4 emerging technologies to take the worry out of pregnancy
Pregnancy is an exciting time, but it’s also a worrisome one. So many things can go wrong, although in most cases the concerns of new parents will turn out to be unfounded.
In a country like Israel, where the birth rate in 2016 was 3.11 per woman – the highest in the OECD (Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development) countries – it’s no surprise that innovators are looking for technologies to take some of the worries out of pregnancy and give a greater measure of control to expectant mothers.
As Dr. Josef Tovbin, chief of labor and delivery at Assuta University Hospital in Ashdod, put it: “I believe at-home solutions can save a lot of time and worry, and reduce the number of unnecessary hospital visits.”
Below, we explore four interesting new ‘femtech’ solutions emerging from Israel.
- Wednesday, September 11, 2019
Technology entrepreneurs delight in disrupting established industries, from textiles to healthcare to agriculture.
Changes in automotive manufacturing have been tougher to sell because no matter how many computers are put under the hood, the cars themselves “are still being built on 100-year-old concepts,” Daniel Barel, CEO of Israeli automotive startup REE, tells ISRAEL21c.
REE aims to bring the vehicle’s very design into the 21st century. Gone is the engine in front and the traditional mechanics around steering columns, suspension, transmission and more.
Prescribing the right anti-depression medication often involves tedious trial and error. Your psychiatrist suggests one type of pill, but it doesn’t work or has too many side effects. So you go on to the next medication and then another one until you finally find a prescription that seems to work. Meanwhile, the debilitating symptoms of depression continue.
Neuroscientist Dekel Taliaz found the entire drawn-out process to be, well, depressing. So, together with his brother Oren, he set up a company bearing the siblings’ family name – Taliaz – to apply the latest in artificial intelligence and machine learning to enable psychiatrists to prescribe the right anti-depression medication the first time.
Superman, Spiderman, Hello Kitty or FC Barcelona – if you had the choice to stylize your appearance according to your favorite superhero, which would you choose?
This tough choice is one that faces Israeli children about to receive a bionic hand. And according to the man offering these hands, the more colorful and standout they are, the better.
Just as first impressions set the stage for the entire course of a relationship, first impressions set the stage for how the cells of our immune system react when meeting a new microbe, according to Israeli researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science.
This new insight led the researchers to develop an algorithm that may predict the onset of such diseases as tuberculosis. Their findings were published July 22 in Nature Communications.
If you isolate a single molecule of a conductive metal, can it conduct energy all by itself? That question nagged Muhammad Bashouti in high school and stumped his science teacher.
Actually, an Israeli researcher at the Weizmann Institute of Science had found the answer (a resounding “yes”) several years before Bashouti was born in 1977. But it wasn’t yet public knowledge.
One of the most out-of-the-box approaches proposed to stop the thousands of Gaza “fire kites” – the incendiary devices that have been sent over the border from the Gaza Strip into Israel on kites and balloons, setting fire to thousands of acres and landing occasionally in kindergarten playgrounds – was to shoot the kites out of the sky using remotely operated “racing drones.”
Drone racing has become a popular niche sport around the world. Participants build extremely fast and agile multi-rotor drones and race them against each other around a course. Serious drone pilots use FPV (first-person view) goggles to experience what the drone is seeing rather using a monitor and a joystick.
Let’s say your child has a weird skin rash. What do you do? Head to the local clinic and wait for hours until a doctor examines your child for exactly 20 seconds before prescribing medication. A day truly well-spent. Not.
One parent who had enough of this waiting game is Israeli entrepreneur Eugene Dicker. A few years ago, a single spot appeared on his daughter’s face. They spent the obligatory time waiting for a doctor who prescribed medication, but the condition worsened and even after consulting with another doctor spots appeared over most of her body.
When a self-driving Uber struck and killed a pedestrian in Tempe, Arizona in 2018, it marked the first time autonomous vehicle technology was involved in a fatality and set off warning bells across the nascent industry.
