Healing the brain with micro-robots

Send a miniature robot into the human brain to heal it? What was science fiction a few decades ago could quickly become reality, assures the founder of Bionaut Labs. This Californian start-up plans to launch its first clinical trials in two years.

From science fiction to reality

“The idea of ​​the microrobot dates from before I was born. One of the most famous examples is a film called Le Voyage Fantastique, where a team of scientists board a miniaturized vessel to go into the brain and absorb a blood clot”notes Michael Shpigelmacher, Managing Director of Bionaut Labs.

“In your cell phone you have a bunch of extremely precise, extremely sophisticated microscopic contraptions that are smaller than a grain of rice”says this trained roboticist, who has worked in artificial intelligence and consumer electronics.

“What was science fiction in the 1960s is now science fact (…) We want to take this old idea and make it a reality”ensures theAFP the 53-year-old scientist, during a visit to the research and development center of Bionaut Labs in Los Angeles.

Resulting from a partnership with the prestigious German research institute Max Planckthe startup is experimenting with injectable micro-robots controlled remotely using magnetic energy.

There are other techniques, such as optical or ultrasonic testing, but magnetic energy has the merit of being simple and of not interfering with the human body, explains Mr. Shpigelmacher.

Unlike an MRI, the device is easily transportable and consumes ten to a hundred times less electricity.

Course of the session

Magnetic coils, placed outside the patient’s skull and a computer are enough to remotely guide a microrobot in the brain, as evidenced by a simulation carried out for theAFP.

The sequence begins and, following a trajectory programmed in advance, the robot – a metal cylinder a few millimeters in length to which a powerful neodymium magnet has been integrated – begins to evolve in gel reproducing the brain.

The machine comes to position itself under a pocket filled with a blue liquid then, propelled like a rocket, suddenly pierces it with its pointed end, thus allowing the liquid to flow out of the pocket.

The robot can then be extracted following the same path.

When Bionaut Labs will have begun its first clinical trials, this is exactly what should make it possible to break through the cysts filled with cerebrospinal fluid caused in the brain by Dandy-Walker malformation, a rare congenital condition affecting children.

These cysts, which can grow to the size of a golf ball, swell and increase brain pressure, causing a host of serious disorders.

Another possible trajectory with robots

Bionaut Labs has already tested its robots in specialized laboratories “on large animals, sheep and pigs. And the data shows the technology is safe for humans”assures Michael Shpigelmacher.

“Most brain surgery today is limited to the straight line. If you can’t get to the target in a straight line, you’re stuck”says Mr. Shpigelmacher.

Injectable robots “make it possible to reach otherwise inaccessible targets, following the safest trajectory possible”.

Thanks to these first promising results, the startup has already obtained authorization from the American Medicines Agency (FDA) to experiment with its method for patients suffering from Dandy Walker syndrome but also from malignant glioma, a cancerous brain tumor. considered incurable.

In the latter case, the microrobot will be equipped with a receptacle containing an anti-cancer treatment and will travel to the tumor to deposit its drug load there.

A “surgical strike” where currently available techniques simply bombard the whole body, with a loss of effectiveness and many adverse effects, explains Mr. Shpigelmacher.

“And since we’re a robot, we can come full circle and do measurements, take tissue samples”enthuses the boss of Bionaut Labswhich has about thirty employees and continues to recruit.

Bionaut Labs is already in discussion with partners for the treatment of other diseases affecting the brain, such as Parkinson’s, epilepsy or stroke.

“To my knowledge, we are the first commercial attempt to design” such a product “but I don’t think we will be left alone”says Michael Shpigelmacher, because academic research is very active with “about fifteen teams” currently working on the subject.