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Category: biotech/medical – Page 1,797

Making And Breaking Eye Contact Makes Conversation More Engaging

Also, consider that some people with medical conditions may not be comfortable making eye contact.

“In the past, it has been assumed that eye contact creates synchrony, but our findings suggest that it’s not that simple,” says senior author Thalia Wheatley, a professor of psychological and brain sciences at Dartmouth, and principal investigator of the Dartmouth Social Systems Laboratory.

Summary: Study reveals a correlation between instances of eye contact and higher levels of engagement during conversations.

Source: Dartmouth College

Making eye contact repeatedly when you’re talking to someone is common, but why do we do it? When two people are having a conversation, eye contact occurs during moments of “shared attention” when both people are engaged, with their pupils dilating in synchrony as a result, according to a Dartmouth study published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

“Eye contact is really immersive and powerful,” says lead author Sophie Wohltjen, a graduate student in psychological and brain sciences at Dartmouth.

Continue reading “Making And Breaking Eye Contact Makes Conversation More Engaging” | >

Quantifying Biological Age: Blood Test #4 in 2021

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https://www.patreon.com/MichaelLustgartenPhD

Levine’s Biological age calculator is embedded as an Excel file in this link from my website:

Quantifying Biological Age

DNA methylation GrimAge strongly predicts lifespan and healthspan.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/30669119/

Fisetin is a senotherapeutic that extends health and lifespan.
https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6197652/

Dietary intakes of flavonols, flavones and isoflavones by Japanese women and the inverse correlation between quercetin intake and plasma LDL cholesterol concentration.
https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/10958819/

NAD and the aging process: Role in life, death and everything in between.

Continue reading “Quantifying Biological Age: Blood Test #4 in 2021” | >

Halo Therapeutics join Science Creates to advance antiviral development

The newly formed biotech start up Halo Therapeutics, spun out from the University of Bristol, has become the latest company to join the Science Creates ecosystem.

The team is targeting new treatments for coronavirus as they expand on their exciting recent breakthrough discovery, which was published in Science Magazine.

The context

New antiviral drugs offer the hope of broadening the range of treatments available to treat COVID-19. The recent findings by the Halo Therapeutics team have demonstrated that exposing the SARS-CoV-2 (Coronavirus) virus to a free fatty acid called linoleic acid locks the virus’s spike protein into a closed, non-infective form stopping it in its tracks.

Signs of Dementia Are Written in the Blood

“Identification of these compounds means that we are one step closer to being able to molecularly diagnose dementia,” said senior author of the study, Professor Mitsuhiro Yanagida, who leads the G0 Cell Unit at OIST.

Summary: Researchers identified 33 metabolic compounds in blood samples that differed between those with dementia and cognitively healthy older adults. 7 of the metabolites were elevated in dementia patients, while 26 were at lower levels compared to samples of those without dementia. Elevating levels of those metabolites could have a neuroprotective effect against dementia.

Source: OIST

Scientists in Japan have identified metabolic compounds within the blood that are associated with dementia.

The study revealed that the levels of 33 metabolites differed in patients with dementia, compared to elderly people with no existing health conditions. Their findings, published this week in PNAS, could one day aid diagnosis and treatment of dementia.

Radiation Therapy Effectiveness Influenced by Gut Fungi

“We think that this indicates that gut bacteria and fungi influence anti-tumor immune responses in many, if not all, types of cancer.”

Cedars-Sinai Cancer researchers have discovered that intestinal microorganisms help regulate anti-tumor immune responses to radiation treatments, and that fungi and bacteria have opposing effects on those responses. The study, conducted in laboratory mice 0 illuminates a path toward improving the effectiveness of radiation and immune-based treatments for patients with melanoma, breast and many other cancers.

The study, published on Aug. 13 in the peer-reviewed journal Cancer Cell, builds on prior studies that focused on the role of intestinal bacteria in influencing immune responses to chemotherapy and immunotherapy. Here the investigators sought to determine what role both bacteria and fungi in the gut might play in the response to radiation therapy.

Trillions of microorganisms live in normal human intestines. These so-called commensal microorganisms are “friendly” bacteria and fungi that help process nutrients and play key roles in regulating the immune system in everything from infections to allergies. The research team found that reducing levels of commensal fungi in the intestines enhanced the anti-tumor immune response in the mice following radiation therapy. Conversely, they showed that depletion of commensal bacteria reduced the anti-tumor response.

Researchers decipher genetic mechanism that makes the midge invulnerable to harsh conditions

Circa 2014

New collaborative research published in the journal Nature Communications by scientists from Japan, Russia and the US contains the genetic analysis on a species of African midge, which can survive a wide array of extreme conditions including large variations in temperature, extreme drought and even airless vacuums such as space. The team successfully deciphered the genetic mechanism that makes the midge invulnerable to these harsh conditions. Prof. Noriyuki Satoh and Dr. Takeshi Kawashima of Prof. Satoh’s Marine Genomics Unit, as well as Prof. Alexander Mikeyhev of the Ecology and Evolution Unit, and Mr. Manabu Fujie and Dr. Ryo Koyanagi of the DNA Sequencing Section at the Okinawa Institute of Science and Technology Graduate University have contributed to the collaboration.

The midge, Polypedilum vanderplanki, is capable of anhydrobiosis, a unique state that allows an organism to survive even after losing 97% of its body water. Anhydrobiotic organisms are also able to survive other severe conditions such as extreme temperatures ranging from 90°C to-270°C, vacuums and high doses of radiation; all of which would be lethal to most other life forms.

The midge found in northern Nigeria lives in an environment where the dry season lasts for at least six months and droughts can last up to eight months. By the time eggs have hatched and larvae have developed, the pools of water they breed in have dried up. However these dried larvae can survive in this dehydrated state for more than 17 years. “This is a very interesting kind of phenomena,” remarks Prof. Satoh. “The first descriptions of this midge were more than 60 years ago… But serious research started only ten years ago.”

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