CHICAGO, Ill. — Cardiac pacemakers require wires to be implanted in the chest to help control the patient’s heartbeat. But now researchers have developed the first-ever wireless, battery-free pacing device that doesn’t have to be removed.

It’s an implantable electrical device that dissolves inside your body after it’s done with its work.

“One of the key features of this system is very thin, silica, nanomembrane. Actually, this is the only active part of this device,” said Yeonsik David Choi, lead developer of the device in the Rogers Research Group at Northwestern University and lead author of the study.

It may sound like science fiction but it’s turning into science fact.

“The idea here is to create sort of an alternative type of temporary pacemaker that doesn't require extraction. It’s purely wireless. There are no leads coming out of the chest,” said John Rogers, professor of material science and biomedical engineering at Northwestern University.

“The thickness is around 300 nanometers,” said Choi.

The razor-thin sliver of silicon could revolutionize the future of temporary pacemakers.

“It's built around what we refer to as transient electronic materials. These are materials that dissolve naturally when exposed to biofluids,” said Rogers.

The device itself would be attached to the heart at the tail end of surgery without needing an external box, batteries, or wires. Charging is achieved through a wireless inductive power transfer.

“Which is essentially how cell phones can be charged by the charging mats, where you can just place your phone onto the mat and power is transferred to power your phone,” explained Rose Yin, a George Washington researcher, and the study’s surgical coordinator.

The biodegradable materials, which include water-soluble silicon, magnesium, and wax, would dissolve over the course of 5-7 weeks.

Biomedical scientists at Northwestern and George Washington Universities have been investigating an alternative to traditional pacemakers for the better part of a decade.

“The current pace technology is not adequate. It's not optimal simply because these wires tend to get dislodged. They can get infected,” said Dr. Rishi Arora, a Northwestern professor of cardiology and co-author of the study.

He says this technology could eliminate the disadvantages of wired pacing and surgical extraction after the temporary pacemaker is no longer needed.

“We have nothing great right now to offer people that need it, that need more than a few days of temporary pacing support,” said Arora. “I think something like this could really help patients in the longer term.”

They’ve already successfully tested the device in small and large animals, and soon could be seeking approval for investigational testing in humans.

“You could also think of it as an electronic form of a medicine in the sense that it's a device that's present only when you need it,” said Rogers. “It's eventually expelled from the body, very much like a pharmaceutical, but it's a piece of engineered technology in electronic medicine.”

Researchers say it will likely be another two years before it’s approved for human testing. But it could be a major leap forward in a more non-invasive approach to keeping the heart ticking.

EVANSTON, IL — Is it possible you were infected with a mild form of COVID-19 and didn’t know it? How robust is your body’s immune response to the vaccine, and how will we know whether we’ve reached herd immunity? A new home antibody test could unlock the answers to those questions using a drop of blood.

With a single finger prick, scientists are hoping to measure coronavirus immunity levels across the population.

“There are a lot of people right now, because of limited vaccine supply, who don't know the level of immunity that they have,” explained biological anthropologist Thom McDade.

McDade and a team of scientists at Northwestern University developed the home antibody test that doesn’t require a hospital or clinic visit.

“One of the innovations of this approach is that allows people to collect samples from themselves in the comfort and privacy and safety of their home,” he said.

This test doesn’t tell you if you have COVID-19 when you take it. Instead, it focuses on neutralizing antibodies, which can actually measure how robust of an immune response you actually have following an infection.

“If you've been exposed previously, but might have had a mild or asymptomatic case, how much immunity do you carry forward and how much protection you have against subsequent re-infection from another exposure?”

The test itself is simple. A few drops of blood are added to a commonly used filter paper then sealed in a plastic bag and mailed off to the lab. There, the sample is mixed with a buffer agent that replicates infection and measures neutralization of the virus with a score of 1 to 100.

“If you have 100 percent neutralization that means high levels of neutralizing antibodies that are blocking that interaction between the virus and your receptors,” said McDade.

The investigators are already using the test in a 10,000-person study. That could help them understand community spread and how much protective immunity has developed.

“That could be people who have never exposed people who are exposed and asymptomatic and we can also use it to test the effectiveness of vaccines,” said McDade. “There might be people who have immunocompromised condition or who are older who might not generate as robust an immune response following vaccination and that would be useful information.”

With nothing proprietary about the process, following peer review, McDade said it could be made widely available with existing infrastructure and supplies and could help measure herd immunity.

It’s still not clear whether this test can measure the effectiveness of neutralizing antibodies against emerging variants, but researchers say it could be modified for specific variants as needed.

