Latest advances in medical research thread

[ScienceRocks]

Medtronic announces world's smallest pacemaker
By Ben Coxworth
April 14, 2015

Two years ago we heard about the Nanostim, a pacemaker that's less than 10 percent the size of a regular model. While it's pretty darn small, Medtronic's just-announced Micra TPS (Transcatheter Pacing System) is reportedly even tinier. Billed as the world's smallest pacemaker, it's described as being the size of a large vitamin capsule – and it can be implanted using a catheter.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Modified Salmonella eats away at cancer, without a side order of food poisoning
By Nick Lavars
April 15, 2015

Though generally a bacteria we'd associate with a severe bout of food poisoning, previous research has suggested that Salmonella needn't always bring bad news and stomach cramps. Certain strains have been shown to kill off cancer cells, but to use them as a form of treatment for humans without inducing any nasty side effects has so far proven difficult. But now, researchers have developed genetically modified salmonella that turns toxic only after it enters a tumor.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Scientists may have found potential cause of the disease in the behaviour of immune cells - giving new hope to millions.

Experts said the findings, from Duke University in North Carolina, USA, could “open new doors” in the increasingly frustrated global hunt for a dementia therapy.

Researchers at Duke announced that their studies of Alzheimer’s in mice had thrown up a new process they believe contributes to the disease’s development.

They observed that in Alzheimer’s, immune cells that normally protect the brain instead begin to consume a vital nutrient called arginine.

By blocking this process with a drug, they were able to prevent the formation of ‘plaques’ in the brain that are characteristic of Alzheimer’s disease, and also halted memory loss in the mice.

Alzheimer s breakthrough Scientists may have found potential cause of the disease in the behaviour of immune cells - giving new hope to millions - Health News - Health Families - The Independent

 

[ScienceRocks]

Dementia 'halted in mice brains'



Quote

15 April 2015

Tweaking the brain's immune system with a drug has prevented mice developing dementia, a study shows.
The team at Duke University, in the US, showed immune cells which start attacking nutrients in the brain may be a trigger for the disease.
They say their findings could open up new avenues of research for a field that has not developed a single drug to slow the progression of the disease.
Experts said the findings offered new hope of a treatment.
The researchers indentified microglia - normally the first line of defence against infection in the brain - as major players in the development of dementia.
They found some microglia changed to become exceptionally adept at breaking down a component of protein, an amino acid called arginine, in the early stages of the disease.
As arginine levels plummeted, the immune cells appeared to dampened the immune system in the brain.

http://www.bbc.co.uk...health-32315763

 

[ScienceRocks]

Researchers believe a biological revolution enabling humans to experience everlasting youthfulness is coming

IT is likely the first person who will live to be 1,000 years old is already alive today.

This is according to a growing regiment of researchers who believe a biological revolution enabling humans to experience everlasting youthfulness is just around the corner.

At the epicentre of the research is Aubrey de Grey — a Cambridge gerontologist and co-founder or the California-based Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence(SENS) Research Foundation.

“The first thing I want to do is get rid of the use of this word immortality, because it’s enormously damaging, it is not just wrong, it is damaging,” he told Motherboard.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Researchers make key malarial drug-resistence finding

According to the World Health Organization's 2014 World Malaria Report, there are an estimated 198 million cases of malaria worldwide with 3.3 billion people at risk for contracting the infection.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Study reveals a cause of poorer outcomes for African-American patients with breast cancer
Poorer outcomes for African-American women with estrogen-receptor positive (ER+) breast cancer, compared with European-American patients, appears to be due, in part, to a strong survival mechanism within the cancer cells,...

 

[Abishai100]

Blood Tests, HGH, & Stroke: Down Syndrome Lancet


A new discovery is really enticing:

"DNA blood test detects Down Syndrome faster" (source news.discovery.com).

Website Source



How will this affect proactive research into the factorial/branching affects/effects of Down Syndrome? We already know that the ailment affects brain perception, attention mechanisms, and prioritization timing. However, there are also lesser-studied connections such as those with dwarfism.

A study suggests that people suffering from dwarfism (a condition caused by unnatural slow growth and hormone imbalances) are possibly candidates for Down Syndrome --- sounds interesting, but is it too odd to be verifiable?

What we really need is a deeper study of the hormonal activity in Down Syndrome patients and people suffering from dwarfism.

Maybe this news release is relevant:

Children prescribed HGH at risk of stroke and body-brain coordination problems






Dwarfism (Wikipedia)

The Growth Hormone Research Society

HGH deficiency in Down Syndrome Patients (NIH)

 

[ScienceRocks]

Exoskeleton helps spinal injured walk and reactivates nerves in some

An exoskeleton that enables movement and provides tactile feedback has helped eight paralysed people regain sensation and move previously paralysed muscles. People can spend a lifetime feeling disconnected from their lower body, and tend to receive less physical therapy as a result. Just over a third of the 12,500 people who experience a...