Industry insiders and concerned legislators asked: Are self-driving cars ready to be tested on real streets? How can the technology be improved to avoid devastating collisions?
If you’re among the 10 percent of the world’s population unfortunate enough to suffer from migraine headaches, you know only too well the sensation of severe throbbing or pulsing pain often accompanied by nausea, vomiting, dizziness and extreme sensitivity to light and sound.
A new Tel Aviv University study identified genes that protect cells from Zika viral infection.
The research, led by Dr. Ella H. Sklan of TAU’s Sackler School of Medicine, was published in the Journal of Virology and is one step toward the development of a treatment for Zika and other viral infections.
Of all cancers, lung cancer is the deadliest, largely because it is so difficult to diagnose early on. With very few nerve endings in the lungs, this type of cancer doesn’t cause painful symptoms until a tumor has grown quite large – and by that time, it’s often too late.
“If the cancer is detected at stage 1, the survival rate is 80 percent,” explains Giora Davidovits, CEO of Israeli startup Savicell, which is developing a new blood test to diagnose lung cancer.
Melanoma is the stuff of cancer nightmares. While treatable when locked in the skin’s outer layer, once it penetrates deeper and metastasizes in vital organs it turns deadly.
Israeli researchers have now discovered that fat cells play a key role in this transformation and have come up with a way to block it.
A trailblazing study by Israeli researchers suggests that intestinal microbes may have a direct effect on the course of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), the incurable, fatal neurodegenerative disease also known as Lou Gehrig’s disease that affected physicist Stephen Hawking.
Published today in Nature, the study by researchers at the Weizmann Institute of Science revealed that the progression of an ALS-like disease in lab mice was slowed after the mice received certain strains of gut microbes or substances known to be secreted by these microbes.
Search-and-rescue dogs and service dogs do absolutely amazing work, saving lives and assisting those in need on a daily basis by command. But what if their handlers are unable to deliver verbal commands, either because of their surroundings or disabilities they may have?
Step in the haptic dog vest, which emits painless vibrations that dogs are trained to recognize as various commands. It was developed by an interdisciplinary research team from Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, and is set to be presented at the World Haptics Conference in Tokyo this month.
It was our third most popular article in 2018, and it’s not hard to understand why: “One drug could treat Alzheimer, MS, Crohn’s disease and more” captured the attention of readers around the world.
“I received quite a high number of mails, mostly from patients or relatives of patients, for instance families of Alzheimer’s patients,” says Prof. David Naor of the Lautenberg Center for Immunology and Cancer Research at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Faculty of Medicine.
If you’re ever unfortunate enough to require brain surgery, Israeli startup Nurami Medical has got you covered – literally.
The Haifa-based company has developed a patch made of synthetic, biodegradable nanofibers meant to be affixed to the dura mater – the protective membrane underneath the skull that keeps the brain and spinal cord safe – after cranial neurosurgery.
Novel dental fillings made of resin-based composites enhanced by antibacterial nano-assemblies, developed at Tel Aviv University, can hinder bacterial growth on dental restorations, the main cause of recurrent cavities that can lead to root-canal treatment and tooth extractions.
“Antibiotic resistance is now one of the most pressing healthcare problems facing society, and the development of novel antimicrobial therapeutics and biomedical materials represents an urgent unmet need,” said lead researcher Dr. Lihi Adler-Abramovich.
More and more people are seeking pain relief that doesn’t involve taking pills. Now there’s a new topical device available: Alfa Plus by Solio, invented and manufactured in Israel.
Alfa Plus is the world’s first radio frequency (RF) device for home use to receive FDA and CE approval for pain relief, says founder Shahak “Chuck” Cohen.
For thousands of years, consuming algae has been part of the native diets of Africa, Central America, South America and Southeast Asia. But today, algae are much more than a wrap for sushi – they are also used to produce a wide range of products such as food additives, natural pigments, chemical-free fabric dyes, biodegradable plastics and biofuels.