Researchers from the Institute for Research and Innovation of the University of Porto (i3S) are leading a project that, endowed with around three million euros, aims to develop “smart prostheses” capable of sending alerts and preventing cardiovascular accidents.
The project, which includes three more European partners, aims to “reduce mortality caused by cardiovascular diseases”, which is estimated at 16.8 million people a year worldwide, said today, in a statement, the Institute.
Although the use of vascular prostheses to restore blood flow to clogged arteries has “improved the prognosis” of these diseases, these devices “often fail without warning,” causing “catastrophic effects” for the patient.
In this sense, the researchers will try to develop intelligent vascular medical devices “capable of sending alerts before failures occur, allowing early medical intervention and preventing a new cardiovascular event.”
“We want to develop the next generation of vascular medical devices, introducing the concept of intelligent vascular prostheses capable of generating energy and self-monitoring their performance”, clarifies, quoted in the statement, the researcher leading the project, Inês Gonçalves.
If the performance of these new vascular prostheses decreases, “alerts are sent to the healthcare system”, allowing “early medical intervention, anticipating failure of the prosthesis, due to clot formation, and avoiding a new cardiovascular event”, such as a myocardial infarction, explains Inês Gonçalves.
To arrive at this “pioneering” technology, the researchers will develop “new biocompatible triboelectric nanogenerators, which convert the body’s mechanical energy into electrical energy”, clarifies the researcher Andreia Pereira, also mentioned in the statement.
“A miniaturized, ultra-low consumption energy management unit and a ‘wireless’ system will also be developed, which will be attached to the vascular prosthesis, allowing it to store the generated energy and collect and transmit the data to an external device, such as a ‘ smartphone,'” he adds.
The performance of the smart vascular prosthesis will later be validated in an animal model in collaboration with researchers from the Medical University of Vienna (Austria), one of the project partners, together with the University of Navarra (Spain) and the Institute of Physics of Materials of the University of Porto (IFIMUP).
The project, which will be developed over the next three years, has received funding of around three million euros from the European Innovation Council (EIC) Pathfinder Challenge, within the framework of the Horizon Europe programme.
In addition to the researchers, the project also has a group of clinical consultants who will help develop a device that meets the needs of both patients and physicians.
As part of the project, the i3S team will receive more than 1.1 million euros of the total amount financed and plans to hire four young researchers.
“We will thus have another major international project in the group to support the development and transfer of a fundamental science technology into a product that can benefit society”, adds Inês Gonçalves.
Source: TSF
