The aim of technology is to make products in a large scale for cheaper prices and increased quality. The current technologies have attained a part of it, but the manufacturing technology is at macro level. The future lies in manufacturing product right from the molecular level. Research in this direction started way back in eighties. At that time manufacturing at molecular and atomic level was laughed about. But due to advent of nanotecnlogy we have realized it to a certain level. One such product manufactured is PILL CAMERA, which is used for the treatment of cancer, ulcer and anemia. It has made revolution in the field of medicine.This tiny capsule can pass through our body, without causing any harm.
It takes pictures of our intestine and transmits the same to the receiver of the
Computer analysis of our digestive system. This process can help in tracking any kind of disease related to digestive system. Also we have discussed the
drawbacks of PILL CAMERA and how these drawbacks can be overcome using
Grain sized motor and bi-directional wireless telemetry capsule .Besides this we have reviewed the process of manufacturing products using nanotechnology.
Some other important applications are also discussed along with their potential
impacts on various fields.
INTRODUCTION:
We have made great progress in manufacturing products. Looking back from where we stand now, we started from flint knives and stone tools and reached the stage where we make such tools with more precision than ever. The leap in technology is great but it is not going to stop here. With our present technology we manufacture products by casting, milling, grinding, chipping and the likes. With these technologies we have made more things at a lower cost and greater precision than ever before. In the manufacture of these products we have been arranging atoms in great thundering statistical herds. All of us know manufactured products are made from atoms. The properties of those products depend on how those atoms are arranged. If we rearrange atoms in dirt, water and air we get grass. The next step in manufacturing technology is to manufacture products at molecular level. The technology used to achieve manufacturing at molecular level is “NANOTECHNOLOGY”. Nanotechnology is the creation of useful materials, devices and system through manipulation of such miniscule matter (nanometer).Nanotechnology deals with objects measured in nanometers. Nanometer can be visualized as billionth of a meter or millionth of a millimeter or it is 1/80000 width of human hair.
HISTORICAL OVERVIEW:
Manipulation of atoms is first talked about by noble laureate Dr.Richard Feyngman long ago in 1959 at the annual meeting of the American Physical Society at the California
POTENTIAL EFFECTS OF NANOTECHNOLOGY:
As televisions, airplanes, computers revolutionized the world in the last century; scientists claim that nanotechnology will have an even more profound effect on the next century. Nanotechnology is likely to change the way almost everything, including medicine, computers and cars, are designed and constructed
PILL CAMERA:
Introduction:
Imagine a vitamin pill-sized camera that could travel through your body taking pictures, helping diagnose a problem which doctor previously would have found only through surgery. No longer is such technology the stuff of science fiction films.
Conventional method:
Currently, standard method of detecting abnormalities in the intestines is through endoscopic examination in which doctors advance a scope down into the small intestine via the mouth. However, these scopes are unable to reach through all of the 20-foot-long small intestine, and thus provide only a partial view of that part of the bowel. With the help of pill camera not only can diagnoses be made for certain conditions routinely missed by other tests, but disorders can be detected at an earlier stage, enabling treatment before complications develop.
DESCRIPTION:
The device, called the given Diagnostic Imaging System, comes in capsule form and contains a camera, lights, transmitter and batteries. The capsule has a clear end that allows the camera to view the lining of the small intestine. Capsule endoscopy consists of a disposable video camera encapsulated into a pill like form that is swallowed with water. The wireless camera takes thousands of high-quality digital images within the body as it passes through the entire length of the small intestine. The latest pill camera is sized at 26*11 mm and is capable of transmitting 50,000 color images during its traversal through the digestive system of patient.
Video chip consists of the IC CMOS image sensor which is used to take pictures of intestine .The lamp is used for proper illumination in the intestine for taking photos. Micro actuator acts as memory to store the software code that is the instructions. The antenna is used to transmit the images to the receiver. For the detection of reliable and correct information, capsule should be able to designed to transmit several biomedical signals, such as pH, temp and pressure. This is achieved with the help of Soc.
external reference crystal or clock. The decoder IC receives the serial stream and interprets the serial information as 4 bits of binary data. Each bit is used for channel recognition of the control signal from outside the body. Since the CMOS image sensor module consumes most of the power compared to the other components in the telemetry module, controlling the ON/OFF of the CMOS image sensor is very important.
Moreover, since lightning LED’s also use significant amount of power, the individual ON/OFF control of each LED is equally necessary. As such the control system is divided into 4 channels in the current study. A high output current amplifier with a single supply is utilized to drive loads in capsule.
EXTERNAL CONTROL UNIT:
A schematic of the external control circuit unit is illustrated below, where the ON/OFF operation of the switch in the front of the unit is encoded into 4 channels Control signals. These digital signals are then transferred to a synthesizer and modulated into an RF signal using a OOK transmitter with a carrier frequency of 433 MHz.
