Jennifer Matthews: Even when she's having fun, Ali Kutz is always thinking about her blood sugar. She's had type 1 diabetes for 11 years.
Ali Kutz: It's the day in, day out. You never get a break from it. It's continuous. It's life.
Jennifer Matthews: She pricks her finger to check her blood sugar up to eight times a day.
Ali Kutz: It's just a pain to have to do it all the time, but to make sure that I stay in a certain range, I have to. It's just life, and I have to learn to deal with it.
Jennifer Matthews: Ali's life could get easier in the future. Scientist Sanford Asher from the University of Pittsburgh, is developing a sugar-sensing contact lens.
Dr. Sanford Asher: A person with diabetes would wear the contact lens, and one piece of it would report on the glucose in the tear fluid.
Jennifer Matthews: Photonic crystals are set in a standard contact lens. The crystals simply change color as blood sugar levels rise and fall. Instead of finger pricks, diabetics just need a mirror.
Dr. Sanford Asher: They would compare that color to a color wheel, when they find the match, there will be a number there that will give them the glucose concentration in their blood.
Jennifer Matthews: The contacts are still in development, but Dr. Asher is hopeful.
Dr. Sanford Asher: It would change their lifestyle and the prognosis for diabetics. I think it will revolutionize their life.
Ali Kutz: Just to be able to have that extra opportunity not to have to test, to be able to use a contact lens? I think it's an amazing idea.
Jennifer Matthews: Another amazing idea -- the body battery -- will save failing hearts.
Dr. Dennis Trumble: The potential impact of this device, if it works the way we think it can, could be very significant.
Jennifer Matthews: Scientist Dennis Trumble's solution is a muscle energy converter (MEC) implanted in the chest and attached to a large muscle in the back. As the muscle contracts, an artificial tendon pulls an arm on the device, generating enough power to keep the heart pumping.
Dr. Dennis Trumble: We are basically just harnessing one muscle to help another, which we are taking the back muscle to help the heart muscle.
Jennifer Matthews: With no external power source like standard heart pumps, patients would soon forget they have a pump at all.
Dr. Dennis Trumble: There are literally millions of people who can benefit from this kind of thing.
Jennifer Matthews: This is Jennifer Matthews reporting.
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