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Category: biotech/medical – Page 1,478

The Aging Kidney Harms the Brain

A good deal of evidence points to declining kidney function as a cause of declining cognitive function in aging. There are strong correlations between loss of kidney function and risk of dementia, for example. Correlation isn’t a smoking gun in matters of aging, however: it is possible for any one of the underlying forms of molecular damage that cause aging, or for intermediate consequences of that damage, to give rise to otherwise unrelated pathologies in different parts of the body. Those pathologies appear more often in people with greater amounts of that form of damage, and thus appear correlated.

Nonetheless, there are good reasons to think that kidney failure and its downstream consequences contribute meaningful to neurodegeneration, perhaps largely by degrading the function of the vascular system. Vascular aging can cause damage and dysfunction in brain tissue via numerous mechanisms, including the pressure damage of hypertension, similar damage resulting from an acceleration of atherosclerosis, failing to delivery sufficient nutrients and oxygen to the energy-hungry brain, and disruption of the blood-brain barrier, allowing inflammatory cells and molecules into the brain.

Interactions Between Kidney Function and Cerebrovascular Disease: Vessel Pathology That Fires Together Wires Together.

Betavoltaic device

(betavoltaic cell or betavoltaic battery) is a type of nuclear battery which generates electric current from beta particles (electrons) emitted from a radioactive source, using semiconductor junctions. A common source used is the hydrogen isotope tritium. Unlike most nuclear power sources which use nuclear radiation to generate heat which then is used to generate electricity, betavoltaic devices use a non-thermal conversion process, converting the electron-hole pairs produced by the ionization trail of beta particles traversing a semiconductor.[1]

Betavoltaic power sources (and the related technology of alphavoltaic power sources[2]) are particularly well-suited to low-power electrical applications where long life of the energy source is needed, such as implantable medical devices or military and space applications.[1].

Army to announce vaccine that protects against an array of COVID-19 variants

The U.S. Army is expected to announce that it has developed a vaccine that protects against omicron and other COVID-19 variants. The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) has been developing a Spike Ferritin Nanoparticle (SpFN) since early 2020, and began early-stage human trials of the vaccine in early April. Kayvon Modjarrad, director of WRAIR’s infections disease branch, said that the early-stage trials ended this month, and yielded positive results that are currently under review.

-a slight correction, but still promising.

Correction: This headline and story have been corrected to reflect that the COVID-19 vaccine the Army is developing has not been tested against omicron.

The U.S. Army is expected to announce that it has developed a vaccine that protects against an array of COVID-19 variants, Defense One reported.

The Walter Reed Army Institute of Research (WRAIR) has been developing a spike ferritin nanoparticle (SpFN) vaccine since early 2020 and began early-stage human trials of the vaccine in early April.

Japan university finds Alzheimer’s drug effective in treating ALS

Japan’s Yamagata University said Friday it has found that a drug being developed for the treatment of Alzheimer’s is also effective in treating amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, more commonly known as Lou Gehrig’s disease.

The drug has been found capable of curbing the abnormal agglomeration of protein that causes the progressive neurodegenerative disease, the state-run university in northeastern Japan said.

People with ALS lose their ability to walk, talk, eat and eventually breathe as the disease kills motor neurons, causing muscles to weaken and eventually paralyze.

Microbots in your blood could help destroy cancer

4D printing works the same as 3D printing, the only difference is that the printing material allows the object to change shape based on environmental factors.

In this case, the bots’ hydrogel material allows them to morph into different shapes when they encounter a change in pH levels — and cancer cells, as it happens, are usually more acidic than normal cells.

The microrobots were then placed in an iron oxide solution, to give them a magnetic charge.

This combination of shape-shifting and magnetism means the bots could become assassins for cancer — destroying tumors without the usual collateral damage on the rest of the body.

Full Story:

A school of fish-y microbots could one day swim through your veins and deliver medicine to precise locations in your body — and cancer patients may be the first people to benefit from this revolution in nanotechnology.

Continue reading “Microbots in your blood could help destroy cancer” | >

Scientists Have Cultivated a “Miracle Microbe” That Converts Oil Into Methane

Scientists have succeeded in cultivating an archaeon that converts oil into methane. They describe how the microbe achieves the transformation and that it prefers to eat rather bulky chunks of food.

Microorganisms can convert oil into natural gas, i.e. methane. Until recently, it was thought that this conversion was only possible through the cooperation of different organisms. In 2019, Rafael Laso-Pérez and Gunter Wegener from the Max Planck Institute for Marine Microbiology suggested that a special archaeon can do this all by itself, as indicated by their genome analyses. Now, in collaboration with a team from China, the researchers have succeeded in cultivating this “miracle microbe” in the laboratory. This enabled them to describe exactly how the microbe achieves the transformation. They also discovered that it prefers to eat rather bulky chunks of food.

Solar Polysilicon Prices Start To Plummet

In a bit of good news, the spot price for solar grade polysilicon is dropping quite rapidly. If the trend holds, the cost of solar panels in Australia should follow suit soon-ish.

Polysilicon is used in the manufacture of conventional photovoltaic cells used in solar panels. The sought-after stuff was as cheap as chips in July last year, when it was below USD $7/kg. But a series of events including impacts from the pandemic and a couple of factory fires saw it skyrocket.

Polysilicon spot prices were as high as US$36.64/kg at the beginning of this month. But here’s what’s happened in the last few weeks as reported by Bernreuter Research.

How Neurons That Wire Together Fire Together

Summary: A new study brings understanding how the brain processes information one step closer.

Source: friedrich miescher institute for biomedical research.

For amplifying sensory stimuli quickly and accurately, neuronal circuits require specific wiring. Some 70 years ago, the compelling idea that “neurons that fire together wire together” emerged. Yet, in computational models, neurons that wire together tend to succumb to an explosion of activity and instability not observed in neurobiology. The lab of Friedemann Zenke now characterized a plausible yet straightforward mechanism that biology may use to avoid this issue.

A vaccine against multiple variants of COVID-19

A new vaccine for COVID-19, using a multi-faced nanoparticle, could offer protection against many different strains of the virus simultaneously.

The news has been filled with doom and gloom lately, as the latest variant of COVID-19, called Omicron, becomes dominant in many countries. This follows the previous Delta variant, which followed earlier strains such as Alpha, which derived from the original “wildtype” virus. As 2021 draws to a close and the world prepares for yet another year of the pandemic, many people are understandably anxious and weary.

There is reason for optimism, however. Scientists are now talking about a pan-coronavirus vaccine development strategy, to offer protection from all current and even future variants of COVID-19. Last week, the U.S. National Institute of Health published a commentary in The New England Journal of Medicine calling for such an approach, as a way of breaking the cycle of new strains emerging.