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The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation has been leading the progress of contraception innovation. The next evolution: wireless birth control.

Implantable birth control isn't new, and the current ones can only last three years. The new device developed by Gates Foundation-backed MicroCHIPS would be able to stay in place for up to 16 years. Want to have a baby? Switch it off with a remote.

The chip provides 30 micrograms of pregnancy-blocking hormone levonorgestrel daily. When its time for the hormone to be delivered, an internal battery sends an electric current through the device, temporarily melting the reservoir's hermetic, titanium and platinum seal and doling out just the right dose on the daily for 16 years.
The idea for the device originated two years ago in a visit by Bill Gates and his colleagues to Robert Langer's MIT lab. Gates and his colleagues asked Langer if it were feasible to create birth control that a woman could turn on and off and use for many years. Langer thought the controlled release microchip technology he invented with colleagues Michael Cima and John Santini in the 1990s and licensed to MicroCHIPS might offer a solution.
For now it's still in experimentation stage. The only major problem to this is hacking. The team will have to work out how to effectively encrypt the microchip from turning the birth control off. [MIT Tech Review via The Week]