Irish researchers have made a breakthrough, which could help patients who require implanted medical devices, such as pacemakers, breast implants and drug delivery devices.

Implantable medical devices are evolving all the time, however sometimes the body's own protection system responds to what it sees as a foreign body. These responses can be complex and unpredictable and they can impair how the device works, limiting its performance and efficacy.

Researchers from the National University of Ireland (NUI) Galway, the Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and AMBER, which is Science Foundation Ireland's research centre for advanced materials and bio-engineering research, decided to investigate this further.

They looked specifically at fibrosis, which is the formation of excess fibrous connective tissue in the body. It usually occurs in reaction to something such as an injury. In the case of implanted devices, a dense fibrous capsule surrounds the device, causing it to fail or not work properly.

Device failure rates that can be attributed to fibrosis range from 30% to 50% for implantable pacemakers and 30% for mammoplasty prosthetics.

In the case of glucose biosensors used in the treatment of diabetes or drug/cell delivery devices, the dense fibrous capsule can seriously impair its function. This can have major consequences for the patient and drive up healthcare costs.

However, the researchers have announced a significant breakthrough in soft robotics, which could benefit patients. These soft robotics, which are flexible devices, can modify the body's response to implanted devices.

The researchers have created tiny mechanical soft robotic devices known as dynamic soft reservoirs (DSR). These have been shown to significantly reduce the build-up of fibrous capsules.

"This has vast potential for a range of clinical applications and will hopefully lead to many future collaborative studies between our teams," commented the study's senior co-author, Prof Ellen Roche, of MIT and formerly of NUI Galway.

According to senior co-author, Prof Garry Duffy, of NUI Galway and AMBER, the researchers believe that the ideas they have come up with "could transform future medical devices and how they interact with the body".

"We are very excited to develop this technology further and to partner with people interested in the potential of soft robotics to better integrate devices for longer use and superior patient outcomes," he said.

Meanwhile, according to the study's first author, Dr Eimear Dolan of NUI Galway, the researchers are very excited to publish this study, "as it describes an innovative approach to modulate the foreign body response using soft robotics".

Dr Dolan recently received a Science Foundation Ireland Royal Society University Research Fellowship to bring this technology forward with a focus on type 1 diabetes.

Details about these findings are published in the journal, Science Robotics.