Vidcast:  https://youtu.be/Hx6vlbgavIc

 

MIT engineers in collaboration with Harvard’s Brigham & Women’s investigators are developing surgically-implantable materials that can be literally dissolved when no longer needed.  Metals including aluminum become brittle and disintegrate when exposed to gallium.  The research team has shown that aluminum staples will dissolve within minutes when coated with a gallium-indium liquid.  The gallium compound is non-toxic.  This same concept could be used to develop dissolvable stents and medication-carrying capsules.

 

https://onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/10.1002/adma.202208227

 

#staples #stents #metal #embrittlement #galliumindium #aluminum