Electronic Tissue Monitors Brain, Heart and Muscles

SCIENCE -- January 30, 2012 at 10:34 AM EDT

Electronic Tissue Monitors Brain, Heart and Muscles

Scientists are trying to develop tissue-like electronics that conform better to human organs. Elastic electronics, they call it.

John Rogers, professor of material science and engineering at the University of Illinois has developed a device that can wrap around a rabbit heart and deliver current to the heart tissue to stop arrhythmia. He hopes similar devices can be used to treat brain seizures and monitor premature infants.

"As the skin moves and deforms, the circuit can follow the deformations in a completely non-invasive way," Rogers said.

NewsHour Science correspondent Miles O'Brien reports for the National Science Foundation's* latest Science Nation.

For the record, the National Science Foundation is an underwriter of the NewsHour.

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