Swimmers Heal on the Move Following Catastrophic Damage.

Herein, we describe the development of 2D self-healing small-scale swimmers capable of autonomous propulsion and "on-the-fly" structural recovery in large containers. Incorporation of magnetic Nd2Fe14B microparticles in specialized printed strips results in rapid reorientation and reattachment of the moving tail to its complementary broken static piece to restore the original swimmer structure and propulsion behavior. The swimmers display functional recovery independent of user input. Measurements of the magnetic hysteresis and fields were used to assess the behavior of the healing mechanism in real swimming situations. Damage position and multiple magnetic strip patterns have been examined and their influence upon the recovery efficiency has been compared. Owing to its versatility, fast response, and simplicity the new self-healing strategy represents an important step toward the development of new "on-the-fly" repairing strategies for small-scale swimmers and robots.

Built-In Active Microneedle Patch with Enhanced Autonomous Drug Delivery.

The use of microneedles has facilitated the painless localized delivery of drugs across the skin. However, their efficacy has been limited by slow diffusion of molecules and often requires external triggers. Herein, an autonomous and degradable, active microneedle delivery platform is introduced, employing magnesium microparticles loaded within the microneedle patch, as the built-in engine for deeper and faster intradermal payload delivery. The magnesium particles react with the interstitial fluid, leading to an explosive-like rapid production of H2 bubbles, providing the necessary force to breach dermal barriers and enhance payload delivery. The release kinetics of active microneedles is evaluated in vitro by measuring the amount of IgG antibody (as a model drug) that passed through phantom tissue and a pigskin barrier. In vivo experiments using a B16F10 mouse melanoma model demonstrate that the active delivery of anti-CTLA-4 (a checkpoint inhibitor drug) results in greatly enhanced immune response and significantly longer survival. Moreover, spatially resolved zones of active and passive microneedles allow a combinatorial rapid burst response along with slow, sustained release, respectively. Such versatile and effective autonomous dynamic microneedle delivery technology offers considerable promise for a wide range of therapeutic applications, toward a greatly enhanced outcome, convenience, and cost.

Noninvasive Transdermal Delivery System of Lidocaine Using an Acoustic Droplet-Vaporization Based Wearable Patch.

Current technologies for managing acute and chronic pain have focused on reducing the time required for achieving high therapeutic efficiency. Herein a wearable transdermal patch is introduced, employing an acoustic droplet vaporization (ADV) methodology, as an effective noninvasive transdermal platform, for a fast local delivery of the anesthetic agent lidocaine. The skin-worn patch consists of a flexible drug reservoir containing hundreds of micropores loaded with lidocaine, and mixed with the perfluorocarbon (PFC) emulsion. The ultrasound-triggered vaporization of the PFC emulsion provides the necessary force to breach dermal barriers. The drug release kinetics of our model was investigated by measuring the amount of lidocaine that passed through phantom tissue and pigskin barriers. The ADV platform increases the payload skin penetration resulting in shorter treatment times compared to passive diffusion or ultrasound alone, holding considerable promise for addressing the delayed therapeutic action and slow pain relief of existing delivery protocols. It is envisioned that the integration of ADV-based transdermal devices could be expanded to the depth-dependent delivery of other pain management, vaccines, and gene therapy modalities.