Gizmorama - October 26, 2015

Good Morning,

Boeing has created the "lightest metal ever made" called Microlattice. It's actually 99.99 percent air. Call me cautious, but I think I'll walk, drive, boat, or roll wherever I need to go.

Learn about this and more interesting stories from the scientific community in today's issue.

Until Next Time,
Erin

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*-- Laser imaging tool may help brain tumor surgery accuracy --*
ANN ARBOR, Mich. - During surgery to remove brain tumors, doctors often have to use their best guess as to where a tumor ends and normal brain tissue begins.

Researchers at the University of Michigan are developing laser imaging technology using a stimulated Raman scattering, or SRS, microscope that could help doctors better see what they are doing during surgery.

The type of imaging researchers have been developing with SRS microscopy is available using other technology, however it can take 30 minutes or more for tissue samples to be prepared and examined by an expert. With the new method, the goal is for all members of a medical team to have the ability to make determinations immediately on the next steps during surgery.

"It allows the surgical decision-making process to become data driven instead of relying on the surgeon's best guess," said Dr. Daniel Orringer, a neurosurgeon in the pathology department at the University of Michigan Medical School, said in a press release. "We're able to visualize tumor that otherwise would be invisible to the surgeon in the operating room."

As part of the study to show the efficacy of the technology as it stands now, researchers used more than 1,400 images of children and adults with glioblastoma.

The SRS technology, using colors to differentiate between brain cortex, tumor and white matter, allowed researchers to distinguish with near-perfect accuracy the difference between tumor and non-tumor cells in the brain, they reported.

"This technology has the potential to resolve a long-standing issue in cancer surgery, which is the need for faster and more effective methods to assess whether a tumor has been fully removed," said Dr. Richard Conroy, director of the Division of Applied Science and Technology at the National Institute of Biomedical Imaging and Bioengineering.

The study is published in Science Translational Medicine.


*-- Boeing showcases lightest metal ever --*
MALIBU, Calif. - Microlattice is 99.99 percent air. But it's not air, it's a metal -- the "lightest metal ever made," according to aerospace giant Boeing. It's so light, it takes several seconds for a sizable chunk of the metal to fall to the ground, floating like a feather.

The metal, first described in 2011 scientific paper, is the product of HRL Laboratories, a collaboration between engineers at Boeing and General Motors, with help from scientists at Caltech and the University of California, Irvine.

Over the last few years, researchers have been tweaking the material to make it as strong and light as possible. But the basic production process remains the same.

The metal is made similar to the way a sculptor casts a metal statue using a mold. A polymer with a hollowed structure is filled with a nickel-phosphorus alloy. The polymer is then stripped away to reveal a honeycomb-like lattice featureing metal links just 100 nanometers thick -- or as Boeing calls it, an "open cellular polymer structure."

Scientists say the lattice structure is inspired by the internal design of human bones.

"Strength and record-breaking lightness make it a potential metal for future airplanes and vehicles," Boeing wrote in a recent press release.

The metal will first be used to build rockets and the insides of airplane cabins. By reducing weight, the new material will enable improved fuel efficiency.

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