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Category: biotech/medical – Page 2645

Pretty wild; blood infections in cattle may have a possible link to breast cancer in humans.

Meredith Frie, Michigan State University

Humans began domesticating animals for food over 10,000 years ago, cultivating a close relationship with animals over the following millennia. Like humans, animals can get sick, and sometimes infections pass between humans and animals. Some of these infections, like ringworm, are mostly harmless, while others, like bovine tuberculosis, are extremely serious.

But how do we find out if these infections pose a risk to humans? I study dairy cows infected with bovine leukemia virus (BLV), which is found in most of the dairy herds in the U.S. Scientists are trying to figure out if BLV infects humans and, if it does, whether there is a link between BLV and breast cancer.

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Very interesting read. The researchers created a completely artificial microscopic transport system mimicking the human body. With this technology we’re going to be able to address many areas of healthcare as well as some areas of AI.

Inspired by micro-scale motions of nature, a group of researchers at the Indian Institute of Technology Madras and the Institute of Mathematical Sciences, in Chennai, India, has developed a new design for transporting colloidal particles, tiny cargo suspended in substances such as fluids or gels, more rapidly than is currently possible by diffusion.

Fluid friction determines micro-scale inertia in fluid. This means, for instance, blood cells swimming within blood encounter roughly the same amount of drag that a human would experience attempting to swim through molasses.

As the group reports in The Journal of Chemical Physics, from AIP Publishing, they applied and then extended a model of active filaments that includes these frictional hydrodynamic interactions, specifically as they relate to the speed and efficiency analysis of transporting colloidal particles.

Continue reading “New active filaments mimic biology to transport nano-cargo” | >

Nice breakthrough.

A self-adjusting synthetic gene circuit senses and reverses insulin resistance in animal models of diabetes and obesity.

People with type 2 diabetes — an obesity-associated disease that is a major cause of morbidity and mortality worldwide — develop insulin resistance. The condition can be counteracted by adiponectin, a cytokine secreted by adipocytes that promotes insulin sensitivity and regulates glucose metabolism via the receptors AdipoR1 and AdipoR2 (ref.). In fact, by mimicking adiponectin, the AdipoR-activating small molecule AdipoRon improves glucose and lipid metabolism in mice. Owing to the capacity of adipocytes to regulate insulin and glucose pathways, considerable efforts have been devoted to taking advantage of adiponectin for clinical applications. Writing in Nature Biomedical Engineering, Martin Fussenegger and colleagues demonstrate the therapeutic benefits of a self-adjusting synthetic gene circuit designed to sense and reverse insulin resistance in animal models of diabetes and obesity.

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Ever since Jules Verne and before — perhaps as early as the 5th century B.C. — writers, philosophers and scientists have brought fantasies to life about spaceships carrying humans to other planets, solar systems and galaxies.

Of all the potential targets, only the moon thus far has hosted Earthling “boots on the ground.” Next on most wish lists is Mars. NASA’s tentative schedule designates the first manned mission sometime around 2030.

Aside from the formidable task of designing a safe, efficient vehicle to transport people and supplies, such a mission — depending on the positions of the two planets and other logistics — would take in the neighborhood of nine months each way. Not only is that a long trip, but it would also expose the human body to ambient space radiation for close to a year. Can’t this travel time, many have asked, be cut down somehow?

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Inserting spider DNA into silkworms yields a tough fabric that’s far more flexible than Kevlar.

Spider silk is one of nature’s toughest substances, similar in strength to the Kevlar plastic found in bulletproof vests but much more flexible. Kraig Biocraft, a company out of Ann Arbor, Michigan, genetically altered silkworms to produce a fiber that’s similar to pure spider silk. Today, they announced an Army contract to test this so-called Dragon Silk for possible use in body armor.

There’s a reason that silk from worms is cheap but you can’t buy pajamas made from spider fabric: spiders are territorial and cannibalistic, which makes farming them for fabric production almost exorbitant.

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Cell powerhouses are typically long and lean, but with brain injury such as stroke or trauma, they can quickly become bloated and dysfunctional, say scientists who documented the phenomena in real time for the first time in a living brain.

The scientists also found that without giving these mitochondria anything but time, they often resume their usual healthy shape once blood and oxygen were restored to mild or moderately damaged tissue, said Dr. Sergei Kirov, neuroscientist in the Department of Neurosurgery at the Medical College of Georgia at Augusta University.

“We believe this is good evidence that mitochondria can recover their normal form following brief periods of ischemia from stroke or trauma and that drugs that enhance their recovery may improve overall recovery from these sorts of injuries,” Kirov said.

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Another difference between normal and abnormal cells — cancer cells can continue to grow despite damage to cell structures and changes in the number of chromosomes.

Scientists have uncovered how tumours are able to grow despite significant damage to the structure and number of their chromosomes — the storage units of DNA — according to two new studies published in Cancer Cell and Cancer Discovery today.

“We hope that understanding these mechanisms will allow us to limit drug resistance and improve the efficacy of cancer therapies.” - Professor Charles Swanton

Healthy cells are programmed to self-destruct if there are mistakes in their genes that can’t be fixed, but cancer cells can carry on growing with these abnormalities. Over time, further genetic changes allow them to keep growing, spread, and become resistant to treatment.

Continue reading “Researchers reveal how cancer cells cope with genetic chaos” | >