Search Results (15)

Introduction: Transnasal penetrating intracranial injuries represent an exceptionally rare form of traumatic brain injury, characterized by high mortality and a substantial risk of severe neurosurgical and infectious complications. Self-inflicted injuries involving the penetration of a foreign body through the nasal cavity into the brain are exceedingly uncommon and require prompt diagnosis and a multidisciplinary treatment approach. Objective: This study aimed to present a rare clinical case of transnasal penetration of a foreign body (a ballpoint pen refill) into the brain parenchyma during a suicide attempt, and to describe the diagnostic and therapeutic approach. Case Report: A 46-year-old woman with an acute psychotic disorder was admitted following a suicide attempt involving the insertion of a ballpoint pen refill through the right nasal cavity. Computed tomography revealed a retained intracranial foreign body embedded within the brain parenchyma, traversing the cribriform plate and associated with pneumocephalus. The foreign body was successfully removed via an endoscopic endonasal approach. Owing to the cerebrospinal fluid leak that developed after removal of the foreign body, reconstruction of the anterior skull base defect was performed using fascia lata and tissue adhesive. The postoperative course was uneventful, with no neurological complications and gradual resolution of the intracerebral hemorrhagic changes and pneumocephalus. The patient was discharged without neurological deficits and was referred for psychiatric treatment with a diagnosis of catatonia accompanied by episodes of psychomotor agitation. Conclusions: Transnasal penetrating brain injuries are rare but potentially fatal. Early radiological diagnosis, meticulous preoperative planning, and an endoscopic endonasal approach enable safe removal of the foreign body and reliable reconstruction of the anterior skull base defect. Multidisciplinary collaboration among neurosurgeons, otorhinolaryngologists, radiologists, and psychiatrists is essential for achieving favorable outcomes in these patients. Full article

The growing prevalence of bacteria resistant to antibiotics and conventional disinfectants is a cause for concern and underscores the necessity of developing new strategies to prevent the transmission of microorganisms. To this end, nanocrystalline Cu, Au, and Ag nanoparticles were employed to fabricate various coatings using the sputtering technique. Then, the antibacterial activity of the coatings against Gram-negative Escherichia coli and Gram-positive Staphylocococcus epidermidis was investigated. The coating obtained by co-sputtering of Au, Ag, and Cu exhibited the most pronounced antibacterial properties. This coating was applied to disposable BIC ballpoint pens, which were subsequently used by clients in two public institutions. After three months of regular use, the antibacterial properties of the coatings were re-evaluated. It was confirmed that this coating led to a significant reduction (log5 CFU/mL) in the bacterial presence on the treated surface within 0.5 h. These results support further investigation into the underlying mechanism, which is likely based on the synergistic interaction of the employed noble metal nanoparticles. Full article

Background: The disposal of plastic material has been gaining negative attention due to its impact on the environment and people’s health. Insulin pens used by people living with diabetes are disposed of through landfills or incineration, negatively impacting the environment and generating costs for the state. Methods: In an attempt to reduce the disposal of plastic in the environment and reduce disposal costs, the “Insulinadiamor” project was created, which uses handicrafts as a means of re-socializing women deprived of their liberty. In this project, female inmates in the state of Sergipe turn insulin pens into ballpoint pens. Results: During the year 2022, 2000 insulin pens were transformed into ballpoint pens. We estimate a loss of around USD 37,150.28 for the state due to the inappropriate use of medicines, which was reflected in the return of complete insulins. In addition, by avoiding landfill or incineration of the plastic content collected, we contributed to an estimated saving of almost USD 603.91 for the state and more than 80 kg of CO₂-equivalent emissions. Conclusions: This project brings a sustainable and transformative approach involving financial savings, rehabilitation of inmates, and contribution to the environment. It also raises the importance of creating more sustainable initiatives to reduce plastic waste in the health sector and other areas. Full article

