NEW DELHI: Imagine swallowing a tiny pill that journeys through the stomach, opens up in the intestine to collect microbes, and then quietly exits the body, carrying valuable biological clues with it. What once belonged to science fiction is now a scientific breakthrough.
Researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) Delhi have developed a pill-sized ingestible microrobot capable of sampling bacteria directly from the small intestine, offering unprecedented insight into the human gut microbiome.
The human body is home to trillions of microbes; nearly half of all cells in the system are microbial. These organisms are essential for digestion, immunity, and even mental health. Yet, studying them accurately has remained a major challenge. Current methods are either invasive, such as endoscopy and ileostomy, or indirect, relying on stool samples that do not truly represent microbial activity in the upper gastrointestinal (GI) tract.
Calling the microbiome a “hidden universe,” Prof. Sarvesh Kumar Srivastava, Principal Investigator at IIT Delhi’s Medical Microdevices and Medicine Laboratory (3MLab), said miniaturised devices are essential to explore the body’s inner space, much like rovers are used to explore outer space.
He explained that the newly developed ingestible microdevice can autonomously collect microbes from specific regions of the upper GI tract, enabling species-level identification and biomarker analysis.
The pill-like device remains sealed in the stomach and opens only after reaching the intestine. Once it gathers microbial samples, it securely closes again, protecting the contents as it passes naturally through the digestive system. Remarkably, the prototype is no larger than a grain of rice.
The research team has successfully validated the technology in animal models and filed a patent for the invention. Their findings were published in the prestigious journal Small under the title “A Small Pill-like Ingestible Microdevice for Site-specific Microbiome Sampling in the Upper GI Tract.”
Dr. Samagra Agarwal, co-senior author from AIIMS New Delhi, emphasised the clinical importance of the small intestine, noting that a better understanding of microbes and chemicals released there could aid early disease detection, improve monitoring of chronic conditions, and enable more targeted treatments.
Funded by the Indian Council of Medical Research (ICMR), the team is now working towards advancing the technology for clinical use in Indian patients, pending regulatory approvals, marking a significant step forward in personalised medicine and gut health research.