Circa 2018
Stem cells have been a source of much excitement in the medical community for years, as if they could be properly developed for use in humans doctors could theoretically use them to regrow missing body parts.
While the techniques have seen some success in the lab, the processes involved are complex and it will likely be some time before they become widely used in clinical practice.
When doctors in a Washington hospital sought to treat the first confirmed case of the Wuhan coronavirus in the United States on Wednesday, they tapped a device called Vici that allowed them to interact with their patient not in person, but through a screen.
The telehealth device, which looks like a tablet on wheels that doctors can use to talk to patients and perform basic diagnostic functions, like taking their temperature, is one of a handful of high-tech machines that doctors, airport workers, and hotel staff are using to help contain the outbreak that has been sweeping the world since it was discovered in Wuhan, China in late December.
“Caregivers provide care within the isolation unit, but technology is allowing us to reduce the number of up-close interactions,” says Dr. Amy Compton-Phillips, chief clinical officer at Providence Regional Medical Center in Everett, Washington, where the patient is being treated. Vici, made by Santa Barbara, California-based InTouch Health, resembles a tablet on wheels, and can protect caregivers from infection.
On Friday, the National Institute of Infectious Diseases announced that it has succeeded in cultivating and isolating the Wuhan coronavirus, reported the Japan Times.
Now that it has isolated the virus, the institute can begin developing a vaccine and a drug for the coronavirus. It can also deliver test kits capable of offering a quick diagnosis.
RELATED: LATEST UPDATES ON WUHAN’S DEADLY CORONAVIRUS
A Chinese woman infected with the new coronavirus showed a dramatic improvement after she was treated with a cocktail of anti-virals used to treat flu and HIV, Thailand’s health ministry said Sunday.
The 71-year-old patient tested negative for the virus 48 hours after Thai doctors administered the combination, doctor Kriengsak Attipornwanich said during the ministry’s daily press briefing.
“The lab result of positive on the coronavirus turned negative in 48 hours,” Kriengsak said.
“It’s very, very transmissible, and it almost certainly is going to be a pandemic,” said Dr. Anthony S. Fauci, director of the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Disease.
Rapidly rising caseloads alarm researchers, who fear the virus may make its way across the globe. But scientists cannot yet predict how many deaths may result.
New Research Estimates 75,000 People in Wuhan Are Infected With Coronavirus.
Everyone is aware of the fact that Coronavirus is spreading across China and the world quickly. By far, the virus has affected over 11,800 people and the global death toll has risen to at least 250.
Now, the Government of China has urged its people to give up non-veg because scientists believe that eating slaughtered animals’ flesh may be the cause of the disease. The virus is believed to have spread from animals to humans.
Due to the groundbreaking work in superlongevity by Dr David Sinclair and Yuancheng Ryan Lu on the Information Theory of Aging and how epigenetic therapy can be used to reverse aging, I suddenly have a compelling interest in epigenetics. Here is a recent research article that I’d recommend on.
Epigenetics can be defined as ‘the structural adaptation of chromosomal regions so as to register, signal, or perpetuate altered activity states.’ Increased transcription of key regulatory, metabolic, and myogenic genes is an early response to exercise and is important in mediating subsequent adaptations in skeletal muscle. DNA hypomethylation and histone hyperacetylation are emerging as important crucial events for increased transcription. The complex interactions between multiple epigenetic modifications and their regulation by metabolic changes and signaling events during exercise, with implications for enhanced understanding of the acute and chronic adaptations to exercise, are questions for further investigation.
A book is made of wood. But it is not a tree. The dead cells have been repurposed to serve another need.
Now a team of scientists has repurposed living cells—scraped from frog embryos—and assembled them into entirely new life-forms. These millimeter-wide “xenobots” can move toward a target, perhaps pick up a payload (like a medicine that needs to be carried to a specific place inside a patient)—and heal themselves after being cut.
These are novel living machines. They’re neither a traditional robot nor a known species of animal. It’s a new class of artifact: a living, programmable organism.
Credit: sam kriegman, UVM credit: douglas blackiston, tufts university
Posted in biotech/medical, futurism
Research suggests that a cure for grey hair is close. In the near future, it will be possible to reverse grey hair (also spelt gray).