CHICAGO, Ill. — We know that not getting enough sleep is bad for your health. But a new study finds that a subset of those who have trouble sleeping have a much higher risk of dying because of it. The nine-year study could be a wake-up call for people not taking their slumber seriously enough.

It’s a simple question: "Do you have trouble falling asleep at night or do you wake up in the middle of the night?" The answer, according to new research, could help indicate your risk of dying.

“We were really interested to see whether people who reported having trouble sleeping, trouble falling asleep, or waking up a lot during the night were more likely to die,” said Dr. Kristen Knutson, a Northwestern University neurology professor specializing in sleep medicine and corresponding author of the new study.

“This is a large study in the U.K., about half a million people, where they collected a lot of information at the beginning and they've been following them over time, particularly for their deaths by collecting death certificates,” said Knutson.

In collaboration with the University of Surrey, researchers found that over a nine-year period, sleep issues could subtract years from your life expectancy.

“They were about 13% more likely to die than people who did not have trouble falling or staying asleep,” said Knutson.

That finding was even more pronounced among people with diabetes. Participants were 87% more likely to die from any cause, such as car accidents or heart attack during the study follow-up period, compared to people without diabetes or sleep disturbances.

“There's difficulty sleeping, being comfortable, symptoms-related or diabetes can disturb their sleep. So, there's a lot of reasons why someone with diabetes. Might have sleep disturbances,” said Knutson.

Researchers believe it is the first study to combine insomnia and diabetes to look at mortality risk, a serious issue in the U.S.

According to the National Institutes of Health and the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention, more than 30 million Americans have diabetes, the seventh leading cause of death. It’s estimated that of those with type 2 diabetes, half struggle with sleep problems due to unstable sugar levels during the night.

“There are a lot of symptoms people pay close attention to, like pain, for example,” said Knutson. “We just want to add sleep to that list of symptoms that are taken seriously, and you report and discuss with your doctor to understand what's going on.”

It’s a potentially deadly combination that, if addressed correctly, could add years to your life.

EVANSTON, Ill. — Phosphorus is an essential nutrient. Every living organism on the planet requires it and there is no synthetic substitute. Half the world’s food supply is fertilized by its chemical derivative – phosphate. And we’re running out. Add to that, phosphate runoff in streams and lakes is causing toxic algae blooms killing aquatic life, and you find the catch-22.

Scientists say maintaining a delicate balance is important. Phosphorous normally occurs naturally in small quantities. But its increased use in fertilizer for agricultural purposes negatively impacts water quality and ecosystems.

“It can stimulate the growth of algae, too much is not good, and too little is not good,” said Craig Stow, a research scientist at the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration’s Great Lakes Environmental Research Laboratory.

Increased temperatures, light penetration, and phosphate run-off pollution have caused harmful algae blooms in rivers, streams, and lakes for years.

“Very wet conditions cause a lot of runoff from agricultural yields, and that goes into the major rivers and tributaries,” said Stow. “So, some of wetter years tend to be worse years for algal blooms.”

Satellite imagery over Lake Erie shows some of the dangerous algae blooms that have killed aquatic life and contaminated drinking water.

But now, a team of scientists has developed a way to target and remove phosphate from polluted waters.

“Phosphate, in particular, is a very menacing problem,” said Vinayak Dravid, director of the Northwestern University Atomic and Nanoscale Characterization (NUANCE) Center.

He and his team have developed a membrane that they say can soak up 99% of the phosphate ions from water.

“Just like a household sponge absorbs water and soap and you can wash the dishes, this particular sponge membrane absorbs only phosphate,” said Dravid.

“This is going to be a lot like a conventional sponge, but it has a special coating on it,” explained Stephanie Ribet a Ph.D. student and study co-author. “We will load our column full of the membranes and then we will run our contaminated water with a pump through the column and then we'll get the water out.”

Last year, the team successfully used the same kind of nanotechnology to soak up oil from water.

“We have been expanding for a lot of pollutants right now, such as heavy metals, microplastics, as well as in soil and air also,” said Vikas Nandwana, a research assistant professor of material sciences at Northwestern.

In addition, the sequestered phosphate can be reused.

“You take that absorbed phosphate to another tank and slightly change the condition to basic and all the phosphate gets released,” said Dravid. “And that allows it to be used many times potentially.”

The research, which was published in "The Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences" could provide the kind of new filtration technology that they say is sustainable and inexpensive.

“I think there's an opportunity to show that not only is it the right thing to do, but it is scalable, and it has a business proposition,” said Dravid.

It’s a possible lab innovation that could help preserve life as we know it.