{"id":216741,"date":"2025-06-27T17:03:46","date_gmt":"2025-06-27T22:03:46","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/light-powered-microscopic-swimmers-with-on-off-control-open-new-pathways-for-drug-delivery"},"modified":"2025-06-27T17:03:46","modified_gmt":"2025-06-27T22:03:46","slug":"light-powered-microscopic-swimmers-with-on-off-control-open-new-pathways-for-drug-delivery","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/2025\/06\/light-powered-microscopic-swimmers-with-on-off-control-open-new-pathways-for-drug-delivery","title":{"rendered":"Light-powered microscopic swimmers with on\/off control open new pathways for drug delivery"},"content":{"rendered":"<p><a class=\"aligncenter blog-photo\" href=\"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog.images\/light-powered-microscopic-swimmers-with-on-off-control-open-new-pathways-for-drug-delivery2.jpg\"><\/a><\/p>\n<p>Scientists have created tiny disk-shaped particles that can swim on their own when hit with light, akin to microscopic robots that move through a special liquid without any external motors or propellers.<\/p>\n<p>Published in <i>Advanced Functional Materials<\/i>, the <a href=\"https:\/\/advanced.onlinelibrary.wiley.com\/doi\/10.1002\/adfm.202504046\" target=\"_blank\">work<\/a> shows how these artificial swimmers could one day be used to deliver cargo in a variety of fluidic situations, with potential applications in drug delivery, water pollutant clean-up, or the creation of new types of smart materials that change their properties on command.<\/p>\n<p>\u201cThe essential new principles we discovered\u2014how to make microscopic objects swim on command using simple materials that undergo <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/phase+transitions\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">phase transitions<\/a> when exposed to controllable energy sources\u2014pave the way for applications that range from design of responsive fluids, controlled <a href=\"https:\/\/phys.org\/tags\/drug+delivery\/\" rel=\"tag\" class=\"\">drug delivery<\/a>, and new classes of sensors, to name a few,\u201d explained lead researcher Juan de Pablo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Scientists have created tiny disk-shaped particles that can swim on their own when hit with light, akin to microscopic robots that move through a special liquid without any external motors or propellers. Published in Advanced Functional Materials, the work shows how these artificial swimmers could one day be used to deliver cargo in a variety [\u2026]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":732,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,6],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-216741","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-biotech-medical","category-robotics-ai"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216741","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/732"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=216741"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/216741\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=216741"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=216741"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lifeboat.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=216741"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}