REPÚBLIC BOLIVARIANA OF VENEZUELA

MINISTERIO DEL PODER POPULAR PARA LA DEFENSA

UNIVERSIDAD NACIONAL EXPERIMENTAL POLITÉCNICA DE LA FUERZA
ARMADA BOLIVARIANA
NUCLEO ANZOATEGUI - EXTENSIÓN PUERTO PIRITU

Teacher: Yoli Herrera Students:

Georgeth Yamale. C.I:21.387.462
Jesús López. C.I: 20.632.870
Daniel Villazana. C.I: 20.632.927
Gregory Robaina. C.I: 21.173.191
Jhorman Méndez. C.I: 20.795.088

Puerto Piritu, 12th February of 2010

 Honda to Conduct Collaborative Testing of its Walking Assist Device
(gregory)
The device was created to support walking by the elderly and other
people with weakened leg muscles.

The compatibility and effectiveness of Honda’s walking assist device will

be evaluated during rehabilitation training to help people relearn to walk safely
and efficiently, that is conducted at Kasumigaseki-Minami Hospital. The testing
also will identify and study areas of effectiveness and potential issues from
different perspectives by the trainees, physical therapists, doctors and
researchers.

Honda began research of a walking assist device in 1999 with the goal to
provide more people with the joy of mobility. The cooperative control technology
utilized for this device is a unique Honda innovation achieved through the
cumulative study of human walking just as the research and development of
technologies was conducted for Honda’s advanced humanoid robot, ASIMO.
With this device, the user’s stride will be lengthened compared to the user’s
normal stride without the device and therefore the ease of walking is achieved.

Currently, the device is in the feasibility stage and Honda has been
showcasing and gathering feedback from a wide range of people who
experienced the device at relevant trade shows including the International
Trade Fair on Barrier Free Equipments & Rehabilitation for the Elderly & the
Disabled (BARRIER FREE 2008) held in April (at Intex Osaka) and at the
Welfare 2008 in June (at Nagoya International Exhibition Hall).
 Giving the 'unconscious' a voice (JESUS L.)

THE inner voice of people who appear unconscious can now be

heard. For the first time, researchers have struck up a conversation with a
man diagnosed as being in a vegetative state. All they had to do was
monitor how his brain responded to specific questions. This means that it
may now be possible to give some individuals in the same state a degree of
autonomy.

"They can now have some involvement in their destiny," says Adrian
Owen of the University of Cambridge, who led the team doing the work.

In an earlier experiment, published in 2006, Owen's team asked a

woman previously diagnosed as being in a vegetative state (VS) to picture
herself carrying out one of two different activities. The resulting brain
activity suggested she understood the commands and was therefore
conscious. Now Owen's team has taken the idea a step further. A man also
diagnosed with VS was able to answer yes and no to specific questions by
imagining himself engaging in the same activities. The results suggest that
it is possible to give a degree of choice to some people who have no other
way of communicating with the outside world. "We are not just showing they
are conscious, we are giving them a voice and a way to communicate,"
says neurologist Steven Laureys of the University of Liège in Belgium,
Owen's collaborator.
 Micro-robot that can clear arteries (GEORGETH)

A microscopic robot small enough to travel through blood vessels has

been built by scientists.

Less than a millimetre in size, the robot walks like a crab on six legs and
has been designed to clear blocked arteries. It was produced by researchers at
Chonnam National University in Korea, who found the robot was able to travel
55 yards in a week.

Once inside a blocked artery, it is able to release drugs to dissolve blood

clots, which are often the cause of heart attacks. The robot has three short front
legs and three longer back legs which are attached to a central rectangular
body.

By attaching grafted heart muscle to the legs, the scientists found the
legs would bend as the muscle cells contracted. The cells get their energy from
sugar in the patient's blood. That means the robot does not need an external
power supply, which are often heavy and cumbersome, if not impractical.

Because the robot's three front legs are shorter than the back legs, they
bend inwards as the heart muscles contract, creating a difference in friction that
pushes the robot forward.

Using cells from the patient's own body – perhaps grown from stem cells
– would also reduce the likelihood of the body producing an immune reaction,
which might destroy the tiny robot before it could clear a blockage.
A 'bionic eye' may hold the key to returning sight to people left blind by a
hereditary disease, experts believe. (JORMAN)

A team at London's Moorfields Eye Hospital have carried out the

treatment on the UK's first patients as part of a clinical study into the therapy.
The artificial eye, connected to a camera on a pair of glasses, has been
developed by US firm Second Sight.
It said the technique may be able to restore a basic level of vision, but
experts warned it was still early days.
The trial aims to help people who have been made blind through retinitis
pigmentosa, a group of inherited eye diseases that affects the retina.
The disease progresses over a number of years, normally after people
have been diagnosed when they are children.
It is estimated between 20,000 to 25,000 are affected in the UK.
It is not known whether the treatment has helped the two patients - both men in
their fifties - to see and any success is only likely to be in the form of light and
dark outlines, but doctors are optimistic.
Lyndon da Cruz, the eye surgeon who carried out the operations last
week, said the treatment was "exciting".
"The devices were implanted successfully in both patients and they are
recovering well from the operations."
Other patients across Europe and the US have also been involved in the trial.

Electronic
The bionic eye, known as Argus II, works via the camera which transmits
a wireless signal to an ultra-thin electronic receiver and electrode panel that are
implanted in the eye and attached to the retina.
The electrodes stimulate the remaining retinal nerves allowing a signal to
be passed along the optic nerve to the brain.
David Head, chief executive of the British Retinitis Pigmentosa Society,
said: "This treatment is very exciting, but it is still early days.
"There is currently no treatment for patients so this device and research into
stem cells therapies offers the best hope."
British scientists have grown part of a human heart from stem cells for the
first time. (DANIEL)

Heart surgeon Sir Magdi Yacoub, who led the team, said
doctors could be using artificially grown heart components
in transplants within three years.

His researchers at Harefield hospital managed to grow

tissue that works in the same way as human heart valves.

Sir Magdi told the Guardian newspaper a whole heart

could be produced from stem cells within 10 years.

Common pathway

The team who spent 10 years working on the project included physicists,
pharmacologists, clinicians and cellular scientists.

Researchers will see their achievement as a major step towards growing entire
organs for transplant.

Stem cells have the potential to turn into many different types of cell.

Many scientists believe it should be possible to harness the cells' ability to grow
into different tissues to repair damage and treat disease.

Previously, scientists have grown tendons, cartilages and bladders, which are
all less complex.

Sir Magdi, professor of cardiac surgery at Imperial College London, had been
working on ways to address a shortage of donated hearts for patients.

He said he hoped that soon an entire heart could be grown from stem cells.