Irina Kareva translates biology into mathematics and vice versa. She writes mathematical models that describe the dynamics of cancer, with the goal of developing new drugs that target tumors. “The power and beauty of mathematical modeling lies in the fact that it makes you formalize, in a very rigorous way, what we think we know,” Kareva says. “It can help guide us to where we should keep looking, and where there may be a dead end.” It all comes down to asking the right question and translating it to the right equation, and back.
Amanda Leverett Davis was diagnosed with an aggressive bone cancer called chondroblastic osteosarcoma in March of 2017. By the time her doctors discovered it, the disease had metastasized and advanced to stage 3. Amanda was told it was non-curative.
But nearly two years after her initial diagnosis, Amanda is still alive to share her story, and remarkably, she’s cancer free.
In biotech these days, CRISPR/Cas9 is a hot topic, because of its utility as a precise gene editing tool. Before humans repurposed it, CRISPR/Cas9 was a sort of internal immune system bacteria use to defend themselves against phages, or viruses that infect bacteria, by slicing up the phages’ DNA.
Scientists at Emory University School of Medicine and the Max Planck Unit for the Science of Pathogens have found that the “scissors” component of CRISPR/Cas9 sometimes gets stuck.
Cas9, an enzyme that cuts DNA, can also block gene activity without doing any cutting. In the pathogenic bacterium Francisella novicida, Cas9 regulates genes that need to be shut off for the bacteria to cause disease.
The ways in which the communities of bacteria living within our bodies influence our overall well-being are becoming better understood all the time, and with that better understanding comes potential new ways to intervene for better health outcomes. Adding to this is a new discovery by researchers in Melbourne, who have described how a healthy microbiome can boost the activity of killer immune cells that are vital to fighting off infections and cancer.
New thermal cloaking, insect proof uniforms are on the horizon, if the U.S. can get out in front of China.
The U.S. Army’s new Futures Command is accelerating research into synthetic biotechnology to help the military develop next-generation living camouflage and other never-before-seen organisms and materials.
Dimitra Stratis-Cullum, who is overseeing the research in synthetic biology for the U.S. Army Research Laboratory’s Combat Capabilities Development Command, detailed the effort on Thursday at the fourth annual Defense One Tech Summit.
With its growing aging population, Singapore has a looming crisis, but could also be primed to become a major player in the rejuvenation biotechnology industry.
Singapore has one of the fastest-aging populations in the world. Senior citizens 65 years old or older are expected to make up almost half of Singapore’s population by 2050. Unfortunately, this swelling population is spending more time living with sickness, even though they live longer. While average lifespans have been extended, healthspans have not. [1] Singaporeans have an impressive average life expectancy of 84.8 years, but an average Singaporean born in 2017 is predicted to spend the last ten and a half years in sickness, compared to how a Singaporean born in 1999 is likely to spend only nine twilight years in deteriorating health.
This is becoming a massive concern for the Singaporean government because of the financial strain that this is imposing on Singapore’s budget. Having the world’s second-lowest birth rate coupled with a rapidly aging population means that the ratio of working adults to senior citizens is quickly shrinking. In 2007, there were 6.9 working adults for every senior citizen. By 2030, there will be 2.3 working adults per senior citizen.
In under a decade, Singapore’s healthcare budget more than doubled from S$4 billion in 2010 to S$10 billion in 2017. [2] Among the developed nations of the world, Singapore has a reputation for being one of the most fiscally conservative; there’s a socio-political stigma against the term “welfare state” in Singapore. Since its unprecedented independence in 1965, Singapore has had a general zeitgeist of “every man for himself,” as we are a nation with no natural resources. Our highly-educated workforce, along with our strategic geographical location, is the primary resource undergirding our knowledge-based economy.