Surface-enhanced Raman spectroscopy (SERS) is widely used as a detection method in scientific research fields. However, the method for creating SERS substrates often requires expensive equipment and involves a complex process. Additionally, preserving and effectively utilizing SERS substrates in the long term poses a challenging problem. In order to address these issues, we propose a new method for creating SERS substrates on various types of paper using a combination of a ballpoint pen and 3D printing. This method ensures a high enhancement factor and maximizes the utilization of the substrate. We achieved an enhancement factor of up to 8.2 × 10⁸ for detecting R6G molecules, with a relative standard deviation of 11.13% for the Raman peak at 612 cm⁻¹ of R6G, demonstrating excellent SERS sensitivity and spectral reproducibility. Furthermore, we successfully detected thiram at a concentration as low as 10⁻⁸, which is lower than both the Chinese national standard and European standard. Full article

Determining the approximate dates that written documents were drawn up based on the chemical composition of the ink is not a simple process. It is very demanding in terms of legal requirements. Various studies have succeeded in dating manuscripts by analyzing the temporal evolutions of the concentrations of dyes and solvents in documents based on the original formulations of the ink pens. These analyses were carried out simultaneously by HPLC-DAD for dyes and by GC-MS for solvents. This study aims, for the first time, to evaluate novel ink compounds and the temporal evolution of the concentrations of the degradation products of the dyes used by most suppliers and which are present in almost all types of ballpoint inks, i.e., Crystal Violet (CV). CV degrades through two parallel pathways: on the one hand, it undergoes progressive demethylation until it becomes pararosaniline, and on the other, it undergoes a breakdown of the molecule obtaining, among other by-products, the compound N,N′-Dimethyl-4-aminophenol (NNAPH), that was experimentally verified using four different inks (e.g., Inoxcrom^® and Sigma^® brands, in blue and black). For the NNAPH compound, we observed that four of the inks under analysis displayed the same temporary behavior despite having different initial chemical compositions. These initial results show the high potential for both CV and NNAPH, together with the rest of the pararosaniline family, as age tracers for dated/old documents. These techniques may potentially open up new avenues for universal dating tools, regardless of the brands of ink employed for use in different ballpoint pen types. Full article

The phenomenon of luminescence and quenching is widely applied in the forensic examination of various ink materials. Here, we introduce a hybrid spectroscopic and chromatography approach to gain insights into the underlying cause of infrared luminescence (IRL) in blue ballpoint (BP) pen inks. A total of thirty BP pen ink samples from the Egyptian market were employed in this study. Insights into the origin of luminescence and quenching in the studied samples were gained based on video spectral comparator (VSC), thin layer chromatography (TLC), ultraviolet–visible (UV–Vis) spectrophotometry, and photoluminescence (PL) spectroscopy. Results showed that some of the studied inks possessed IRL due to the presence of crystal violet and some other triaryl methane dyes. Nevertheless, some ink samples did not possess IRL, despite the presence of the dyes responsible for IRL in their matrix. Interestingly, the inclusion of phthalocyanine dye in those non-luminescent ink matrices resulted in luminescence quenching, mainly due to the overlap between the absorption of phthalocyanine dye and the luminescence of the triarylmethane dyes. The IRL behavior of the ink sample under the first illumination wave band (400–485 nm) exerted control over the IRL activity across subsequent illumination wavebands, and the most effective differentiation was achieved by utilizing the first and second preset filters in VSC. The results revealed the luminescent components present in studied inks and unraveled their distinct luminescence behavior present within the ink matrix. The combination of optical spectroscopy and chromatography techniques could provide a distinctive tool to reveal the luminescence and quenching behaviors of ink dyes for the successful forensic discrimination of several BP writing pens. Full article

One of the major challenges in forensic document analysis is estimating the age of ink deposition on a manually written document. The present work aims to develop and optimise a methodology, based on the evaporation of 2-phenoxyethanol (PE) over time, that can contribute to ink age estimation. A black BIC^® Crystal Ballpoint Pen was purchased in a commercial area, and ink deposition began in September 2016 over 1095 days. For each ink sample, 20 microdiscs were subjected to n-hexane extraction in the presence of an internal standard (ethyl benzoate) followed by derivatisation with a silylation reagent. A gas chromatography-mass spectrometry (GC/MS) method was optimised for PE-trimethylsilyl (PE-TMS) to characterise the ageing curve. The developed method presented good linearity between 0.5 and 50.0 μg mL⁻¹, as well as limits of detection and quantification of 0.026 and 0.104 μg mL⁻¹, respectively. It was possible to characterise PE-TMS concentration over time, which reveals a two-phase decay behaviour. First, there was a substantial decline between the 1st and the 33rd day of deposition, followed a by a stabilisation of the signal, which allowed to detect the presence of PE-TMS up to 3 years. Two unknown compounds were also present and allowed to identify three dating time frames for the same ink stroke: (i) between time 0 and 33 days, (ii) between time 34 and 109 days, and (iii) more than 109 days. The developed methodology allowed to characterise the behaviour of PE over time and to establish a relative dating of three-time frames. Full article

