Lifeboat Foundation

Dr. Richard Naud’s research at the University of Ottawa holds important implications for understanding learning and memory theories, and it may pave the way for advancements in artificial intelligence in the future.

The mysteries of the human brain’s internal mechanisms are slowly being uncovered, and a significant new study led by Dr. Richard Naud from the Faculty of Medicine at the University of Ottawa is bringing us nearer to solving these profound questions.

The study’s results have important implications for theories of learning and working memory and could potentially help lead to future developments in artificial intelligence (AI) since AI developers and programmers watch the work of Dr. Naud and other leading neuroscientists.

MIT’s albumin-based cancer vaccine shows promise in clinical trials, yielding robust immune responses, raising hope for effective cancer treatment.

University of Melbourne researchers are leading a new push to address the growing harm of antimicrobial resistance (AMR) as more humans and animals become seriously ill or die from infections that medicine once treated easily.

Over-use and misuse of microbe-killing drugs – including antibiotics, antivirals and antifungals – is the main driver accelerating the evolution of resistance to these drugs in bacteria, viruses, fungi and parasites around the world.

The World Health Organisation calls AMR a top global public health threat that was directly responsible for 1.27 million deaths and contributed to 4.95 million deaths in 2019.

A study in mice and nematodes has investigated a potential new therapeutic approach that could help people with the genetic variant that predisposes them to Alzheimer’s disease.

Biopharmaceutical impurities such as host cell proteins can delay biologics development and production. These elements can have immunogenic effects in patients, forcing scientists to restart process development. Thus, detecting and removing biopharmaceutical impurities is necessary for maintaining drug efficacy and ensuring patient safety.

In this webinar brought to you by Cytiva, Andrew Hamilton and Joe Hirano will discuss how to identify, detect, and measure impurities in biologics manufacturing.

Japanese startup PorMedTec says it’s have cloned three piglets with the express purpose of having their organs be viable for transplantation to humans, without being rejected by the immune system.

The company imported gene-edited cells from a US biotech startup called eGenesis and used them to create genetically modified embryos, the Japan Times reports, which were then implanted into the uterus of a pig.

“The realization of xenotransplantation has been long awaited in Japan for several years, but it remained in the basic research stage because pigs that could withstand clinical application were still under development,” the company said in a statement.

Sounds like the video game/movie “The Last of Us” though there was a somewhat similar X Files episode as well before that. Though I doubt it’ll be a zombie plague, it could be like another pandemic someday or an issue such as a deadly fungal outbreak they had in Portland, Oregon before if I recall.

Scientists have been left concerned after making the surprise discovery of a frog with a small mushroom sprouting from its leg.

The amphibian was discovered in the foothills of India’s Western Ghats and researchers stated that it’s the first time a mushroom has been found growing on live animal tissue.

Continue reading “Mushroom sprouting from frog’s leg leaves scientists concerned” »

Scentists have uncovered a fascinating link between ancient viruses and the development of myelination, the biological process crucial for the advanced functioning of the nervous system in vertebrates, including humans.

Scientists discovered a gene, ‘RetroMyelin,’ from ancient viruses, essential for myelination in vertebrates, suggesting viral sequences in early vertebrate genomes were pivotal for developing complex brains. This breakthrough in Cell unravels how myelination evolved, highlighting its significance in vertebrate diversity.

“We’ve used the mutations that give cancer cells their staying power to engineer what we call a ‘Judo T-cell therapy’ that can survive and thrive in the harsh conditions that tumors create,” said co-author Kole Roybal.

CAR-T cells: CAR-T cell therapy starts with doctors extracting T cells — a type of white blood cell — from a cancer patient’s blood. They then engineer the T cells to display proteins called “chimeric antigen receptors” (CARs) that bind to cancer cells.