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MARCH 26, 2019

Tortoise Shell Inspires Method For Delivering Drugs to the Gut

By Meaghan Lee Callaghan

With a nod to Aldous Huxley and a hat tip to tortoises, researchers have created an ingestible device that can deliver biologic drugs, such as insulin, directly into the gastrointestinal tract.

The swallowable, self-orienting, millimeter-scale applicator, or SOMA—the drug in Huxley’s futuristic novel “Brave New World”—one day could allow doctors to administer drugs orally but avoid contact with gastric fluids, thereby preserving their