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Category: biotech/medical – Page 2656

It’s an add-on for CRISPR.

Researchers have created a new genome editing technique called Target-AID, which induces point mutations instead of cutting DNA

Gene editing technology has fantastic potential, but there are remaining issues and questions over safety and specificity. The major contender is currently CRISPR-Cas9, but this induces a double stranded break in DNA which is a slightly riskier approach — particularly if it cuts in other locations too that you don’t want it to. Research teams across the world are both optimising and customising the CRISPR system; creating more accurate versions or versions that regulate gene expression as opposed to editing it. One such team has now built an add-on to CRISPR, Target-AID.

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Artificial intelligence is beginning to disrupt entire industries from finance to medicine. Yet the most revolutionary application has yet to arrive—and it’s an existential one.

As thinking machines become more integrated into our lives, we must expect a transformation in how we define what it means to be conscious; what it means to live and to die; and ultimately, what it means to love a non-human being.

These questions are artfully explored in the plot of the 2013 sci-fi film, Her, which tells the story of a man who falls deeply in love with an intelligent operating system. This OS, Samantha, is designed to evolve and adapt her personality to appeal to Theodore. She has a very human voice and provides constant empathetic support. As Samantha’s psychological and intellectual capacities grow, so does Theodore and Samantha’s love for each other.

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BrainGate technology is no longer the stuff of science fiction. The science of interfacing human brains and other biological neurons with computers has been developing for well over a decade and now, the progress is amazing. While the human mind is an amazing organ, that surpasses any computer ever made. Many fantasize about improving on natural skills and abilities using technology in the form of some sort of brain implant. That dream is about to become a reality. In some ways, it already has according to the BrainGate website.

“BrainGate Company’s current and planned intellectual property (the technology) is based on technology that can sense, transmit, analyze and apply the language of neurons. BrainGate consists of a sensor that is implanted on the motor cortex of the brain and a device that analyzes brain signals.”

Cyborg and biohacking research history started in 1998 with Dr. Kevin Warwick and what he called Project Cyborg according to Digital Trends. Warwick began by implanting a simple radio-frequency identification chip or RFID in his own shoulder. He planned to use this chip to adjust lighting in his office and opening doors locked to others. The experiment was successful, and so Warwick went a bit further, experimenting on himself yet again. In 2002, Warwick had a surgeon implant a BrainGate technology device.

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Dr Haroldo Silva from SENS talks about ALT cancer in this short film.

As normal cells divide, the ends of their chromosomes (telomeres) progressively shorten until eventually the cells reach senescence or undergo apoptosis. Cancers, which disproportionally kill more individuals in the 65 years or above age group, often overcome this built-in replication limit by expressing the enzyme telomerase.

However, about 10–15% cancers do not use telomerase and at least a major subset of these exhibit hallmarks of Alternative Lengthening of Telomeres (ALT) activity, including long and heterogeneous telomere lengths, presence of ALT-associated PML nuclear bodies (APBs), and generation of high-levels of C-rich circular telomeric DNA repeats (C-circles). Although there are many telomerase-based anti-cancer therapies in clinical development at the moment, research on ALT has not produced any promising therapies so far. This lag is due in part to a lack of assays that are reliable and amenable to high-content/high-throughput (HTS) screens.

Continue reading “Uncovering the genetic basis of ALT (Alternative Lengthening of Telomeres) — Harold Silva” | >

Time people rethought outdated ideas about biology and accepted that development and aging are not one way processess and they are amenable to intervention.

Scientists have announced they can now reverse the menopause in what is thought to be a major scientific breakthrough.

Trials claim to have ‘rejuvenated’ women’s ovaries using a blood treatment normally used to help wounds heal faster and have reversed menstrual cessation in multiple women, including 40-year-old woman who underwent the menopause five years ago.

The research, undertaken by scientists in Athens, has been presented at the European Society of Human Reproduction and Embryology’s annual meeting in Finland, The New Scientist reports.

Continue reading “Menopause reversed as scientists successfully ‘rejuvenate women’s ovaries’” | >

The first prototype of DeLorean appeared in October 1976, and production officially began in 1981 in Dunmurry, a suburb of south west Belfast, Northern Ireland (with the first DMC-12 rolling off the production line on January 21). The car features gull-wing doors and an innovative fiberglass chassis and underbody structure, along with a brushed stainless steel body.

DMC became famous for its appearance and was modified as a time machine in the Back to the Future film trilogy. A little more than 8,500 DMC-12s left DeLorean’s factory in Northern Ireland between 1981 and 1983, until its founder John DeLorean’s was arrested by the FBI on charges of drug trafficking.

Actually, it is quite impressing that Texas-based DeLorean Motor Company could soon initiate again its production thanks to a new law which exempts small volume car manufacturers from the safety requirements applied to the newly cars. On January 27, 2016, in Humble, Texas location, the car maker announced that production will resume and “new” DMC-12’s will be rolling off the assembly line in early 2017.

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download (15)Technology can be confusing when it begins moving at such an accelerated rate, perfectly exemplified by the 3D industry, and encompassing all that goes with it, from 3D scanning to 3D printing and then peripheral industries that are often connected too such as augmented and virtual realities. We’ve barely digested all the stunning innovations making impacts in so many different sectors, from 3D printed medical models that allow for more complex surgeries, to 3D printed parts for a suspension system that make racing bikes go faster, all the way to incredible toys for your kids using augmented reality systems.

Yet, while work is definitely just beginning in the 3D realm, scientists have already begun exploring a range of uses for 4D technology that should prove offer impacts in just as many applications, from the medical field to electronics and far beyond. It might seem like a lot all at once, but the two technologies definitely work together, with the 4D emphasis adding a more intuitive, smart angle to fabrication.

As we’ve seen in other studies using the application of heat, it would appear that 3D printed objects can be treated or manipulated to cause shapes to morph according to their environment, as well as remembering their previous state and going back to it in the appropriate conditions. Now, teams from both MIT and the Singapore University of Technology and Design (SUTD) are employing light in their endeavors to create smart structures. They’ve had good success too, if the amount of torturing they’ve put these materials through is any indication. According to the engineers, they’ve twisted, bent, and stretched everything from small coils to flowers fabricated out of numerous materials, and even a replica they made of the Eiffel tower. As is the case with structures being pushed into the 4D realm, all of the above materials reverted.

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Brain maps seem to come out in rapid succession these days. They take various forms: a map for word concepts, a map of individual cells’ activity, a map based on the organ’s physical contours.

What they share in common is the aspiration to take the lumpy mass of the brain and categorize it, somehow, into useable areas — not unlike the textbook brain images with their colored denotations of “occipital lobe” and “frontal cortex.”

But these maps often come along with a problem: They may not sync up with the other maps. Now a group of scientists have managed to sync up two of the most commonly used types of brain maps — for gene expression and brain structure — and they’re releasing their methods to any and all in the scientific community.

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