February 7-9, 2023 | Anaheim Convention Center, Anaheim, CA
Component Supply will be exhibiting at MD&M West 2023 for the second year in a row. MD&M West connects engineers, business leaders, and innovative thinkers worldwide to create robust solutions and life-changing medical devices. Come by our booth to meet our team and ask us your MedTech questions.
We look forward to meeting and working with you all to help bring your medical innovations to life.
October is National Liver Awareness Month. The liver is one of the most vital organs in the human body. Therefore, how well we care for our liver affects the rest of our body’s functions and health. The liver has many functions. The most vital role is to break down nutrients and minerals in the blood of what we consume, produce bile for digestion, and filter out toxins in our blood.
Numerous diseases can damage the liver. The most common and increasingly growing concern is liver cancer, nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, and hepatitis. Liver disease is one of the top 3 leaded causes of cancer-related deaths in the United States. Early detection and treatment may prevent the further progression of these diseases because your liver can repair itself. However, once the liver reaches a certain point without treatment, the damage the disease has caused to the liver may become irreversible and lead to liver failure or death. Risk factors and causes of fatty liver disease include alcohol abuse, a high-calorie diet, chronic viral hepatitis, and poor lifestyle choices.
This month is especially meaningful to me. For ten years, my aunt suffered from nonalcoholic fatty liver disease, which eventually became cirrhosis. Cirrhosis is where your liver becomes severely scarred, the damage cannot be reversed, and there is no treatment other than a liver transplant. With cirrhosis, the patient’s liver shrinks and becomes hard, making it difficult for the liver to filter the large amounts of blood it’s supposed to. The two primary sources that supply blood to the liver are the hepatic artery and the hepatic portal vein. The scar tissue caused by cirrhosis prevents the blood from flowing through the portal vein. She underwent several other intensive procedures in hopes of prolonging the effects of the disease. One procedure she endured was the TIPS (transjugular intrahepatic portosystemic shunt) procedure. This operation involves a small wire-mesh coil that creates a bypass to allow better blood flow between two veins in the liver. Unfortunately, these procedures were not enough to sustain her liver function and being unable to get onto the liver transplant list. My aunt passed away in 2018.
Fun Facts About Your Liver:
The liver is the only organ in the body that can completely regenerate, requiring just a quarter of the original tissue.
It is the heaviest organ in the body, can weigh up to 3 pounds
Stores around 10 percent of your body’s blood at one time
At Component Supply, we have always believed that we are more than just a supplier and fabricator of metal and plastic tubing and wire. We promote and support research every day by supplying quality, affordable components faster than anyone. In honor of my aunt, Tammy, we will support labs and encourage research in this field throughout this month. If you are a researcher of liver disease, please reach out to us for opportunities to receive a discount on your standard or fabricated components for October.
Let us support your research and developments benefiting liver patients nationwide.
Tygon® Tubing is a flexible plastic polymer tubing with various formulations that contain different chemical and physical properties. Tygon® tubing is resistant to most inorganic chemicals and resistant to cracking and aging. Therefore, it has a longer lifespan than rubber tubing. This non-oxidizing tubing is less permeable than rubber tubing and will not contaminate fluid as it passes through the tubing. At Component Supply, we offer four different types of Tygon® tubing: E-3603, B-44-3, ND100-65, and ND100-80. Tygon® tubing is used in many industries, including food and beverage, chemical processing, laboratory, medical, and pharmaceutical.
Tygon® E-3603 Laboratory Tubing
Tygon® E-3603’s tubing’s durable formulation is resistant to flex fatigue and abrasion, providing increased sustainability and safety for the environment and users. This tubing is commonly used in laboratory, food and beverage handling, and biopharmaceutical instruments. The non-oxidizing tubing is less permeable than rubber tubing and will not contaminate fluid as it passes through the tubing. Typical applications for E-3603 include condensers, incubators, desiccators, gas lines and drain lines, instrument connection, vent, drain, and other general laboratory applications. E-3603 provides a long-term economical choice as its durability reduces labor and replacement expenses. The limitations of Tygon® E-3603 is that the tubing should not be used as an implant material under any circumstances.
Tygon® B-44-3 Beverage Tubing
Tygon® B-44-3 is a clear, PVC-based tubing commonly used for transferring liquids. This tubing possesses a smooth, non-wetting, nonporous bore, which does not affect the taste or odor of the liquid that is transferred through it and allows for complete drainage and thorough simple flush-cleaning. It is chemically resistant to virtually all non-solvent chemicals. Tygon® beverage tubing meets FDA, 3-A, and NSF criteria. The industries commonly use Tygon® B-44-3 are beverage dispensing, bag-in-box, dairy processing, food dispensing, and beverage transfer applications.
