Team:DUT China B/Human Practices
Contact lab with society
We get our inspiration from MCU movie. We consider that micro-robots may have potential in medical applications such as micro-therapy and targeted drug delivery, but this is an innovative and cutting-edge medical tool. In the future, if it really has the feasibility and significance of the application remains to be proved. If the Chlamydomonas micro-robot is really applied in the future, can the public fully accept this treatment technology? In addition to the medical field, can the Chlamydomonas micro-robots also function in more fields? Guided by the project background, we will integrate feedback step by step during the project development process, promote in-depth investigation, and finally improve and demonstrate the complete meaning of algae micro-robot in society.
1. In the initial stage of the project, we have interviewed three medical research-related scholars and Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Science in order to make the cutting-edge technology of the micro-robots feasible in the future and figure out exactly the practical application of our projects in the future society. After talking with scholars, we got their affirmation of the novelty and application feasibility of our project.
2. After clarifying the feasibility of the project and its significance to the society, we continue to promote the project. In the process, we have had many exchanges with the professors of Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Science, and asked them about problems related to our measurement of Chlamydomonas’s movements. At the same time, we also considered a specific problem: if Chlamydomonas micro-robot is actually implemented in the future, can it be accepted by the public? We conducted a social survey to learn about the public's cognition degree of this technology and their acceptance level of its practical application from both online surveys and offline face-to-face interviews.
Through questionnaires and interviews, we learned that more than half of the people support the development of this technology in medical applications, and more than two-thirds of people can accept this medical technology.
3. During the investigation, some people have expressed the hope to bring such micro robots into other field. We have considered their suggestions carefully and believe that the micro-scale and mobility can give the cyanobacteria micro-robots advantages in many other fields. On the basis of these characteristics, we ask the relevant scholars in the field of microfluidics, physics and environment about their views in the application of micro-nano robots.
Scholars in different fields agree with the innovation of our project, but at the same time they also propose that the application of Chlamydomonas robots in different fields needs to consider its practical role, and to add downstream functional design. After careful consideration, we believe that Chlamydomonas can play a role in different fields, while single motion control cannot fully exert its function. Therefore, we took the advice of experts and selected three specific directions for the following design.
I. We interviewed experts in the field of medical and robotics to explore the feasibility of future applications of Chlamydomonas micro-robot in medical fields.
In the literature review process, we learned that micro-robots will play an important role in the field of precision medicine in the future. With excellent features of strong motility, photoreceptivity and complex protein expression ability, Chlamydomonas will have good application prospects in precision medical treatment as micro robots. But what are the problems with our concept? How feasible is it, and how far is it to achieve its application in medical treatment? Will its excellent features solve the existing medical problems? We interviewed three professors in the field of medical research and professors in the field of robotics research to get the answer.
● Communication with Dr. Yang Yongliang
Introduction: Associate Professor Yang Yongliang mainly uses biomacromolecule simulation, bioinformatics (including artificial intelligence technology), chemical biology, drug design and medicinal chemistry to combine various in vitro and in vivo experimental techniques to study major diseases and important mechanisms of occurrence and development of life processes, discovery of relevant regulatory targets, design and development of innovative drugs, and advanced methods of diagnosis and treatment.
Dr. Yang introduced the research status of micro-robots. There are indeed some limitations of targeted therapies in existing medical applications. Micro-robots are not a relatively new concept of treatment and have been studied for many years. The teacher affirmed the idea and feasibility of our project. It is believed that if the size of Chlamydomonas is appropriate, it can be used to encapsulate or mount drugs, and the light control help the doctors to get to the tumor treatment site where surgery is difficult to reach. For example, brain tumors now rely mainly on drugs for treatment, if the project can finally achieve the targeted effect, it will be very promising. However, the project also needs to consider whether there is an immune response in the human body. Whether it can be considered to apply the algae to the human intestinal inflammatory system such as IBD, which does not require access to the human blood circulation system. Secondly, if the algae can add loading and adsorption functions in addition to the targeted movement, it will play its role better.
Reflection: Our project is feasible and innovative, but it should also be considered during the implementation of the project that what if the future of the algae micro-robots really changes the human body's immunity problem. The algae micro-nano robot should not just play the role of transportation, but also play more functions such as loading, expression and so on.
Communication with Yang Guangrui
Introduction: Professor Yang Guangrui's main research direction is the role of the biological clock in aging, behavior, and the development of major diseases. He received his Bachelor of Medicine (1999) and Ph.D. (2007) from the Second Military Medical University and Peking University, followed by the University of Utah (University of Utah, 2007/06-2009/12) and the University of Pennsylvania 2010/01-2011/10) After postdoctoral research, he served as Assistant Research Fellow at the University of Pennsylvania (2011/11-2014/10) and Assistant Professor of Research (2014/11-2017/03).
Professor Yang’s attitude is that microalgae, as a living organism, has a great risk of entering the human body, and there is no practical application at present. It may be difficult for doctors and patients to accept. Moreover, the human body path is too complicated, and it has a long way to go from now to the its future application, but the project is novel and meaningful.
Reflection: In the communication with Professor Yang Guangrui, he also mentioned the existence of immune response problems in the human environment. Secondly, in the realization of the technical problems, we consider that there are mainly control and targeting problems in precision medical research.
