Lifeboat Foundation

Boston, Mass. — Interoception is the awareness of our physiological states; it’s how animals and humans know they’re hungry or thirsty, and how they know when they’ve had enough to eat or drink. But precisely how the brain estimates the state of the body and reacts to it remains unclear. In a paper published in the journal Neuron, neuroscientists at Beth Israel Deaconess Medical Center (BIDMC) shed new light on the process, demonstrating that a region of the brain called the insular cortex orchestrates how signals from the body are interpreted and acted upon. The work represents the first steps toward understanding the neural basis of interoception, which could in turn allow researchers to address key questions in eating disorders, obesity, drug addiction, and a host of other diseases.

Using a mouse model his lab developed at BIDMC, Mark Andermann, PhD, principal investigator in the Division of Endocrinology, Diabetes and Metabolism at BIDMC and Associate Professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School, and colleagues recorded the activity of hundreds of individual brain cells in the insular cortex to determine exactly what is happening as hungry animals ate.

The team observed that when mice hadn’t eaten for many hours, the activity pattern of insular cortex neurons reflected current levels of hunger. As the mice ate, this pattern gradually shifted over hours to a new pattern reflecting satiety. When mice were shown a visual cue predicting impending availability of food — akin to a person seeing a food commercial or a restaurant logo — the insular cortex appeared to simulate the future sated state for a few seconds, and then returned to an activity pattern related to hunger. These findings provided direct support for studies in humans that hypothesized that the insular cortex is involved in imagining or predicting how we will feel after eating or drinking.

Researchers have developed a new Artificial Intelligence (AI)-based technique that can detect low-sugar levels from raw ECG signals via wearable sensors without any fingerprint test. Current methods to measure glucose requires needles and repeated fingerpicks over the day. Fingerpicks can often be painful, deterring patient compliance.

The new technique developed by researchers at University of Warwick works with an 82 per cent reliability, and could replace the need for invasive finger-prick testing with a needle, especially for kids who are afraid of those.

“Our innovation consisted in using AI for automatic detecting hypoglycaemia via few ECG beats. This is relevant because ECG can be detected in any circumstance, including sleeping,” said Dr Leandro Pecchia from School of Engineering in a paper published in the Nature Springer journal Scientific Reports.

Ira Pastor, ideaXme exponential health ambassador, interviews Dr. Magomed Khaidakov, Assistant Research Professor, Department of Internal Medicine, University of Arkansas for the Medical Sciences. https://www.amazon.com/Pessimistic-Guide-Anti-aging-Research…atfound-20

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On this trivia episode of X10, Veera quizzes Nicola and Giuliano on stem cells, giving them five genuine stumpers from Ulla-Kaisa Peteri that leave them unsure and puzzled throughout.

Read more.

Want to test your knowledge about stem cells with this not-so-trivial trivia? Let’s see if you can do better than Giuliano and Nicola! (You probably can, especially better than Nicola…).

Thanks to Ulla-Kaisa Peteri for preparing the questions!

Science fiction writers envisioned the technology decades ago, and startups have been working on developing an actual product for at least 10 years.

Today, Mojo Vision announced that it has done just that—put 14K pixels-per-inch microdisplays, wireless radios, image sensors, and motion sensors into contact lenses that fit comfortably in the eyes. The first generation of Mojo Lenses are being powered wirelessly, though future generations will have batteries on board. A small external pack, besides providing power, handles sensor data and sends information to the display. The company is calling the technology Invisible Computing, and company representatives say it will get people’s eyes off their phones and back onto the world around them.

The first application, says Steve Sinclair, senior vice president of product and marketing, will likely be for people with low vision—providing real-time edge detection and dropping crisp lines around objects. In a demonstration last week at CES 2020, I used a working prototype (albeit by squinting through the lens rather than putting it into my eyes), and the device highlighted shapes in bright green as I looked around a dimly lit room.

Researchers reverse stroke damage in animal model using stem cell exosomes.

Expanding upon previous work that developed a treatment using a type of extracellular vesicles known as exosomes—small fluid-filled structures that are created by stem cells—investigators at the University of Georgia (UGA) present brain-imaging data for a new stroke treatment that supported full recovery in swine, modeled with the same pattern of neurodegeneration as seen in humans with severe stroke. Findings from this new study were published recently in Translational Stroke Research through an article titled “Neural Stem Cell Extracellular Vesicles Disrupt Midline Shift Predictive Outcomes in Porcine Ischemic Stroke Model.”

Amazingly, it’s been almost a quarter-century since the first drug was approved for stroke. Yet, what’s even more striking is that only a single drug remains approved today, so having a greater understanding of the molecular mechanisms that underlie stroke cases should lead to new therapies that could provide dramatic improvements in patient outcomes.

Continue reading “Exosome Therapy for Stroke Produces Full Recovery in Animal Model” »

London, 15th January 2020 – Biotech LIfT BioSciences today announced a further major investment into the company in its mission to develop the first curative and affordable cell therapy for all solid tumours. The investors included Jonathan Milner, a leading biotech ‘super-angel’ investor and earlier stage investor in LIfT, Kizoo Technology Ventures, a leading early-stage investor in breakthrough technologies and Downing Ventures, a leading London-based investor.