Tygon® ND100-65 Medical Tubing
Tygon® ND100-65 is a non-toxic, non-hemolytic, non-pyrogenic material specifically designed for the medical industry and is especially useful for medical device manufacturers requiring a non-DEHP plasticized material. It is made from a biocompatible, non-DEHP polymer material purposefully developed for blood contact medical device needs. Individual product dimensions are maintained and monitored during the manufacturer’s extrusion process through in-line micrometers and offline verification with computerized imaging equipment. This material can be effectively bonded and/or welded using the following methods: heat, electronic (RF)/ultrasonic, solvent, and adhesive. ND100-65 withstands EtO, gas, and Gamma sterilization. Tygon® ND100-65 industry and applications use laboratory, pharmaceutical, and other medical and surgical applications such as dialysis, chemotherapy drug delivery, bypass procedures, and minimally invasive surgeries.
Tygon® ND100-80 Microbore Tubing
The Tygon® ND Series is a biocompatible, non-DEHP plasticized tubing developed explicitly for the medical device industry. This tubing’s soft, flexible material reduces the risk of puncture, yet its rigidity prevents kinking. With a clear and glass-smooth inner bore, Tygon® ND100-80 provides excellent visibility. The medical industry uses Tygon® ND100-80 in dialysis equipment, minimally invasive devices, peristaltic pumps, medical laboratories, inhalation equipment, blood and IV solutions, catheters, and intravenous or intra-arterial infusion.
We are happy to announce we will be attending MD&M Minneapolis on November 2nd-3rd, 2022. MD&M Minneapolis is a large medical design and manufacturing event located at the Minneapolis Convention Center in Minnesota. As a supplier to the MedTech industry, we are looking forward to meeting with attendees and sharing our range of medical device components and capabilities. Let us help you meet your application needs.
Please visit us at MD&M Minneapolis at booth #2735!
About Component Supply
Component Supply is dedicated to providing materials for the medical device, aerospace, and laboratory sciences industries. We have fast lead times and offer the most comprehensive standard and fabricated hypodermic tubing, PTFE tubing, mandrel wire, woven filter mesh, fittings, and blunt needles.
At Component Supply, we advocate for research and development by supplying quality, affordable components faster than anyone. For the month of May, we are focusing on National Cancer Research as a part of our REAP- Research Engagement and Awareness Program. We honor all the patients, survivors, scientists, and physicians battling this deadly disease. Our goal is to see cancer patients benefit from the lifesaving R&D advancements for their disease. Therefore, we are offering discounts all month long to those in the cancer research field to make this possible.
To facilitate research engagement, Component Supply will offer 25% offcatalog pricing* for standard supply items for cancer research. Also, for customers requiring custom fabrication, we will waive our $150 prototyping minimum. All you have to do is send us a link to your research lab website or a 3-5 sentence summary of your work in the field, and we will apply the requested discounts. **
Please send your RFQ, orders, and links to your research website to parts@componentsupplycompany.com with the subject “REAP2022.” We look forward to working with you!
MD&M West is the largest MedTech event in the United States located in Anaheim, California, at the Anaheim convention center and will be held on April 12-14, 2022. This tradeshow brings together engineers, business leaders, and innovative thinkers worldwide to create robust solutions and life-changing medical devices. With over 1,000 exhibitors and 13,000 attendees, we are excited to have the opportunity to grow our business and meet new clients.
At Component Supply, this is our first tradeshow as exhibitors. In the past, we have always attended as guests, visiting other vendors and growing our network, so we are very excited to participate with our own booth this year. We welcome you to visit us at booth #2822 to learn more about our company, meet our staff, and even look at our products and capabilities.
Meet GeorgeAnn (Georgie) DeAntoni. Ph.D. Candidate in the Department of Anthropology at UC Santa Cruz.
GeorgeAnn (Georgie) DeAntoni. Ph.D. Candidate
Education:
B.S. Anthropology and Native American Studies UC Berkeley 2015 M.A. in Anthropology from UC Santa Cruz 2018 Seeking Ph.D. Anthropology UC Santa Cruz
Research:
GeorgeAnn DeAntoni began studying archaeology in 2012 and participated in her first excavation in 2013. Currently, she is studying the plants that Native Californians used for food and medicine during the mission period in California (1769-1833). She uses Component Supply’s Nylon mesh for a seed project for her current research project. DeAntoni explains how she retrieves the plant materials to study, “To do this, I look for seeds and charcoal that can be found in the soils of an archaeological site. Using a process called flotation, which relies on moving water and a series of fine meshes, we separate charred plant matter- which floats because it is less dense than water- from artifacts and dirt. Once the botanicals are separated from the soils and artifacts, we look at them under the microscope to identify the different plant taxa found in the samples.”
