The technique of keyhole surgery minimises scarring, speeds healing and reduces the risk of infection. However, it is extremely difficult to carry out delicate surgical procedures accurately in a ...

Researchers create biodegradable heart valves using shape-memory polymers and 3D bioprinting for safer cardiovascular procedures.

Polymers that exhibit shape-memory effect (SME) are an important class of materials in medicine, especially for minimally invasive deployment of devices. Professor Subbu Venkatraman and his group from ...

Polymer colloids, soft matter, stimuli-responsive polymers, emulsion polymerization and water-based polymer coatings, inks and adhesives. Photoresist polymers for nanolithography, nanofluidic devices ...

Eye surgery could get simpler, thanks to a new type of shape-memory polymer--material that can hold a temporary shape and then snap back to its original form when heated. Andreas Lendlein and ...

Imagine a world of shape-shifters. A surgeon inserts a small lump of plastic into an anesthetized patient and, like magic, it expands into a life-saving mesh tube that keeps a formerly clogged artery ...

Broken bones held together by metal plates and screws are vulnerable to further damage because the difference in stiffness between the metal screw and the bone tissue weakens the bone near the screw.