Fizzy bubbles carry drugs deep into wounds
Low-tech delivery method could be used to help stop bleeding
By Meghan Rosen
Alka-Seltzer’s frothy fizz may hold the secret to stopping blood loss.
Jets of rushing bubbles can carry blood-clotting drugs deep into a wound and seal it shut, scientists report October 2 in Science Advances.
The work is the first to show bubble-powered devices doing something useful inside the body, says organic chemist Jan van Hest of Radboud University in Nijmegen, the Netherlands. “What they’ve done is really clever because it has a biomedically relevant application — it can stop blood flow,” he says.