Since 2019, Giovanni Traverso has been a professor and researcher in the Faculty of Mechanical Engineering at the renowned Massachusetts Institute of Technology (WITH), in United States of America, where he integrates different research teams. “I’m a clinical gastroenterologist, but my primary focus is developing new medical systems for a variety of diseases in the body,” he explains over the phone line.
One of the solutions he developed at MIT’s labs is a simple device consisting of a silicone tube filled with liquid metal, to which knots are tied at intervals, to measure pressure changes along the gastrointestinal tract and the contractions , which he exercised through exercise food.
What is the device for? “There is a group of conditions that affect many patients and affect the movement of the gastroenterological system: reflux, gastroparesis – when the stomach is not functioning and digestion is very slow – or constipation. They are disorders of the mobility or motility of the gastroenterological system. This device can give us information about these problems in the patient,” explains Traverso.
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In hospitals, these disorders are diagnosed using catheters fitted with pressure transducers that measure contractions of the gastrointestinal tract, in a technique called high-resolution manometry. This is done with complex and expensive equipment. In addition, they are not found in every health center, but in those that are larger and better equipped.
“With my team we are trying to develop systems that provide the same information but are cheaper. We came up with the idea that we could use a strip with knots, and we found it worked,” says Traverso. This strip or tube acts as a sensor. As they included the nodes, the sensitivity increased and they confirmed this with numerical models.
Traverso knows that the Inca quipus are laced with information. “Our device is a strip that can measure gastrointestinal pressure through nodules. That is the similarity between the two.” There is a video on the MIT website (https://news.mit.edu/2022/gastrointestinal-diagnosticquipu-0322) that states that the device was made by the Inca Quipus was inspired.
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Giovanni Traverso left the country with his family in 1989 at the age of 14. He has lived in Peru, Canada and the UK. He studied medicine at the University of Cambridge and received his doctorate from Johns Hopkins University. He is an Associate Physician in the Department of Gastroenterology at Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) and, since 2019, an Assistant Professor and Researcher in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at MIT. He received the top prize in the Collegiate Inventors Competition and was named one of the most promising innovators under the age of 35 by MIT Technology Review.
Traverso also helped develop a system that would orally deliver drugs that could only be delivered by injection. “For example, there are patients who have to inject insulin every day and don’t want to or forget to do so. This is one of the areas in which we have worked,” says the scientist. They have also developed a capsule that is swallowed and, once in the stomach, will open and deliver the drug for a week or two or a month. It is in the clinical trials stage.
In a pandemic, it was part of the development of a reusable silicone N95 mask, a project designed for health workers that could soon hit the market. In some of these projects, the scientist was a co-founder of companies such as Lyndra or Teal Bio and also works with the Gates Foundation. “The problems we see are here in Boston or in South Africa. We try to use technology and science to develop simple solutions that can be implemented anywhere,” he says.