Researchers at the University of California, Davis have developed a technology that targets CD147 to significantly improve bone health and treat musculoskeletal diseases without the side effects of current therapies.

Inflatable pouches are attractive as actuators and structural links in soft robots due to their low deflated profile and high deformation ratio. Particularly compelling for minimally invasive surgery, deflated robots/actuators may be deployed in small form factors and maneuver delicately in tight spaces once inflated. However, current fabrication methods do not readily scale for production of actuators with less than 1 mm feature sizes; they often require precision handling of separator films; and/or there are limited multilayer integration capabilities. Fully miniaturized, high degree-of-freedom surgical pouch robots and actuators have not yet been realized.To overcome these challenges, UC Berkeley researchers have developed a rapid, monolithic, and scalable manufacturing method for fabricating thin-film-based pneumatic pouch soft robots. Small features (less than 0.3 mm) can be patterned at high speeds and using commercially available manufacturing tools while maintaining film planarity. Resulting robots can have complex, multilayer structures including single- and bi-directional joint actuators, structural links, integrated in-plane air channels, through-holes for interlayer connectivity, and air inlets to a supply manifold—from a single integrated processing step. Researchers have demonstrated a miniature four finger hand which can dexterously manipulate a cube (8 degrees of freedom), as well as an 10 degree-of-freedom planar arm with a gripper which can maneuver around obstacles. Entire pouch robot structures can have un-inflated thickness of less than 300 um and be inherently soft, allowing the robots to be used in tight spaces with fragile tissues for surgical applications.

Dural tear is a frequent and costly complication of spinal surgery, which can cause cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) leakage, triggering additional, serious post-operative difficulties. Researchers at UC Irvine have developed a new method and device to mitigate dural tears in a rapid, safe, and water-tight manner

The primary therapeutic goal in female pelvic medicine is to restore normal pelvic floor function. Despite this, the current standard treatments are 5 compensatory, as they do not directly target sphincteric and supportive muscle dysfunction and do not reverse the existing injury or halt functional deterioration. Surgical treatments, such as muscle transplantation and transposition techniques, have had some success; however, there still exists a need for alternative therapies. Tissue engineering approaches offer potential new solutions; however, current options offer incomplete regeneration. Many naturally derived as well as synthetic materials have been explored as scaffolds for skeletal tissue engineering, but none offer a complex mimic of the native skeletal extracellular matrix, which possesses important cues for cell survival, differentiation, and migration. The extracellular matrix consists of a complex tissue-specific network of proteins and polysaccharides, which help regulate cell growth, survival and differentiation.Despite the complex nature of native ECM, in vitro cell studies traditionally assess cell behavior on single ECM component coatings, thus posing limitations on translating findings from in vitro cell studies to the in vivo setting. Overcoming this limitation is important for cell-mediated therapies, which rely on cultured and expanded cells retaining native cell behavior over time.Skeletal muscles are composed of bundles of highly oriented and dense muscle fibers, each a multinucleated cell derived from myoblasts. The muscle fibers in native skeletal muscle are closely packed together in an extracellular three dimensional matrix to form an organized tissue with high cell density and cellular orientation to generate longitudinal contraction. Skeletal muscle can become dysfunctional due to a variety of different factors including trauma, atrophy or degeneration.The reconstruction of skeletal muscle, which is lost by injury, tumor resection, or various myopathies, is limited by the lack of functional substitutes.  

Sarcopenia  is defined as an age associated decline in or loss of lean skeletal muscle mass. The pathophysiology can be multifactorial and the change in body composition may be difficult to detect due to obesity, changes in fat mass, or edema. Changes in weight, limb or waist circumference are not reliable indicators of muscle mass changes. Sarcopenia may also cause reduced strength, functional decline and increased risk of falling. Sarcopenia is otherwise asymptomatic and is often unrecognized.  

UCLA researchers in the Department of Neurology have identified and synthesized small molecule analogs that activate skeletal muscle growth, mediated by calcium calmodulin kinase II signaling.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Bioengineering have developed a novel electrical charge cancellation scheme to effectively remove residual charge on an electrode, achieving greater precision for lesser hardware cost, while maintaining a surgically implantable small size without extra pulse insertion.

UCLA researchers in the Departments of Microbiology, Immunology, and Molecular Genetics, and Human Genetics have discovered a novel small molecule therapy that facilitates treatment of Duchene Muscular Dystrophy.

UCLA researchers have developed a novel method for enriching, expanding, and maturing populations of skeletal muscle progenitor cells (SMPCs) from human pluripotent stem cells (hPSCs).

UCLA researchers have designed, synthesized, and validated a polyrotaxane nanocarrier for targeted delivery of large plasmids for gene therapy applications for treatment of Duchenne muscular dystrophy and cancer.

