Kaai Inc. (Goleta, CA), a supplier of green and blue laser diodes, has demonstrated green laser diodes at 523 nm, the longest continuous-wave green laser diode emission reported to date. Based on indium gallium nitride (GaN) semiconductor technology, the company's lasers are fabricated on nonpolar and semipolar substrates.

Do you have questions about motors for medical applications? Want to know about miniature motors for handheld instruments, torque requirements, or motor life predictions? Paul McGrath, regional sales engineer for Maxon Precision Motors (Fall River, MA), is the newest addition to MPMN's panel of experts and is available to provide the answers you need to those burning general or application-specific motor questions.

Creganna (Galway, Ireland) has announced the acquisition of Avalon Medical Services Pte., which trades as Tactx Medical Inc. (Campbell, CA). The new company will be called Creganna—Tactx Medical.

Although formed with the intent of creating an electrically powered laser from organic thin films, two EU-funded research programs have yielded the development of a novel optoelectronic component with potential for use in biomedical applications.

For the last Medtech Pulse post of 2009, I decided to jump on the bandwagon and briefly contribute to the annual end-of-year ballyhoo. Join me for some year-end reflection and thoughts about the year ahead of us. Also, please feel free to add your own thoughts or comments below.

An estimated 10% of patients suffering from coronary artery disease are left untreated owing to lacking substitute graft materials, according to University of Gothenburg thesis student Helen Fink. In her thesis, Fink states that current materials employed in artificial grafts are limited to substitute vessels larger than 5 mm, owing to frequent thrombosis and occlusion of small-diameter grafts, and thereby put some patients at risk of not being treated. Bacterial cellulose (BC) could offer a solution.

An innovation process developed by a team at Stanford University (Palo Alto, CA) in collaboration with hundreds of representatives from the medtech sector is described in Biodesign: The Process of Innovating Medical Technologies.