Immuno Forest: Microneedles for Delivering Vaccines into the Skin
Immuno Forest: Microneedles for Delivering Vaccines into the Skin
Collections: Image Award Winners
2012 Award Winner
Peter DeMuth
Irvine and Hammond Labs
Koch Institute at MIT
These biodegradable microneedles, each less than a millimeter tall, could be coated or embedded with vaccines and applied to the skin as a patch. The needles would penetrate the highly immunoactive outer layers of the skin but not the deeper layers containing nerves and blood vessels, making them painless, safe and potent.
Video
Peter DeMuth explains how and why he captured this image of a microneedle array.