Nanobots have been the realm of science fiction for decades. Referenced and discussed in comic books and movies to tell the reader about something so “futuristic” that it can change the very being of the human body.
Now imagine that they already exist. That we have created them and can use a swarm of billions, trillions even, tiny robots.
Thousands of times thinner than a human hair and able to cruise around your body to repair a bone or heal an illness.
Their scale is unfathomable and their possibilities (if you were to listen to the movies and comic books) almost infinite.
Maybe not to the scale of fiction but they do exist and have done for over a decade and Samuel Sánchez, a chemist with the Institute of Bioengineering of Catalonia, Barcelona has been envisioning that nanobots could be programmed and designer to carry useful payloads such as cancer-killing drugs or antibiotics through the body.
Imagine a particle of silica as the body, or chassis of the nanobot. Sánchez has discovered and shown that when this surface is dotted with special proteins it can be propelled through fluid like little motors.
Using experimental antibiotics to treat infected wounds on mice. When dropped onto one end of an infected wound, these bots travelled through the skin to treat the entire area - the first ever report of nanobots killing bacteria in animals.
They also found out during this research that without these dots of protein (urea) to fuel the movement of the bots, they couldn’t heal the entire infection, only locally like regular drugs which is when they discovered that motion was essential for the bot’s effectiveness.
Whilst they are still testing, improving and building on these machines, there is hope that one day, thanks to this technology that so many injuries will become trivial.
"The end of infections, only a small pinprick away. The research is certainly promising and the thought that injuries such as broken bones will go from months of healing to mere weeks or days is tantalising"
