The majority of patients with large B cell lymphomas fail to respond to CAR-T-cell therapy, but ‘warming up’ or ‘cooling down’ the microenvironment may help improve outcomes.
Category: biotech/medical – Page 447
Spider-inspired magnetic soft robots could perform minimally invasive gastrointestinal tract procedures
The gastrointestinal (GI) tract is a collection of organs and structures inside the bodies of humans and other animals that is responsible for the digestion of food, the absorption of nutrients and the expulsion of waste. Its underlying parts include the mouth, esophagus, stomach, intestines, rectum and anus.
Over the past decades, the incidence of cancer in the GI tract and some other conditions affecting the digestive system has risen substantially. Existing approaches to diagnose and treat GI cancers rely on endoscopy, a medical procedure that entails the inspection of internal organs via a flexible tube with an embedded camera (i.e., endoscope), which is inserted into the body through the anus, mouth or a small incision.
In addition to being highly uncomfortable for patients, endoscopy often fails to reach regions that are deep into the GI tract or are difficult to access due to the body’s natural configuration. Some biomedical engineers have thus been trying to devise alternative systems that could inspect parts of the digestive system more effectively, while causing patients minimal discomfort.
Anti-ageing and increased mental capacity through cannabis
A low-dose long-term administration of cannabis can not only reverse aging processes in the brain, but also has an anti-aging effect. Researchers from the University Hospital Bonn (UKB) and the University of Bonn together with a team from Hebrew University (Israel) have now been able to show this in mice. They found the key to this in the protein switch mTOR, whose signal strength has an influence on cognitive performance and metabolic processes in the entire organism. The results are now presented in the journal “ACS Pharmacology & Translation Science”
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Adaptable 3D bioprinting technique can boost engineered tissue output
The field of tissue engineering aims to replicate the structure and function of real biological tissues. This engineered tissue has potential applications in disease modeling, drug discovery, and implantable grafts.
If quantum computing is answering unknowable questions, how do we know they’re right?
Quantum computing promises to solve the seemingly unsolvable in fields such as physics, medicine, cryptography and more.
But as the race to develop the first large-scale, error-free commercial device heats up, it begs the question: how can we check that these ‘impossible’ solutions are correct?
A new Swinburne study is tackling this paradox. The paper is published in the journal Quantum Science and Technology.
A biocompatible and stretchable transistor for implantable devices
Recent technological advances have opened new possibilities for the development of advanced biomedical devices that could be implanted inside the human body. These devices could be used to monitor biological signals that offer insight about the evolution of specific medical conditions or could even help to alter problematic physiological processes.
Despite their potential for the diagnosis and treatment of some conditions, most implantable devices developed to date are based on rigid electronic components. These components can damage tissue inside the body or cause inflammation.
Some electronics engineers have been trying to develop alternative implantable electronics that are based on soft and stretchable materials, such as polymers. However, most known polymers and elastic materials are not biocompatible, which means that they can provoke immune responses and adversely affect the growth of cells.
Innovative microscope captures large, high-resolution images of curved samples in single snapshot
Researchers have developed a new type of microscope that can acquire extremely large, high-resolution pictures of non-flat objects in a single snapshot. This innovation could speed up research and medical diagnostics or be useful in quality inspection applications.
“Although traditional microscopes assume the sample is perfectly flat, real-life samples such as tissue sections, plant samples or flexible materials may be curved, tilted or uneven,” said research team leader Roarke Horstmeyer from Duke University.
“With our approach, it’s possible to adjust the focus across the sample, so that everything remains in focus even if the sample surface isn’t flat, while avoiding slow scanning or expensive special lenses.”