◀ A sensor patch a surgeon to wear Two months later, after tweaking on the skin picks for the duration of the sensor patch design, the team up signals from an acoustic bea- a surgery, they said. was ready to try again. They spent con implanted in So Lan changed hours reviewing video footage of their the breast tumor and sends infor- course, deciding previous attempt, guring out how mation on the to project the they could make the procedure faster tumor’s position AcouStar guidance and more accurate. The surgery was a to a tablet. onto a tablet dis- success, and the team published their play instead. work in May 2018. In the spring of 2017, after three Now, working with Vibronix, a months testing a prototype on a sil- company founded in 2014 by Cheng icone breast model called a “phantom,” and his colleague Pu Wang, and with Cheng, Lan, and their team were ready support from the National Science for a more realistic trial. At this proof- Foundation’s Small Business Innovation state-of-the-art gadget will op if no of-concept stage, they couldn’t yet test Research program, AcouStar is getting one needs or wants it. That’s why Cheng it on a real patient. But they could try ready to move beyond the prototype takes a “problem-oriented approach,” it out on a cadaver breast. stage. That means demonstrating that starting each project by working with The team would have access to the the ber-optic guide wire is safe in doctors to identify a problem, rather cadaver for only three days, and Obeng- the body for up to 24 hours, as well as than looking for jazzy applications of Gyasi would act as surgeon. On her rst making the AcouStar platform smaller new technology. try, she was able to completely excise and easier to use. Ultimately, Cheng Lan learned this lesson rsthand, the “pseudotumor,” but the researchers believes AcouStar could be used not when Han and her surgical colleague, realized that the patch they had used just for breast cancer surgery but for a Samilia Obeng-Gyasi, gently vetoed to x the sensors to the body wasn’t wide variety of procedures that require his proposal to use the HoloLens: sticky enough; it kept moving around surgeons to locate something they can’t the headset was just too heavy for during the surgery. see or feel with pinpoint accuracy.
¦§¨© ¦§ª« «¨¬ ®¯ª°±©² self-lubricated and colors, it’s been nearly condom developed New Self- 50 years since a major by Grinsta¡’s team. advancement in the design The results Lubricating of condoms. That may were promising: have changed in October, when Boston 85 percent of Condom University researchers announced the study participants invention of a self-lubricating con- who felt the new dom that could help prevent sexually condom material Would transmitted infections and unplanned and compared pregnancies. them to latex Revolutionize “Preventing the spread of HIV and condoms and ▲ ENG’s Mark Grinstaff other diseases is critically important,” condoms wetted Safe Sex says Mark Grinsta¡, a College of Arts by personal lubricant products found & Sciences professor of chemistry and that Grinsta¡’s was the most slippery a College of Engineering professor of to the touch. biomedical engineering, coleader of the “People found that to be an attractive interdisciplinary research team that feature,” says Grinsta¡, who is also Developed by BU team, it may announced the new condom design in a ENG’s Distinguished Professor of help reduce disease spread, paper published in the British journal Translational Research. “Those in unwanted pregnancies Royal Society Open Science. “That our survey who don’t typically use a really was the driving force for creat- condom said they would consider using / . ing new technology here.” a condom if it stayed slippery like this.” The actual condom has not been Of every 10 participants in the tested yet. What has been done is a group, 9 indicated that if it were on touch test: individuals were given the market, they would prefer to use three pieces of latex—a standard, the self-lubricating condom over a nonlubricated latex condom, a standard latex version. standard condom with a personal To the naked eye, the self-lubricating
lubricant applied to it, and the condom prototype looks like a typical TOP LAN LU AND CHENG JIXIN OF COURTESY
24 Winter–Spring
22-27_Explorations_Bostonia_WS19_final.indd 24 2/5/19 6:16 PM ▲ Grinstaff’s group spent more than three years researching the new condom, testing nearly 1,000 formulations to find a winning combination of latex and lubrication.
in preventing pregnancy when used properly. They are the only form of contraception that eectively protects against sexually transmitted infections (STIs), yet many people don’t use them. Poor lubrication is a major factor, according to the World Health Organization, the National Institutes “Preventing the spread of HIV and other diseases is critically of Health, and the Gates Foundation. important,” says Mark Grinstaff. “That really was the driving The persistent slick feel of the self- lubricating condom could help people force for creating new technology here.” overcome some of the biggest self- reported turnos about using condoms, which include complaints that tradi- male latex condom. The technological ing Ducksoo Kim, a tional latex condoms create too much improvement is in the way that it feels School of Medicine friction, reducing pleasure and causing to the touch. professor of radiol- discomfort to sensitive skin. In contrast to the popular silicone- ogy and Boston “Poor lubrication encourages based lubricants found in many Medical Center condom misusage,” says Stacy Chin condoms, which repel moisture and director of in- (GRS’17), a coauthor on the study and can be tacky and messy, the newly terventional radiol- CEO of start-up HydroGlyde Coatings, designed condom is coated in polymers ogy, who partnered a BU spin-o that will help bring the that capture moisture from water and with Grinsta to coated condoms to consumers. She says bodily uids and trap those liquids on bring the idea of the team knew if they could “improve
the condom surface. The result is es- a self-lubricating ▲ Stacy Chin (GRS’17), comfort for users, we can enable them sentially a continuously self-lubricating condom to reality. CEO of HydroGlyde to wear condoms more consistently condom that could consistently provide “We have a Coatings, which will and appropriately, preventing STIs and produce the first a slippery sensation throughout sexual coating on the latex new condoms unplanned pregnancies.” activity for extended lengths of time, that maintains Chin hopes HydroGlyde Coatings— without the need to stop and add any all the properties of latex,” Grinsta which has already raised $1.4 million in articial lubricant. explains. “It’s durable and strong. It is funding from the NIH Small Business It took Grinsta’s group, which a coating that when you get a thin layer Innovation Research program, the specializes in solving medical prob- of moisture on it, it becomes slippery. Massachusetts Tech Transfer Center, lems, more than three years of It’s quite exciting technology.” and the Massachusetts Life Sciences research and testing nearly 1,000 The US Centers for Disease Con- Center—will have its rst product, a formulations to nd a winning com- trol and Prevention and other global self-lubricating latex-based male bination of latex and lubrication. health organizations warn that condom, on the market in two years. It started back in 2015 with a call for sexually transmitted diseases (STDs) The last signicant advancement in proposals from the Bill & Melinda Gates are alarmingly on the rise. Nearly 2.3 condom technology was the lubricant Foundation, which was seeking ideas million STDs were diagnosed in 2017 now in 99 percent of condoms. for new technologies that would increase in the United States; infections are “Glow-in-the-dark condoms and condom usage around the world. The also rising for syphilis and gonorrhea avored condoms are clever gimmicks Gates Foundation awarded grants of in some countries. that don’t help performance,” says
TOP RIGHT TOP OPEN SCIENCE SOCIETY ROYAL OF LEFT; COURTESY TOP CATLANE CONTRIBUTOR ISTOCK $100,000 each to 11 researchers, includ- Condoms are 98 percent eective Grinsta. “I think we can do better.”
Winter–Spring 25
22-27_Explorations_Bostonia_WS19_final.indd 25 1/30/19 2:24 PM