Intramedullary nail holes laser indicator, a non-invasive technique for interlocking of intramedullary nails.

Interlocking of intramedullary nails is a challenging procedure in orthopedic trauma surgery. Numerous methods have been described to facilitate this process. But they are exposed patient and surgical team to X-rays or involves trial and error. An accurate and non-invasive method has been provided to easily interlocking intramedullary nails. By transferring a safe visible light inside the nail, a drilling position appears which use to drilling bone toward the nail hole. The wavelength of this light was obtained from ex-vivo spectroscopy on biological tissues which has optimal transmission, reflectance, and absorption properties. Moreover, animal and human experiments were performed to evaluate performance of the proposed system. Ex-vivo performance experiments were performed successfully on two groups of cow and sheep samples. Output parameters were procedure time and drilling quality which there were significant differences between the two groups in procedure time (P < 0.05). But no significant differences were observed in drilling quality (P > 0.05). Moreover, an In-vivo performance experiment was performed successfully on a middle-aged man. To compare the provided method, targeting-arm, and free-hand techniques, two human experiments were performed on a middle-aged and a young man. The results indicate the advantage of the proposed technique in the procedure time (P < 0.05), while the drilling quality is equal to the free-hand technique (P = 0.05). Intramedullary nail holes laser indicator is a safe and accurate method that reduced surgical time and simplifies the process. This new technology makes it easier to interlocking the intramedullary nail which can have good clinical applications.

Plasmonic Bragg microcavity as an efficient electro-optic modulator.

Plasmonic electro-optic modulators might play a pivotal role in the development of compact efficient communication devices. Here, we introduce a novel electro-optic modulator based on a plasmonic Bragg microcavity and a pockels active material. We investigate detailed design and optimization protocols of the proposed structure. With 2D scanning of geometrical parameters, an extinction ratio of 19.8 dB, insertion loss of 2.8 dB and modulation depth of 0.99 with a driving voltage of ±5 V are obtained.

Plasmonic fiber optic hydrogen sensor using oxygen defects in nanostructured molybdenum trioxide film.

Hydrogen is one of the most promising candidates for fulfilling the next energy demands in transportation, aerospace, heating, and power generation. Due to its highly explosive nature, hydrogen leakage sensors are considered a critical industrial need. We propose a room-temperature, high-sensitivity hydrogen sensor using oxygen defect-induced plasmonic features. The proposed sensing probe utilizes nanostructured α-MoO3 thin film as the sensing material in which free carriers and plasmonic properties are induced in response to hydrogen exposure. A notable blue spectral shift of 70.6 nm is observed in response to hydrogen gas exposure from 150 ppm to 2000 ppm, which confirms the sensor's capability for efficient detection of low hydrogen concentrations. The sensor's sensitivity, linearity, and reversibility are experimentally investigated through a simple optical setup.

SPR-based plastic optical fibre biosensor for the detection of C-reactive protein in serum.

A plastic optical fibre biosensor based on surface plasmon resonance for the detection of C-reactive protein (CRP) in serum is proposed. The biosensor was integrated into a home-made thermo-stabilized microfluidic system that allows avoiding any thermal and/or mechanical fluctuation and maintaining the best stable conditions during the measurements. A working range of 0.006-70 mg L-1 and a limit of detection of 0.009 mg L-1 were achieved. These results are among the best compared to other SPR-based biosensors for CRP detection, especially considering that they were achieved in a real and complex medium, i.e. serum. In addition, since the sensor performances satisfy those requested in physiologically-relevant clinical applications, the whole biosensing platform could well address high sensitive, easy to realize, real-time, label-free, portable and low cost diagnosis of CRP for future lab-on-a-chip applications. 3D sketch (left) of the thermo-stabilized home-made flow cell developed to house the SPR-based plastic optical fibre biosensor. Exemplary response curve (shift of the SPR wavelength versus time) of the proposed biosensor (right) for the detection of C-reactive protein in serum.