#Industry News
Ultrathin Needle for Delivering Drugs to Specific Brain Regions
Researchers at MIT have developed a miniaturized cannula that employs a needle as thin as a human hair to directly deliver drugs to highly specific brain regions, even as small as one cubic millimeter.
This direct dosing approach could allow doctors to target specific brain circuits, potentially helping to reduce side-effects in the rest of the brain and increase treatment efficacy.
Pharmacological treatments for brain disorders can often have significant side-effects as the drug spreads throughout the entire brain. “Even if scientists and clinicians can identify a therapeutic molecule to treat neural disorders, there remains the formidable problem of how to deliver the therapy to the right cells — those most affected in the disorder,” says Ann Graybiel, a researcher involved in the study. “Because the brain is so structurally complex, new accurate ways to deliver drugs or related therapeutic agents locally are urgently needed.”
