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You just never know what will get the creative juices flowing. It could be a slight aberration from your morning routine. Or it could be something as basic as the entree you order at dinner. The latter is actually what inspired the invention of a crab-like miniature robot that could help surgeons remove early-stage stomach cancers without leaving scars.

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Since it was established 11 years ago, the Stanford Biodesign Innovation Program has led to more than 200 patents and 24 start-up companies, including Spiracur, the company behind the SNaP Wound Care System (featured in the January issue of Medical Design Briefs). This intensive one-year program helps educate and guide doctors, engineers, and students to identify a medical need, develop an invention to address that need, navigate the hurdles of the regulatory process, and create a business plan that can be presented to venture capitalists for funding.
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If a prosthesis is not fit or aligned correctly, it can affect a patient's walking patterns, resulting in an asymmetric gait. These abnormal gait patterns can increase the stress on the healthy limb, leading to problems later in life such as arthritis. Researchers at Oak Ridge National Laboratory and Brooke Army Medical Center are now working to improve prosthesis performance for young soldiers returning from war by perfecting a portable, wearable system that could improve prosthesis fitting. The system can measure walking patterns and can be applied to real-world activities in a variety of settings. Next, they hope to develop a gait analysis system that can be utilized outside of a confined laboratory setting.

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Researchers have made T-rays into a much stronger directional beam than was previously thought possible — and have done so at room-temperature conditions. This is a breakthrough that should allow future T-ray systems to be smaller, more portable, easier to operate, and much cheaper than current devices.
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The process of monitoring blood glucose levels through finger pricking is an inconvenience at best for the estimated 26 million diabetics in the U.S. It's no mystery why researchers have continued to set their sights on developing more convenient and less invasive methods of monitoring glucose levels, including tear-based glucose sensors and non-intrusive contact lenses. Now, Brown University researchers are throwing their hats in the ring with a new kind of biochip that could allow diabetics to monitor their glucose levels using saliva.
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From delivering care to the developing world, to remote echocardiography, to hearing assessment, telemedicine has opened doors to new and potentially improved forms of diagnosis and treatment. Dermatology is one area in particular that stands to benefit greatly from this technology.
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Raven II, a robotic surgery system developed at UC Santa Cruz and the University of Washington, is being shared on an open-source basis with five other universities. Researchers hope that this will enable users to share software, replicate experiments, and collaborate in other ways — and ultimately advance the field through the power of academia.

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