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Newly developed battery-powered electric bandages could help wounds heal more quickly, a new study reports. In animal testing, wounds treated with electric bandages healed 30% faster than wounds treated with conventional bandages, researchers reported Aug. 7 in the journal Science Advances. The bandages could be a game-changer in treating slow-healing wounds caused by diabetes and other chronic illnesses, researchers say. Those sorts of wounds significantly increase a person’s risk of amputation and death. “Our goal here was to develop a far less expensive technology that accelerates healing in patients with chronic wounds,” said researcher Amay Bandodkar, an assistant professor of...

The dramatic rise of smartphones, tablets, laptops and other personal and portable electronics has brought battery technology to the forefront of electronics research. Even as devices have improved by leaps and bounds, the slow pace of battery development has held back technological progress. Now, researchers at UCLA's California NanoSystems Institute have successfully combined two nanomaterials to create a new energy storage medium that combines the best qualities of batteries and supercapacitors. Supercapacitors are electrochemical components that can charge in seconds rather than hours and can be used for 1 million recharge cycles. Unlike batteries, however, they do not store enough...

A startup is planning human trials for a nanostructured material that quickly stops bleeding. A startup based in Cambridge, MA, says that it plans to soon begin clinical trials of a nanostructured material that stops bleeding almost instantly. A startup called Arch Therapeutics has licensed the technology from MIT and is developing manufacturing processes for making it in large amounts. The new material can be poured over a site and will stop the bleeding almost at once. The first application, pending Food and Drug Administration approval, will be for use during surgery to quickly stop bleeding and even prevent it...

Someone – still anonymous – sold on eBay a "bloody bandage" from Ariel Sharon's head. It was a relic from Israel's 1973 Yom Kippur War with several Arab states. A resupplied Israeli army, led by masterful and courageous military leaders such as tank commander Brigadier General Sharon, were able to turn the tables on the invading armies. Soon Israel was advancing on the Arabs, and their armies were driven deep into Syria and Egypt. As a result of the war, Sharon became a veritable hero and a self-professed hawk in Israeli politics for decades to follow. Nearly two decades later,...