 

[ScienceRocks]

Russia printed mouse thyroid gland and are targeting a functioning bioprinted kidney in 2018

Skolkovo biomed cluster resident 3D Bioprinting Solutions has announced the successful printing of a mouse's thyroid gland. 3d Bioprinting Solutions is targeting functional printed kidney scheduled for 2018. If confirmed, it would reportedly be the world's first synthetic construction of a complete, transplantable living organ.

 

[ScienceRocks]

3D printers are churning out made-to-order bones and rudimentary organs

The advent of three-dimensional (3D) printing has generated a swell of interest in artificial organs meant to replace, or even enhance, human machinery. Printed organs, such as a prototype outer ear developed by researchers at Princeton University in New Jersey and Johns Hopkins University in Baltimore, Maryland, was on the agenda at the.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Protein converts pancreatic cancer cells back into healthy cells
By Nick Lavars
April 21, 2015

Scientists working in the area of pancreatic cancer research have uncovered a technique that sees cancerous cells transform back into normal healthy cells. The method relies in the introduction of a protein called E47, which bonds with particular DNA sequences and reverts the cells back to their original state.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Drugs stimulate body's own stem cells to replace brain cells lost in multiple sclerosis

A pair of topical medicines already alleviating skin conditions each may prove to have another, even more compelling use: instructing stem cells in the brain to reverse damage caused by multiple sclerosis.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Research reveals new possibilities for islet and stem cell transplantation

(Edmonton) James Shapiro, one of the world's leading experts in emerging treatments of diabetes, can't help but be excited about his latest research. The results he says, could soon mark a new standard for treatment—not only in diabetes, but in several other diseases as well.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-04-reveals-possibilities-islet-stem-cell.html#jCp

 

[ScienceRocks]

New sampling device promises to make blood tests needle-free
By Nick Lavars
April 21, 2015
2 Pictures

Though the pain they cause is minor, a lot of people still find something pretty unsettling about needles. When it comes to conducting a routine blood test, one US-based company believes that these unpleasant pricks can be removed from the equation completely. Its ping pong-sized HemoLink blood sampler can be operated by the patient at home, and needs only to be placed against the skin for two minutes to do its job.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Team first to model atomic structures of three bacterial nanomachines
7 hours ago

Hong Zhou runs the Electron Imaging Center for Nanomachines laboratory at CNSI, where a highly sophisticated cryo electron microscope made the research possible.

Researchers at UCLA's California NanoSystems Institute have become the first to produce images of the atomic structures of three specific biological nanomachines, each derived from a different potentially deadly bacterium—an achievement they hope will lead to antibiotics targeted toward specific pathogens.

Read more at: http://phys.org/news/2015-04-team-atomic-bacterial-nanomachines.html#jCp

 

[ScienceRocks]

Journal Nature reports Chinese scientists have genetically modified human embryos with 32.5% success rate.

In a world first, Chinese scientists have reported editing the genomes of human embryos. The results are published in the online journal Protein and Cell and confirm widespread rumours that such experiments had been conducted—rumours that sparked a high-profile debate last month about the ethical implications of such work. In the paper,...

 

[ScienceRocks]

Existing skin medications may reverse effects of multiple sclerosis
By Ben Coxworth
April 23, 2015

It's a frustrating situation. There are already stem cells in the nervous system that are capable of repairing the damage done by multiple sclerosis, but getting them to do so has proven very difficult. Now, however, a multi-institutional team led by Case Western Reserve University's Prof. Paul Tesar may have found the answer – and it involves using medications that were designed to treat athlete's foot and eczema.

 

[ScienceRocks]

Implantable device could allow for better-targeted cancer treatment
By Chris Wood
April 24, 2015

While there are a large number of approved cancer treatments, identifying which drugs are best suited to individual patients is extremely difficult for doctors. A team of MIT researchers has developed a small, implantable device that aims to change this by allowing scientists to measure the effectiveness of different drugs, on a patient-by-patient basis.

 

[ScienceRocks]

They’re Alive! Watch These Mini 3D Printed Organs Beat Just Like Hearts

There’s something almost alchemical going on at the Wake Forest Institute for Regenerative Medicine. Scientists there have genetically transformed skin cells into heart cells and used them to 3D print mini-organs that beat just like your heart. Another darker organoid fused to a mini-heart mimics your liver.

The work, developed by Anthony Atala and his Wake Forest team for the “Body on a Chip” project, aims to simulate bodily systems by microfluidically linking upminiature organs—hearts, livers, blood vessels, and lungs—and testing new drug treatments and chemicals or studying the effects of viruses on them.