New research shows your brain can reshape your gut bacteria in just 2 hours — here’s what it means for stress, immunity, mood, and biohacking
Category: biotech/medical – Page 49
How you could see inside your body — with a micro-robot
Would you swallow a micro-robot? In a gutsy demo, physician Vivek Kumbhari navigates Pillbot, a wireless, disposable robot swallowed onstage by engineer Alex Luebke, modeling how this technology can swiftly provide direct visualization of internal organs. Learn more about how micro-robots could move us past the age of invasive endoscopies and open up doors to more comfortable, affordable medical imaging. (This talk contains medical imagery.)
Heart rhythm disorder traced to bacterium lurking in gums
Tempted to skip the floss? Your heart might thank you if you don’t. A new study from Hiroshima University (HU) finds that the gum disease bacterium Porphyromonas gingivalis (P. gingivalis) can slip into the bloodstream and infiltrate the heart. There, it quietly drives scar tissue buildup—known as fibrosis—distorting the heart’s architecture, interfering with electrical signals, and raising the risk of atrial fibrillation (AFib).
Clinicians have long noticed that people with periodontitis, a common form of gum disease, seem more prone to cardiovascular problems. One recent meta-analysis has linked it to a 30% higher risk of developing AFib, a potentially serious heart rhythm disorder that can lead to stroke, heart failure, and other life-threatening complications.
Globally, AFib cases have nearly doubled in under a decade, rising from 33.5 million in 2010 to roughly 60 million by 2019. Now, scientific curiosity is mounting about how gum disease might be contributing to that surge.
Breakthrough DNA-based supercomputer runs 100 billion tasks at once
The boundaries of computing are shifting as biology fuses with technology. At the center of this new frontier is an emerging concept: a liquid computer powered by DNA. With the ability to support more than 100 billion unique circuits, this system could soon transform how we detect and diagnose disease.
While DNA is best known for encoding life, researchers are now exploring its potential as a computing tool. A team led by Dr. Fei Wang at Shanghai Jiao Tong University believes DNA can do much more than carry genetic instructions.
Their study, recently published in Nature, reveals how DNA molecules could become the core components of new computing systems. Rather than just holding genetic data, DNA could behave like wires, instructions, or even electrons inside biological circuits.
Ketamine’s Antidepressant Action Extended for the First Time
Roughly 10 percent of the U.S. population is afflicted with major depressive disorder at any given time, and up to 20 percent will exhibit MDD symptoms over their lifetimes. Yet despite its prevalence, methods to treat MDD often fall short for a not-insignificant portion of the population. Antidepressants—the standard of treatment—don’t work for 30 percent with MDD.
When infused at a low dose, ketamine shows remarkable efficacy as a rapidly acting antidepressant, with effects observed within hours even in patients who have been resistant to other antidepressant treatments. However, consistent infusions of ketamine are needed to maintain symptoms at bay, which could result in side effects, such as dissociative behaviors and the possibility of addiction, and stopping treatment can result in relapse.
In a new study published in Science, Lisa Monteggia’s and Ege Kavalali’s labs show that it is feasible to substantially extend the efficacy of a single dose of ketamine from its current duration of up to a week to a longer period of up to two months.
Neuralink Patient Is Using His Brain Implant to Play ‘Counter-Strike 2’
Neuralink’s second brain implant recipient shows the potential advancements in assistive technology for quadriplegics by playing video games.
Long-term remission of advanced liver cancer in 46% of patients achieved with combination therapy
An interdisciplinary research team has demonstrated a durable and lasting response to a novel treatment—combined locoregional therapy and immunotherapy (LRT-IO)—for advanced liver cancer patients. The study marks the first investigation into the long-term outcomes for patients with locally advanced liver cancer receiving this treatment. The researchers identified key factors associated with a complete response, and found that this pioneering approach is safe, effective and sustainable.
The findings were recently published in JAMA Oncology. The team included researchers from the Department of Surgery and Department of Clinical Oncology, School of Clinical Medicine at the LKS Faculty of Medicine of the University of Hong Kong (HKUMed).
Advanced liver cancer is often considered incurable, but it can sometimes be converted to a treatable stage through a combination of therapies, potentially leading to curative surgery.
A root development gene that’s older than root development
A gene that regulates the development of roots in vascular plants is also involved in the organ development of liverworts—land plants so old they don’t even have proper roots. The Kobe University discovery, published in New Phytologist, highlights the fundamental evolutionary dynamic of co-opting, evolving a mechanism first and adopting it for a different purpose later.
When scientists discover that a gene is necessary for the development of a trait, they are quick to ask since when this gene has been involved in this and how the evolution of the gene has contributed to the evolution of the trait.
Kobe University plant biologist Fukaki Hidehiro says, “My group previously discovered that a gene called RLF is necessary for lateral root development in the model plant Arabidopsis thaliana, but it was completely new that the group of genes RLF belongs to is involved in plant organ development. So we wanted to know whether the equivalent of this gene in other plants is also involved in similar processes.”
