Indicine cattle make up half of all cattle populations worldwide. Using a large genomic dataset, this study finds historic migrations and extensive introgression with domestic and wild bovine species has facilitated this species physiological adaptation to extreme environments.
Target validation is a crucial step in pre-clinical drug discovery workflows that builds confidence on the identification of a genetic target as relevant to a disease. With recent advancements, CRISPR serves as a particularly powerful tool for this process, as it enables researchers to accurately modify genes and determine their function in a variety of experimental systems.
One scientist leveraging CRISPR gene editing in this way is Dr. Panos Zalmas, Head of the Open Targets Validation Lab based at the Wellcome Sanger Institute, whose work focuses on discovering and validating new putative disease targets for the development of safe and effective medicines.
In this SelectScience® interview, we speak with Zalmas to learn how he is working to improve the rate of target adoption into drug discovery pipelines across therapy areas such as oncology, neurodegeneration, and immunology and inflammation. Here, Zalmas explains the importance of gene editing in his target validation workflows and highlights how CRISPR technologies in particular are key to the success of drug discovery.
A new AI system, Sturgeon, is redefining brain tumor surgeries.
Sturgeon is a pretrained neural network that uses incremental results from nanopore sequencing to rapidly classify central nervous system tumours and can be used to aid critical decision-making during surgery.
The notion of black holes is one that invokes terror and dread. They’re inescapable! They devour everything! Nothing ever comes out!
The accuracy of these beliefs falls on the spectrum of debatable to incorrect. And a pair of physicists has now calculated how proverbial blood might be wrung from the black hole stone. According to Zhan-Feng Mai and Run-Qiu Yang of Tianjin University in China, teeny tiny black holes could theoretically be used as a source of power.
Their calculations find that these ultradense objects could work as rechargeable batteries and nuclear reactors, providing energy on the scale of gigaelectronvolts.
Yes, if it’s quality life this is good and maybe even use this as an example of helping humans live longer and why not cats?
For the first time, the FDA has indicated a willingness to endorse a longevity drug.
That’s good news. Maybe there’s gonna be fewer super bugs springing up.
Researchers have developed a method that identifies bacteria easily, cheaply and more precisely than before. This can help reduce use of antibiotics.
Far too many antibiotics are used around the world. As a result, bacteria are becoming resistant.
Longevity drugs for our canine companions are moving closer to reality. They also raise questions about what it might mean to succeed.
The brain-computer interface (BCI) space continues to rise in notoriety, and a number of players are throwing their hats in the ring.
Such technologies could enable users to control a computer with their brain, or even go beyond that. Countless immobile people someday could control a mouse cursor, keyboard, mobile device/tablet, wheelchair or prosthetic device by only thinking.
Big names have already established their presence in the space. Elon Musk’s Neuralink continues to make headway, while Bill Gates-and Jeff Bezos-backed Synchron has an innovative catheter-delivered implant. Blackrock Neurotech, which has a next-generation BCI, has been implanting its Utah Array in patients since 2004.
The brings you the true stories and experiences from radical remission survivors and the healers and doctors who have helped them overcome a dire prognosis. These episodes are full of stories of hope and inspiration for anyone living with a life-changing diagnosis.
New research at ACR Convergence 2023, the American College of Rheumatology’s annual meeting, demonstrates that CAR-T cell therapy could lead to sustained suppression of autoantibodies in treatment-resistant lupus while maintaining a robust response to vaccines.
Systemic lupus erythematosus (SLE, lupus) is a complex autoimmune disease marked by the production of autoantibodies to nucleic acid DNA and nuclear protein autoantigens and is associated with dysfunctional B cells. It mainly affects women and is more common and severe in people who are Black, Hispanic, or Asian. Lupus can lead to a wide range of systemic problems varying in severity, including skin, kidney, lung, joints, and heart disease and complications during pregnancy.
The disease often requires life-long treatment with immunosuppressive or immunomodulatory drugs, and a considerable number of patients don’t respond to them. One theoretical option for these patients is chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell therapy, which is successfully used to treat refractory blood cancers by destroying malignant cells.