Here, a brief history of the development of the ballpoint/rollerball pen and the fountain pen is presented. Their principle of operation is analogous that of multipart microfluidics-type devices, where capillarity–gravity drives the ink, a complex fluid, to flow in the confinement of a micrometer-sized canal or to lubricate a ball rotating in a socket. The differences in the operational writing principles of the fountain pen versus the ballpoint/rollerball pen are discussed. The ballpoint/rollerball pen’s manner of writing was monitored using lens end fiber optics and was digitally recorded. The ball rotation rate per unit length was monitored using a piezoelectric disk oscilloscope technique. The role of ink (a complex fluid) chemistry in the wetting phenomenon is elucidated. We also discuss methods for studying and evaluating ink–film–ball–paper surface wetting. The goal of the proposed research is to optimize and improve the writing performance of the ballpoint/rollerball pen. Full article

Digitizing handwriting is mostly performed using either image-based methods, such as optical character recognition, or utilizing two or more devices, such as a special stylus and a smart pad. The high-cost nature of this approach necessitates a cheaper and standalone smart pen. Therefore, in this paper, a deep-learning-based compact smart digital pen that recognizes 36 alphanumeric characters was developed. Unlike common methods, which employ only inertial data, handwriting recognition is achieved from hand motion data captured using an inertial force sensor. The developed prototype smart pen comprises an ordinary ballpoint ink chamber, three force sensors, a six-channel inertial sensor, a microcomputer, and a plastic barrel structure. Handwritten data of the characters were recorded from six volunteers. After the data was properly trimmed and restructured, it was used to train four neural networks using deep-learning methods. These included Vision transformer (ViT), DNN (deep neural network), CNN (convolutional neural network), and LSTM (long short-term memory). The ViT network outperformed the others to achieve a validation accuracy of 99.05%. The trained model was further validated in real-time where it showed promising performance. These results will be used as a foundation to extend this investigation to include more characters and subjects. Full article

Rapid, simple, and sensitive analysis of relevant proteins is crucial in many research areas, such as clinical diagnosis and biomarker detection. In particular, clinical data on cancer biomarkers show great promise in forming reliable predictions for early cancer diagnostics, although the current analytical systems are difficult to implement in regions of limited recourses. Paper-based biosensors, in particular, have recently received great interest because they meet the criteria for point-of-care (PoC) devices; the main drawbacks with these devices are the low sensitivity and efficiency in performing quantitative measurements. In this work, we design a low-cost paper-based nanosensor through plasmonic calligraphy by directly drawing individual plasmonic lines on filter paper using a ballpoint pen filled with gold nanorods (AuNR) as the colloidal ink. The plasmonic arrays were further successively coated with negatively and positively charged polyelectrolyte layers employed as dielectric spacers to promote the enhancement of the emission of carboxyl-functionalized quantum dots (QD)—previously conjugated with specific antibodies—for indirect detection of the carcinoembryonic antigen-related cell adhesion molecule 5 (CEACAM5). The efficiency, sensitivity, as well as the specificity of our portable nanosensor were validated by recording the luminescence of the QD@Ab complex when different concentrations of CEACAM5 were added dropwise onto the calligraphed plasmonic arrays. Full article

During contact, deformation, and fracture of surface asperities between the friction surfaces of materials, acoustic emission (AE) waves are generated as the strain energy is released. By detecting the AE waves during friction using an AE sensor, the state of friction, wear, and lubrication between the friction surfaces can be measured and evaluated with high sensitivity. In this study, in order to establish a method for evaluating the writing performance of ballpoint pens by AE sensing, the measurement method was examined, and AE signal waveforms were analyzed. It was found that AE sensing can detect phenomena that do not appear as a change in frictional force during writing. In addition, frequency analysis of the AE signal waveforms revealed that differences in writing performance depending on the ink type of the ballpoint pen can be evaluated and interpreted. Full article

