have built a tool based on the same principle to extract bits of tissue, like tumours and blood clots, from the human body through a small incision.
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Currently, surgeons performing minimally invasive surgery can remove tissue by sucking it out through a tube, but this becomes more difficult if the tube is made longer and thinner in an effort to reach further into the body or make incisions smaller.
The researchers鈥� surgical device is 7 millimetres wide, 8 centimetres long and lined with six independently moving blades made from stainless steel. They tested its ability to transport material by extracting different consistencies of gelatin or minced meat, both of which mimic human tissue.
Unlike the suction method, the device maintained the same level of efficiency regardless of how far along the tube it transported the material and despite being relatively thin. However, the wasp-inspired device is slower, says Sakes, taking several minutes to remove material instead of seconds.
The device needs to undergo regulatory testing before it can be used by surgeons, says Sakes. In addition to being used to remove tumours and blood clots, it could help surgeons perform biopsies or extract reproductive organs, bit by bit, during a hysterectomy, she says. It could also be used to inject material, as the wasps do, letting doctors insert medications or radioactive sources for local radiation therapy into hard-to-reach places like the brain.
Frontiers in Bioengineering and Biotechnology
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