In 2019, emerging technologies such as AI, robotics, and biotech made headlines. Here’s a list of 50+ stories that caught our eye this year.
Once you hit a certain age you start to see subtle changes and many begin to search for options to hold onto the appearance of youthfulness for as long as they can in the form of lotions, potions, creams, supplements, serums, diets, and concoctions among others.
Soon there may be a new addition to the anti-aging lineup, that being rapamycin which is an FDA approved drug that is normally used to prevent organ rejection after transplant, the drug may also be helpful in slowing in aging skin according to a recent study published in Geroscience.
Studies have used rapamycin to effectively slow aging in worms, flies, and mice but this study from Drexel University College of Medicine is the first to show an effect on aging in human tissues, specifically the skin; findings showed signs of aging to be reduced including decreases in wrinkles, reduced sagging, and more even skin tone when delivered to humans topically.
UConn engineers have designed a non-toxic, biodegradable device that can help medication move from blood vessels into brain tissues —a route traditionally blocked by the body’s defense mechanisms. They describe their invention in the 23 December issue of PNAS.
Blood vessels in the brain are lined by cells fitted together tightly, forming a so-called blood-brain barrier, which walls off bacteria and toxins from the brain itself. But that blood-brain barrier also blocks medication for brain diseases such as cancer.
“A safe and effective way to open that barrier is ultrasound,” says Thanh Nguyen, a biomedical engineer at UConn. Ultrasonic waves, focused in the right place, can vibrate the cells lining blood vessels enough to open transient cracks in the blood-brain barrier large enough for medication to slip through. But the current ultrasound technology to do this requires multiple ultrasound sources arrayed around a person’s skull, and then using an MRI machine to guide the person operating the ultrasounds to focus the waves in just the right place. It’s bulky, difficult, and expensive to do every time a person needs a dose of medication.
(CBS) — Imagine giving birth to a premature baby and then being told you have a brain tumor. That’s what happened to a woman from Holden. But thanks to a new approach at Brigham and Women’s Hospital, this new mom was able to have brain surgery and quickly return to her newborn son.
At 27 weeks pregnant, Bethany Shea was diagnosed with preeclampsia and had an emergency C-section. Then she went blind.
“It was a pregnancy complication due to my high blood pressure,” Bethany explained.
Prominent cardiologist Dr. Eric Topol explains how artificial intelligence and technological advances are ushering in a new age of healthcare and medicine.
By Laurie Mathena
At Roswell we have developed the first Molecular Electronics chip. We utilized advances in semiconductor technology, nano-fabrication and bio-sensors to create standard CMOS chips that directly integrate sensor molecules into the CMOS integrated circuits.
Going “on-chip” to deploy bio-sensors provides unprecedented economics, precision, portability, and scalability. Our first chip is designed to read DNA; future chips will be designed for protein detection and other diverse bio-sensing applications.
Summary: Study finds EEG features may not always be accurate in being able to capture the level of consciousness in patients under anesthesia. Source: Michigan Medicine
“A hormone that is released during exercise may improve brain health and lessen the damage and memory loss that occur during dementia, a new study finds. The study, which was published this month in Nature Medicine, involved mice, but its findings could help to explain how, at a molecular level, exercise protects our brains and possibly preserves memory and thinking skills, even in people whose pasts are fading.”
Exercise doesn’t just strengthen your muscles, it can also be good for your mind and memory. Fitness advice from the year in Well.
A Chinese scientist who helped create the world’s first gene-edited babies has been sentenced to three years in prison.
He Jiankui shocked the world in 2018 when he announced that twin girls Lulu and Nana had been born with modified DNA to make them resistant to HIV, which he had managed using the gene-editing tool CRISPR-Cas9 before birth.
He, an associate professor at the Southern University of Science and Technology in Shenzhen, said at the time that he was “proud” of the achievement. He later claimed that a second woman was pregnant as a result of his research.
