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Category: biotech/medical – Page 303

December 2024 Longevity Review

A review of the most interesting and impactful longevity related studies from December, including how gene therapy can increase telomere length and how the immune system can be used to clear senescent cells.

Contents:

1. Intro 0:00
2. Gene Therapy To Increase Telomere Length 0:48
3. Freeing The Immune System To Remove Senescent Cells 15:20
4. Using Probiotics To Help With Sarcopenia 27:39.

Canadian Content Study.
5. Extracellular Vesicles To Combat Neuroinflammation 35:59.

Link to the newsletter being discussed (both online and PDF versions):
/ december-2024–120640668

Links to studies reviewed in this newsletter:

Continue reading “December 2024 Longevity Review” | >

New method enables protein labeling of tens of millions of densely packed cells in organ-scale tissues

A new technology developed at MIT enables scientists to label proteins across millions of individual cells in fully intact 3D tissues with unprecedented speed, uniformity, and versatility. Using the technology, the team was able to richly label whole rodent brains and other large tissue samples in a single day.

In their new study in Nature Biotechnology, they also demonstrate that the ability to label proteins with antibodies at the single-cell level across whole brains can reveal insights left hidden by other widely used labeling methods.

Profiling the proteins that cells are making is a staple of studies in biology, neuroscience and related fields because the proteins a cell is expressing at a given moment can reflect the functions the cell is trying to perform or its response to its circumstances, such as disease or treatment.

New Research Uncovers Long-Lived DNA Damage Linked to Cancer

In a groundbreaking shift in our understanding of mutations, researchers have discovered types of DNA

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is a molecule composed of two long strands of nucleotides that coil around each other to form a double helix. It is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms that carries genetic instructions for development, functioning, growth, and reproduction. Nearly every cell in a person’s body has the same DNA. Most DNA is located in the cell nucleus (where it is called nuclear DNA), but a small amount of DNA can also be found in the mitochondria (where it is called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA).

Toward video generative models of the molecular world

As the capabilities of generative AI models have grown, you’ve probably seen how they can transform simple text prompts into hyperrealistic images and even extended video clips.

More recently, generative AI has shown potential in helping chemists and biologists explore static molecules, like proteins and DNA. Models like AlphaFold can predict molecular structures to accelerate , and the MIT-assisted “RFdiffusion,” for example, can help design new proteins.

One challenge, though, is that molecules are constantly moving and jiggling, which is important to model when constructing new proteins and drugs. Simulating these motions on a computer using physics—a technique known as —can be very expensive, requiring billions of time steps on supercomputers.

New tool enables phylogenomic analyses of entire genomes

Researchers led by electrical engineers at the University of California San Diego have developed a better way to perform the comparative analysis of entire genomes. This approach can be used to study relationships between different species across geological time scales.

This new approach is poised to unlock discoveries regarding how evolution has shaped present-day genomes and also how the tree of life is organized. The new method, named CASTER, is described in a paper published in Science on 23 January 2025.

CASTER is poised to offer biologists a far more scalable approach than state-of-the-art for comparing full genomes. This is especially relevant given the exploding number of sequenced genomes of both living and also .

Imagining the physics of George R.R. Martin’s fictional universe

Many science fiction authors try to incorporate scientific principles into their work, but Ian Tregillis, who is a contributing author of the Wild Cards book series when he’s not working as a physicist at Los Alamos National Laboratory, took it one step further: He derived a formula to describe the dynamics of the fictional universe’s viral system.

In independent research published in the American Journal of Physics, Tregillis and George R.R. Martin derive a formula for viral behavior in the Wild Cards universe.

Wild Cards is a science fiction series written by a collection of authors and edited by Martin and Melinda M. Snodgrass. Sitting at over 30 volumes, the books are about an alien called the Wild Card that mutates human DNA. Martin is credited as a co-author of the paper, making it his first peer-reviewed physics publication.

Quantum thermometer uses giant Rydberg atoms to measure temperature more accurately

Scientists at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have created a new thermometer using atoms boosted to such high energy levels that they are a thousand times larger than normal. By monitoring how these giant “Rydberg” atoms interact with heat in their environment, researchers can measure temperature with remarkable accuracy. The thermometer’s sensitivity could improve temperature measurements in fields ranging from quantum research to industrial manufacturing.

Unlike traditional thermometers, a Rydberg doesn’t need to be first adjusted or calibrated at the factory because it relies inherently on the basic principles of quantum physics. These fundamental quantum principles yield that are also directly traceable to international standards.

“We’re essentially creating a thermometer that can provide accurate temperature readings without the usual calibrations that current thermometers require,” said NIST postdoctoral researcher Noah Schlossberger.

Rewriting the Rules: Scientists Discover New Superconductor With “Unconventional” Properties

Researchers from Tokyo Metropolitan University have identified a groundbreaking new superconducting material. By combining iron, nickel, and zirconium in specific ratios, they synthesized a novel transition metal zirconide, with varying proportions of iron and nickel.

While pure iron zirconide and nickel zirconide do not exhibit superconductivity, the new mixtures demonstrate superconducting properties, forming a “dome-shaped” phase diagram characteristic of unconventional superconductors. This finding represents a significant step forward in the search for high-temperature superconducting materials that could have widespread applications.

Superconductors are already integral to advanced technologies, such as superconducting magnets in medical imaging devices, maglev trains, and power transmission cables. However, current superconductors require cooling to extremely low temperatures, typically around 4 Kelvin, which limits their practicality. Researchers are focused on discovering materials that achieve zero electrical resistance at higher temperatures, especially near the critical threshold of 77 Kelvin, where liquid nitrogen can replace liquid helium as a coolant—making the technology more accessible and cost-effective.