Designing innovative (nano)detection platforms, respecting their low-cost and fabrication simplicity, capable to chemically detect multiple target analytes by employing the same engineered device, is still a great challenge in the multiplexed biosensor development. In this scientific context, in the current manuscript, we exploit the low-cost plasmonic calligraphy as a versatile approach to directly draw continuous plasmonic lines on Whatman paper using a regular ballpoint pen successively filled with two different anisotropic nanoparticles shapes (gold bipyramids—AuBPs and gold nanorods—AuNRs) as colloidal inks. After the efficient immobilization of the positively-charged AuBPs and AuNRs onto the paper fibres, proved by Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM) investigations, the specificity of our as-calligraphed-paper platform is ensured by coating the selected lines with a thin layer of anionic poly(styrene sulfonate) polyelectrolyte, creating, consequently, a well-defined plasmonic array of charge-selective regions. Finally, the functionality of the well-isolated and as-miniaturized active plasmonic array is, subsequently, tested using the anionic Rose-Bengal and cationic Rhodamine 6G target analytes and proved by complementary dual optical “ON/OFF Switch” sensing (i.e. Surface-enhanced Raman Scattering sensing/metal-enhanced fluorescence sensing) onto the same plasmonic line, developing thus a simple multiplexed plasmonic array platform, which could further facilitate the well-desired biomarker detection in complex mixtures. Full article

In order to fabricate a digital microfluidic (DMF) chip, which requires a patterned array of electrodes coated with a dielectric film, we explored two simple methods: Ballpoint pen printing to generate the electrodes, and wrapping of a dielectric plastic film to coat the electrodes. For precise and programmable printing of the patterned electrodes, we used a digital plotter with a ballpoint pen filled with a silver nanoparticle (AgNP) ink. Instead of using conventional material deposition methods, such as chemical vapor deposition, printing, and spin coating, for fabricating the thin dielectric layer, we used a simple method in which we prepared a thin dielectric layer using pre-made linear, low-density polyethylene (LLDPE) plastic (17-μm thick) by simple wrapping. We then sealed it tightly with thin silicone oil layers so that it could be used as a DMF chip. Such a treated dielectric layer showed good electrowetting performance for a sessile drop without contact angle hysteresis under an applied voltage of less than 170 V. By using this straightforward fabrication method, we quickly and affordably fabricated a paper-based DMF chip and demonstrated the digital electrofluidic actuation and manipulation of drops. Full article

This work is devoted to the extremely popular but poorly developed scientific and forensic problem of the estimation of the actual dates of inscriptions placed on paper and made by ballpoint pens. It is shown that the degradation of writing inks with time may be controlled via Raman spectroscopy and gas chromatography. The time intervals for the implementation of each of these methods were determined using the ratios of the Raman peak intensities as degradation characteristics rather than their absolute values. In turn, this eliminates the effect of the concentration of a dye. The mutual influence of the volatile components and dyes of writing inks was also investigated and the time interval within which such influence is critical was found. According to the obtained results, a new methodological scheme for determining the age of documents, which were created at least 40 months ago, was proposed. Full article

We have developed a pen and writing tablet for use by subjects during fMRI scanning. The pen consists of two jacketed, multi-mode optical fibers routed to the tip of a hollowed-out ball-point pen. The pen has been further modified by addition of a plastic plate to maintain a perpendicular pen-tablet orientation. The tablet is simply a non-metallic frame holding a paper print of continuously varying color gradients. The optical fibers are routed out of the MRI bore to a light-tight box in an adjacent control room. Within the box, light from a high intensity LED is coupled into one of the fibers, while the other fiber abuts a color sensor. Light from the LED exits the pen tip, illuminating a small spot on the tablet, and the resulting reflected light is routed to the color sensor. Given a lookup table of position for each color on the tablet, the coordinates of the pen on the tablet may be displayed and digitized in real-time. While simple and inexpensive, the system achieves sufficient resolution to grade writing tasks testing dysgraphic and dyslexic phenomena. Full article