She goes on to describe her current project, stating “The seed project that I’m using the mesh for is a small part of a larger effort to do some fully collaborative and community-based archaeological research. This means that I’ve been working very closely with California State Parks and multiple tribal communities- primarily the Amah Mutsun Tribal Band and the Indian Canyon Mutsun Band of Costanoan Ohlone People- to make sure that this project centers their research goals and emphasizes their connection to the site. The California missions had and continue to have a major impact on many Indigenous Californian communities, and for a long time the missions were portrayed as a place where Native peoples acculturated or were effectively erased. However, it goes without saying that Native peoples are still thriving and very active at the site today, and we want to make sure that their relationship to the site and its history is told in a way that is reflective of their experiences.”
Fun Facts Q&A:
What’s your favorite food?
So many types of food, but I’m a real sucker for an asada burrito.
What’s your favorite song or music group?
This one changes a lot, but I’m super into Chris Stapleton, Tyler Childers and Sturgill Simpson at the moment. Just Let Go may be my current favorite song. Also love pretty much anything by ABBA, Dolly Parton or Marty Robbins.
What book do you recommend?
I just finished reading “Fuzz: When Nature Breaks the Law” by Mary Roach and couldn’t put it down! Super good and fun. “Tending the Wild” by M. Kat Anderson is also one that I think is really eye opening and important
What’s the coolest gadget you’ve ever seen?
This is a little archaeology-nerd of me, but I think a Ground-Penetrating Radar is pretty cool. It’s one of the geophysical methods I mentioned earlier that uses radar pulses to get an image of what is below the ground. In the case of archaeological sites, it can help locate clusters of artifacts, changes in soil density (that might be caused by something having been either dug up or buried on the site), or structural remains like house floors or buried walls.
What’s on your bucket list?
Someday I’d like to live in the woods with a donkey, a couple of goats and pigs. Not sure if that’s a bucket list item or just how I’d like my future to pan out.
Who is a person throughout history you’d most like to meet?
Not a person, but I might say Balto, one of the sled dogs from the final leg of the “Great Race of Mercy” in Alaska in 1925 who helped deliver a serum to treat diphtheria. The trek was over 650 miles and there were twenty dog sled teams, but Balto led the final leg of the journey. It was one of my favorite movies as a kid, and the fact that it was based on a true story is just really cool. Some would argue that Togo (the lead dog for the most hazardous and longest distance of the route) should be equally famous, and I’d have to agree. Yay for dogs!
What is the best trip or vacation you’ve ever taken?
After my first year of college my three roommates and I took a three-week cross country road trip in a Prius and went to 28 different states! Before then I had only been to California and Oregon, so it was a really awesome and eye-opening experience. Plus, we got to visit some really beautiful National Parks, Historic Landmarks and museums, which is just about an ideal vacation for me.
What do you enjoy doing when you are not in your lab?
When I’m not in the lab you can probably find me hiking out in the woods somewhere! Or maybe learning to roller skate.
What is one research discovery you’d like to see?
Archaeology is an inherently destructive discipline, which means for the most part we have to take something apart (effectively destroy it) in order to study it. There have been so many advances in the field to be as minimally invasive as possible (for example, using geophysical surveys to get a sense for archaeological features and artifacts below the ground before starting to dig), but I would be really interested to see how we can continue to do culturally relevant research while leaving an even smaller footprint at an archaeological site. One of the great things about paleoethnobotany (the archaeological study of plant use) is that you can get a fine-grained understanding of a site from only a small sample of soils, and so I think future advances in other methods where you can get high-resolution data from small sample sizes would be awesome!
Stainless steel is a widely used material in medical applications due to its versatility, corrosion resistance, and cost-effectiveness. At Component Supply, our 304 and 316 stainless steel mandrel wire stock is spring tempered, drawn, and straightened with a bright finish. When viewing the two stainless steel wires, you may not see an apparent difference in appearance. However, the two differ in chemical composition and application uses.
