Researchers Create Microstructures for Drug Delivery

Marina del Rey, CA (May 1)-Researchers at the University of Southern California’s Information Sciences Institute (ISI) demonstrated a way to manufacture miniscule containers called voxels that could potentially deliver precise microdoses or even nanodoses of drugs.

A team consisting of Peter Will, an ISI fellow and research professor, Alejandro Bugacov, a former postdoctoral researcher, Rob Gagler, a former graduate student, and Bruce Koel, a professor of chemistry at Lehigh University, created various shapes, including four- and five-sided pyramids, pentagonal lotus shapes, and simple square plates, which folded over each other to make flat mini-envelopes.

The USC team performed the experimental work on campus because ISI doesn’t have a wet laboratory. The researchers used “MEMSPRO CAD” software to design the chips, which were then fabricated in France.

According to an ISI press release, Will has been interested in creating voxels since “my days in HP labs, when I was working in medical and chemical applications.”

The National Science Foundation supported the research under an exploratory research grant. The team published a paper about the research, “Voxels: Volume-Enclosing Microstructures,” in the May 2008 issue of the Journal of Micromechanics and Microengineering.