What will the future of healthcare look like?
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What will the future of healthcare look like?
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In the future, nanotechnologies could help doctors detect disease earlier, target drugs to exact locations in the body, and give us new ways to grow and repair body tissue. But what will this quot;miniquot; medicine be like?
Media images often show extremely small submarines shooting through the blood, but this vision of nano-sized healthcare is unlikely to become a reality. Scaled-down metal machines wont work on the nano-scale.
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But nanomachines actually already exist inside you. They are large molecules, like the enzymes that help power your body, and the ribosomes that make the proteins to form your hair and nails. They are present inside the cells of your body, they just dont look like our idea of machines.
But they are designed to work on the nano-scale. If we could learn to copy their designs, we might be able to build nano-sized robots to help heal our bodies.
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The arrival of nanomachines that could help repair our bodies is a long way off. Before we can design these devices, we need to understand how things work on this tiny scale. Most of this research is still at a very early stage.
Scientists at Oxford University are studying how the tails, or quot;flagellaquot;, of some bacteria work. This type of tiny motor could be used in future as a propeller for delivering drugs around the body.
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A lot of current work is focused on developing sensors that detect diseases and tiny capsules that take medicines to where theyre needed most in the body.
But it could be a long time before we see the Denefits. All new medicines have to go through ong trials to make sure theyre safe. So well probably have to wait years for most nanosized healthcare to reach doctors surgeries and hospitals.
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However, cosmetics and beauty companies are already using this tiny technology to big effect. Skin scientists have designed nanosized containersquot; that can carry a products active ngredients deep into your skin, where they work most effectively.
And some sunscreens now contain zinc oxide nanoparticles. These protect you from the Suns rays but, unlike larger particles, they dont give you that chalky look.
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Some people are concerned that putting such small particles into our bodies may cause us harm.
The tiny size of nanoparticles means they dont have the same properties as larger particles of the same material. So a chemical that is safe in its normal state might actually be harmful in its nano-form. Then again, it might remain harmless. We dont really know yet.
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A recent report by the Royal Society and the Royal Academy of Engineering recommended further research was needed into the possible damaging effects of nanoparticles. They also suggested that all consumer products containing nanoparticles should be labelled.
98 Read the text and match the titles to the paragraphs.
1 Naturally nano
2 Small but dangerous?
3 Waiting time
4 What should be done?
5 Here and now
6 Future vision
7 Early days

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