The diaphragm is the main muscle responsible for our ability to breathe, being in charge of automatically controlling our lung capacity. When the function of this muscle is compromised, the instinct to breathe becomes a chore.

A new proof-of-concept design, created by MIT engineers, is intended to further improve the lung capacity of people with diaphragm dysfunction and boost its life-support function.

A gentle, robotic, implantable ventilator designed to augment the natural contractions of the diaphragm

An MIT research team has developed an implantable ventilation system designed to increase the natural contractions of the diaphragm and assist people with breathing problems linked to this muscle.

This system has at its core two soft, balloon-shaped tubes, which can be implanted to fit over the diaphragm. When inflated with an external pump, these tubes act like artificial muscles that push the diaphragm downward, helping the lungs expand, following a rate of inflation of the tubes in sync with the natural rhythm of the diaphragm.

The researchers of this project put this implantable ventilator to the test in two pigs, managing to demonstrate that this system is capable of significantly improving the amount of air that the lungs could inhale, in cases of compromised diaphragm function.

“This is a proof of concept of a new way of ventilating”said Ellen Roche, an associate professor of mechanical engineering and a member of MIT’s Institute for Medical Engineering and Sciences. “The biomechanics of this design are closer to normal breathing, compared to ventilators that push air into your lungs, where you have a mask or tracheostomy. There’s a long way to go before this is implanted in a human being. But it’s exciting that we can show that we can increase ventilation with something implantable.”added the researcher.

As Roche noted, work remains to be done before such an implantable system can be used to treat humans with some degree of chronic diaphragm dysfunction. Among the aspects to be optimized, the team has already considered reducing the size of some components.

The research team trusts in the implantable modality of this ventilator, as there is a history of heart pumps that follow the same principle. Regarding its external elements, the pump and the control system could be used on a belt or backpack.

Despite being still in a preliminary phase, the results obtained in this research are a valuable precedent, which could open the way to a new assisted breathing technology, different from conventional fans, which create positive pressure, in which the air is forced into the lungs, by being pushed down through the patient’s central airways.