To verify the operation of the external control unit and telemetry capsule, CH1 was used to control ON/OFF of CMOS image sensor and CHs 2-4 to control led lighting. The four signals in front of the control panel were able to make 16different control signals (4 bit, 2^4 = 16).The bi-directional operation of telemetry module is verified by transmitting video signal from CMOS image sensor image data was then displayed
The proposed telemetry capsule can simultaneously transmit a video signal and receive a control determining the behavior of the capsule. As a result, the total power consumption of the telemetry capsule can be reduced by turning off the camera power during dead time and separately controlling the LEDs for proper illumination in the intestine. Accordingly, proposed telemetry module for bidirectional and multi-channel communication has the potential applications in many
DRAWBACKS:
It is a revolution, no question about it but the capsule poses medical risks
1."Unfortunately, patients with gastrointestinal structures or narrowing are not good candidates for this procedure due to the risk of obstruction". It might also happen that the pill camera might not be able to traverse freely inside digestive system, which may cause the tests to be inconclusive.
2. If there is a partial obstruction in the small intestine, there is a risk that the pill
will get stuck there and a patient who might have come in for diagnostical reasons may end up in the emergency room for intestinal obstruction.
3. The pill camera can transmit image from inside to outside the body. Consequently it becomes impossible to control the camera behavior, including the on/off power functions and effective illuminations inside the intestine. The first drawback is overcomed using another product manufactured with the help of nanotechnology which is the rice- grain sized motor. This miniature motor, when attached to the pill camera gives it a propelling action inside the body, which makes it easy for the pill to find its way through the digestive system. Also the grain-sized motor has an application of its own too. It can be
employed to rupture and break painful kidney stones inside the body. The other two drawbacks can be overcome using a bidirectional wireless telemetry camera.
The current paper presents the design of a bidirectional wireless telemetry camera, 11mm in diameter, which can transmit video images from inside the human body and receive the control signals from an external control unit. It includes transmitting antenna and receiving antenna, a demodulator, a decoder, four LED’s, a CMOS image sensor, along with their driving circuits. The receiver demodulates the received signal that is radiated from the external control unit. Next, the decoder receives this serial stream and interprets the five of the binary digits as address code. The remaining signal is interpreted as binary data. As a result proposed telemetry model can demodulate the external signals to control the behavior of the camera and 4 LED’s during the transmission of video image. The CMOS image sensor is a single chip 1/3 inch format video camera, OV7910, this can provide high level functionality with in small print footage. The image sensor supports an NTSC-type analog color video and can directly interface with VCR TV monitor. Also image sensor has very low power consumption as it requires only 5 volt dc supply.
APPLICATIONS OF NANOTECHNOLOGY IN OTHER FIELDS
• Nanotechnology may have its biggest impact on the medical industry. Patients will drink fluids containing nanorobots programmed to attack and reconstruct the molecular structure of cancer cells and viruses to make them harmless.
• Nanorobots could also be programmed to perform delicate surgeries --such nanosurgeons could work at a level a thousand times more precise than the sharpest scalpel. By working on such a small scale, a nanorobot could operate without leaving scars that conventional surgery does.
• Additionally, nanorobots could change your physical appearance. They could be programmed to perform cosmetic surgery, rearranging your atoms to change your ears, nose, eye color or any other physical feature you wish to alter.
• There's even speculation that nanorobots could slow or reverse the aging process, and life expectancy could increase significantly.
• In the computer industry, the ability to shrink the size of transistors on silicon microprocessors will soon reach its limits. Nanotechnology will be needed to create a new generation of computer components. Molecular computers could contain storage devices capable of storing trillions of bytes of information in a structure the size of a sugar cube.
• Nanotechnology has the potential to have a positive effect on the environment. For instance, airborne nanorobots could be programmed to rebuild the thinning ozone layer. Contaminants could be automatically removed from water sources, and oil spills could be cleaned up instantly. And if nanotechnology is, in fact, realized, it might be the human race's greatest scientific achievement yet, completely changing every aspect of the way we live.
Conclusion:
Though nanotechnology has not evolved to its full capacity yet the first rung of products have already made an impact on the market. In the near future most of the conventional manufacturing processes will be replaced with a cheaper and better manufacturing process “nanotechnology”. Scientists predict that this is not all nanotechnology is capable of. They even foresee that in the decades to come, with the help of nanotechnology one can make hearts, lungs, livers and kidneys, just by providing coal, water and some impurities and even prevent the aging effect. Nanotechnology has the power to revolutionize the world of production, but it is sure to increase unemployment.
Nanotechnology can be used to make miniature explosives, which would create havoc in human lives. Every new technology that comes opens new doors and horizons but closes some. The same is true with nanotechnology too.
Bibliography:
1.Electronics for you, journal
2.Web Sites:
a. www.sciencedaily.com
b.www.zyvex.com.
c. www.nanotech.gov
No comments:
Post a Comment
leave your opinion