Whether the cost of solving these problems is lower and whether the treatment effect of this technology will be better than others by that time, are also necessary problems we need to consider in the development of cellular micro-nanobots. But if this technology and these issues can be well accepted by the public, then the development of this technology will also important to promote precision medicine. Therefore, we also hope to conduct public research on these technical attitudes on these issues.
Communication with Shenyang Automation Institute, Chinese Academy of Science
Introduction: The main research direction of Shenyang Automation Institute, Chinese Academy of Science is robotics, industrial automation and photoelectric information processing technology.
In the process of reviewing the literature, we found that the researchers such as Liu Lianqing, Wang Wenxue and Zhang Chuang of Shenyang Automation Institute, Chinese Academy of Science realized the directional control of Chlamydomonas cell movement under blue light and white light. However, due to the limitation of the sensitivity wavelength of Chlamydomonas, they can only use blue light for related experiments. Our red-light control system is a complement. Therefore, we invited the professors from Shenyang to come to Dalian for an communication with us. We hope to know what opinions researchers in the field of robotics have on such a modified biological cell micro-robot.
Contents: On July 26, 2018, we invited Dr. Zhang to give us a lecture in Dalian. Dr. Zhang first introduced us his research results: the directional control of the Chlamydomonas movement, which used the self-made channel template and the diaphragm to achieve the captivity and precise directional control. In further communication with him, we also learned that although Zhang is engaged in the field of mechanical research, from the professional point of view of the mechanical field, rigid machinery can not easily reach the scale of micro-robots, and the cells are the finest in this scale. The cell system is the best alternative to mechanical micro-robots. Moreover, the use of cell-modified micro-robots also avoids problems such as difficulty in energy supply and low energy conversion efficiency. Therefore, they chose to use Chlamydomonas as a micro-robot for research on motion control. However, they also mentioned that the wild Chlamydomonas used by them have limitations such as being able to only experience blue light and weak light sensitivity. They have a strong interest in our project, affirming our idea of red light control transformation of Chlamydomonas and its future application in medical and other fields. At the same time, they also proposed modular molecular light converters for our projects and expanded the idea of different light control of Chlamydomonas, and hope that we can achieve more precise and specific control of Chlamydomonas in the future, such as movement control of Chlamydomonas flagella.
Reflection: Professors from Shenyang Institute of Automation, Chinese Academy of Science affirmed the high conversion efficiency and precision of biodynamics from a mechanical point of view. After we communicate with them, we also felt that cell life has more natural advantages over rigid machinery. In terms of actuators, Chlamydomonas, a highly mobile organism, is an excellent candidate, and the red light control transformation expands the application of this micro-robot to improve its performance.
Communication with Dr. Jin Fan
Introduction: Jin Fan, Researcher from Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology，Chinese Academy of Sciences.
We were fortunate to listen to Professor Jin Fan's report when participating in the CCIC in Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology，Chinese Academy of Science. Professor Jin introduced his control of the orientation of Pseudomonas aeruginosa by using red light to get it to the lungs and kill tumor cells. This is very similar to the idea that we hope to achieve targeted drug delivery through targeted control of Chlamydomonas reinhardtii. Professor Jin’s report has aroused our great interest, so we took this opportunity to further exchange with him.
Content: We first gave an introduction of our project. Dr. Jin first affirmed the possibility of C. reinhardtii as a micro-robot in the direction of targeted drug delivery, but this design is not universal enough. It is necessary to select a specific microorganism for a specific disease and make the modification practical. Meanwhile, He explained to us why to use microorganisms for the treatment of cancer. He raised a novel question. Is it really necessary to use drugs to completely kill tumor cells? With the continuous development of medicine, people began to find that the complete killing of tumor cells is not necessarily the best way. And if there is a kinetic balance on the killing of tumor cells, it may achieve better therapeutic effects. The human-modified microorganism can play a function similar to immune cells in the body, so as to better maintain the immune balance in the human body.
In the previous literature search, we also found a lot of articles to realize the directional control of micro-robot through magnetism. We also want to know what advantages the light control has over the more precise magnetron motion. Professor Jin’s opinion is that light control has its superiority in inducing expression over magnetic induction.
Reflection: In the communication with Professor Jin, we solved many doubts related to the project. For example, microbial targeted therapy has a significant advantage over other control measures on the controllable release of drug delivery. After the communication, we reconsider that despite the problems of immune response, photo-controlled microbial carriers for in vivo targeted therapy make full use of the characteristics of microbes themselves, and have irreplaceable advantages in specific disease application scenarios, so some existed problems can not hinder the development of this technology. In view of the characteristics of our algae micro-robot, we should also make full use of the advantages of light control and supplement the downstream design.
After communicating with above professors, we have summarized the following feedback: 1. Chlamydomonas micro-nano robot technology has novelty and applicability of targeted therapy in the future. Compared with mechanical robots, it has the advantages of complete control system at micro-scale and high energy conversion efficiency, but we should investigate the public acceptability. 2. In future applications, we should consider the issue of immune response in the human body, but it would not prevent the development of micro-robot technology. 3. The project should further develop its advantages and complement the downstream functional design for the light control and expression systems.
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