304 stainless steel contains 18% chromium and 8% nickel. 316 stainless steel contains 16% chromium, 10% nickel, and 2% molybdenum. The distinguishable difference between 316 from 304 is that 316 contains molybdenum, which aids in corrosion resistance to chlorides. Due to its higher corrosion resistance, 316’s lifespan will be longer than 304’s, specifically when used in highly acidic conditions. 316 contains less chromium than 304, reducing the hardness and decreasing the tensile strength. Therefore, the uses for 316 will slightly differ from 304’s. Many researchers are quick to remember only the positive attributes of 316 compared to 304 without fully considering the adverse effects in chromium may cause.
Generally, 304 Stainless Steel is the most popular choice in wire because it is less expensive and has a high tensile strength. In other cases, 316 might be preferred over 304 if your application occurs in a highly acidic atmosphere, and slightly lower tensile strength is sufficient. When it comes to application, you must weigh the longevity versus the strength of the stainless steels.
In the medical industry, 304 and 316 are both commonly used. Medical devices utilizing 316 stainless steel have more reusable life than 304. Because of their higher rust resistance, they can undergo continuous sterilization for extended periods. For example, it is common to use 316 ss as temporary rods and pins in a medical procedure. Still, if the rods and pins are permanent, a more durable metal would need to be used, such as nitinol or titanium. Medical devices containing 304 are standard tools that are less expensive and are discarded after use, such as a scalpel. 304 is acceptable in most scope procedures or outpatient surgeries such as dentistry, vascular therapy, orthodontics, and endoscopy. Other demands include Aerospace (high-performance wire and cable, fasteners, springs), Industrial: springs, resistors, jewelry. 316 is more commonly used in marine applications where it is exposed to harsh acidic conditions. More potential end-uses of 304 and 316 include catheters, mandrels, stylets, introducers, push-pull rods, guidewire assembly. However, while 304 and 316 are high-quality metals that will have longevity, over time, rust will begin to form when exposed to oxides, an inevitability with any ferrous metal.
Component Supply is not always aware of the end-uses of our researchers’ applications. Suppose you’re still unsure which material is the most suitable for your application. In that case, we advise purchasing a small quantity of either material to test with before committing to a larger quantity.
Heart Disease is the leading cause of death in the United States. It is nearly impossible not to feel the impact of heart disease, either personally or through a family member or friend. I have witnessed the effects of heart disease on many of my relatives, including my grandfather and great-grandmother, who both suffered from congestive heart failure. Currently, my grandmother has high blood pressure, and according to the American Heart Association, “at least 48 percent of all U.S. adults have some form of cardiovascular disease, such as coronary artery disease, stroke, heart failure, and high blood pressure.” With numbers this alarming, Component Supply wants to continue to support research and development for heart disease. There’s good news: we already know that a regular exercise routine and balanced diet can reduce risks of heart disease! However, that might not always solve all the problems. So, during American Heart Month and continuing months, Component Supply, is offering special support to cardiovascular researchers through REAP – our Research Engagement and Awareness Program.
As the R&D resource, Component Supply has always believed that we are more than a supplier and fabricator of metal and plastic tubing and wire. We promote and support research every day by supplying quality, affordable components faster than anyone. But, in February 2022, if you are a researcher of heart disease, please reach out to us for opportunities to receive a discount on your standard or fabricated components in the month of February.
We look forward to working with cardiovascular researchers by providing materials to further their development.
At Component Supply, we frequently receive inquiries regarding the sterilization options for our nylon mesh products. Typically, they want to know which methods of sterilization are most effective between autoclave, gamma sterilization, and EtO.
First, can you autoclave nylon mesh? To this question, we say, “just because you can, doesn’t mean you should.” While we have had customers successfully autoclave nylon mesh, many more have attempted this process without success. The autoclave process speeds up the absorption of the water in the polyamide causing the material to either become brittle and break or gummy. The settings and the autoclave itself lead to varying degrees of success, or rather, failure.
Gamma sterilization of nylon 6/6 doesn’t perform well either. From our experience, you will see a decrease in the melting point, causing the material to become brittle, which can result in cracking. Additionally, the fiber surface can become rough, which can affect filtering in some application. These changes also do not happen at the time of sterilization but can continue over time after irradiation.
That brings us to our last sterilization method, which is EtO. To our knowledge, EtO is the best sterilization method for nylon 6/6 because materials sterilized with this method are not exposed to excessive heat, moisture or radiation as seen with other sterilization methods.
For more information about the suitability of nylon mesh for your application, please visit our website or contact us directly at parts@componentsupplycompany.com.