Hemophilic arthropathy is a frequent and debilitating comorbidity. Point-of-care musculoskeletal ultrasound (MSKUS) with Power Doppler capacity has become critical during the past several years to evaluate progression of joint disease longitudinally, as well as to detect the presence or absence of joint bleeding associated with joint pains in a timely fashion. With the advent of emerging new treatment modalities the hemophilia population is aging, bringing hemophilic arthropathy rapidly into focus. Based on the increasing need to develop and validate a joint ultrasound imaging protocol that could easily be used in clinical practice as well as a research outcome tool UC San Diego Clinician-Investigators and Collaborators, specialized in Hemophilia, Ultrasound, Musculoskeletal Medicine and Radiology (Drs. Annette von Drygalski, Eric Chang and Randy Moore, as well as Lena Volland, DPT ) developed and validated a unique MSKUS protocol, specifically adept to assess the extent of hemophilic arthropathy in the acute and chronic setting.  This protocol is named JADE protocol (Joint Tissue Assessment and Damage Exam), as described below. The protocol is taught “hands on” during the CME accredited course “Musculoskeletal Ultrasound in Hemophilia”, and is also accessible through online modules. https://cme.ucsd.edu/muh/

Cartilage lesion treatments require expanding cells from healthy donor cartilage which have limited availability and restricted potential to produce cartilage. This invention overcomes these challenges, presenting chemical and physical methods for enhancing cell populations capable of producing neocartilage. According to a 2015 global market report, tissue engineering technologies are expected to reach over 94B USD by 2022.

Cell expansion for cartilage tissue production usually leads to loss of the potential to produce cartilage, which impedes uses for cartilage repair. This invention features methods and systems for producing highly expanded primary cells to construct functional neocartilage and other neotissue. According to a 2015 global market report, tissue engineering technologies are expected to reach over 94B USD by 2022.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Dentistry have developed a novel fluorescent probe for studying the role of osteoclasts in bone diseases and for detecting the early onset of bone resorption by targeting an important protein Cathepsin K. This probe can also deliver drug molecules to bone resorption sites with high specificity.

Medical devices are susceptible to contamination by harmful microbes, such as bacteria and fungi, which form biofilms on device surfaces. These biofilms are often resistant to antibiotics and other current treatments, resulting in over 2 million people per year suffering from diseases related to these contaminating microbes. Death rates for many of these diseases are high, often exceeding 50%. Researchers at UCI have developed a novel anti-bacterial and anti-fungal biocomposite that incorporates a nanopillared surface structure that can be applied as a coating to medical devices.

Researchers at the University of California, Davis have developed an approach to rapidly screen and identify antigenic components in tissues and organs.

Media that contains nutrients and growth factors is necessary to grow all types of cells, a process that is widely used in many fields of research. Such media should be routinely changed either to different media or a fresh batch of the same media. This change currently involves either using a pipette to transfer cells from their current dish of media to a new dish, or aspirating the media out of the dish and replacing it with new media. Both methods have inherent risks to stressing and damaging the cells. Researchers at UCI have developed a unique dish for growing cells that allows for safer aspiration of the old media, which reduces stress and damage to the cells.

Researchers in the UCLA Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Molecular Genetics have developed a novel means of generating adult skeletal muscle-equivalent myofibers from human pluripotent stem cells.

Soft-tissue injuries and organ transplantation are common in modern combat scenarios. Organs and tissues harvested for transplantation need to be preserved during transport, which can be very difficult. Micro and nanobubbles (MNBs) offer a new technology that could supply oxygenation to such tissues prior to transplantation, thus affording better recovery and survival of patients. Described here is a novel device capable of producing MNB solutions that can be used to preserve viability and function of such organs/tissue. Additionally, these solutions may be used with negative pressure wound therapy to heal soft-tissue wounds.

Background: Therapeutic delivery of genes is a rapidly evolving technique used to treat or prevent a disease at the root of the problem. The global transgenic market is currently $24B, growing at an annual projected rate of 10%. Currently, a variation of this technique is widely used on animals and crops for production of desirable proteins, but this is a heavily infiltrated market. Thus, entering the gene therapy segment is more promising and would enhance the growth of this industry.  Brief Description: UCR Researchers have identified a novel transposon from Aedes aegypti mosquitoes. This mobile DNA sequence can insert itself into various functional genes to either cause or reverse mutations. They have successfully developed a transposon vector system that can be used in both unicellular & multicellular organisms, which can offer notable insight to improve current transgenic technologies as well as methods of gene therapy.

UCLA researchers in the Department of Mechanical Engineering have developed a modular actuation system that can control robotic manipulators the size and form of the human hand with an unprecedented combination of speed, strength, and precision.

Assistive exoskeletons are designed to enable humans to perform tasks otherwise beyond their capacities. One area of particular interest is the upper limb. Existing devices for upper limb assistance are powered by active or passive methods. Active devices use motors, but require complicated controllers and consistent power to perform tasks. Passive devices do not require power, but often have fixed parameters meaning that they are not especially versatile. Moreover, the devices that currently exist tend to be bulky, costly, and inefficient. To address those deficiencies, UC Berkeley researchers have developed a semi-passive assistive device for upper limbs. The Berkeley device is lightweight, reduces user fatigue, and increases load carrying capacity. The device is highly versatile, and is able to increase the mobility and functionality of a user’s arm.

A groundbreaking approach to treating neurodegenerative diseases associated with VCP mutations through exon skipping technology.

Researchers at UCLA have developed a method for improving the spatial resolution and sensitivity of gamma radiation detection for positron emission tomography (PET).

Brief description not available