A new study in mice unveils the role of vitamin A in immune system regulation, a finding that could assist in developing treatments for autoimmune and inflammatory diseases as well as vitamin A deficiency.
Category: biotech/medical – Page 2,657
Scientists develop method to visualize a genetic mutation
A team of scientists has developed a method that yields, for the first time, visualization of a gene amplifications and deletions known as copy number variants in single cells.
Significantly, the breakthrough, reported in the journal PLoS Biology, allows early detection of rare genetic events providing high resolution analysis of the tempo of evolution. The method may provide a new way of studying mutations in pathogens and human cancers.
“Evolution and disease are driven by mutational events in DNA,” explains David Gresham, an associate professor in New York University’s Department of Biology and the study’s senior author. “However, in populations of cells these events currently cannot be identified until many cells contain the same mutation. Our method detects these rare events right after they have happened, allowing us to follow their trajectory as the population evolves.”
Perfect cervical cancer screening results hint at the shadowy role of epigenetics
Cervical cancer is the fourth most common cancer for women yet the leading cause of cancer-related death in developing countries, an unfortunate statistic that highlights the importance of access to screening. Through a comprehensive trial involving thousands of subjects, a newly designed test has been found to greatly outperform current screening methods in terms of both cost and accuracy, while also shedding new light on the mechanics at play.
First Successful Pig-to-Baboon Heart Transplant Heralds Human Trials
“It shows that we can successfully prevent rejection,” said Mohuiddin.
One single previous attempt at replacing the function of a baboon heart with that of a pig ended after only 57 days, after which the heart failed and the recipient died.
The new work, led by Dr. Bruno Reichart and others at LMU Munich, aimed to push that limit.
MIT Researchers Can Shrink Objects to Nanoscale
MIT researchers invented a method of shrinking objects to the nanoscale.
The team can generate structures one-thousandth the volume of the original using a variety of materials, including metals, quantum dots, and DNA.
Existing techniques—like etching patterns onto a surface with light—work for 2D nanostructures, but not 3D. And while it’s possible to make 3D nanostructures, the process is slow, challenging, and restrictive.
WOW: Israeli Company Reports New Method Destroys Cancerous Tumors
An Israeli company has announced that it has created a technology that will destroy cancerous tumors.
As The Times Of Israel reports, Alpha Tau Medical has a new treatment called Diffusing Alpha-emitters Radiation Therapy (DaRT). To circumvent the problem of how to prevent alpha particles that kill cancer cells from decaying rapidly, Alpha Tau initiated a method of placing the alpha particles inside a needle containing radium-224, a radioactive isotope. Once the needle is inserted into the tumor, it takes the radium four days to vanish, but during that period the radium transmits “daughter atoms” that spit out alpha particles that rupture the DNA of the cancer cells.
CEO Uzi Sofer told The Times of Israel, “This is the first time in the world that you can treat solid tumors,” with alpha radiation. He asserted that the treatment can be given anywhere; there is no need for a hospital setting, concluding, “It is like going to the dentist.” The whole procedure can take between 30 minutes and two hours.
MIT Scientists Just Used a Biological Virus to Make Faster Computers
When your computer stores data, it has to pause while the information moves from one piece of hardware to another.
But that may soon stop being the case, as scientists from MIT and the Singapore University of Technology and Design uncovered a new manufacturing trick that should let them build computers that don’t have those annoying delays.
The key is to sit back and let a virus — the biological kind — handle the assembly work.