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Category: biotech/medical – Page 74

First-of-its-kind ion pump developed for seawater desalination, energy and biomedical applications

Researchers at the University of California, Irvine, Israel’s Tel Aviv University and other institutions have developed a first-of-its-kind membrane through which charged molecules pass using nothing more than a rapidly switching low-voltage signal. This “ratchet-based ion pump” has no moving parts and requires no chemical reactions.

The device opens the door to advances in water desalination, lithium ion harvesting from seawater, heavy-metal removal from drinking water, battery recycling and various biomedical applications. The team’s findings are outlined in a paper published recently in Nature Materials.

Frog-cell ‘neurobots’ grow self-organized nervous systems and alter gene activity

Biobots, whose growing line of variants started with xenobots, are fascinating tiny self-powered living robots built exclusively using frog embryonic cells. Originally developed in the laboratories of Wyss Institute Associate Faculty member and Tufts University Professor Michael Levin, Ph.D. and his collaborators at University of Vermont, biobots are remarkably motile, moving autonomously through aqueous environments.

Since then, the team has shed light on many exciting properties of biobots, including their ability for kinematic self-replication, and responding to sound stimuli.

Biobots can similarly be constructed using human cells in the form of anthrobots, which have the ability to heal neural wounds in vitro. Thus, a vision emerged that biobots, made out of patients’ own cells, could one day be deployed to repair spinal cord or retinal nerve damage, clear plaques from the arteries, locally deliver pro-regenerative drugs, and perform other vital tasks in the human body.

Stryker attack wiped tens of thousands of devices, no malware needed

Last week’s cyberattack on medical technology giant Stryker was limited to its internal Microsoft environment and remotely wiped tens of thousands of employee devices.

The organization says in an update on Sunday that all its medical devices are safe to use but electronic ordering systems remain offline, and customers must place orders manually through sales representatives.

Stryker emphasizes that the incident was not a ransomware attack and that the threat actor did not deploy any malware on its systems.

Plasma proteomic signature of frailty in 50,506 adults

Online now: Jia et al. delineate the most comprehensive plasma proteomic landscape of frailty to date and develop proteomic frailty scores that predict multiple diseases and respond to modifiable risk factors. They identify a biphasic pattern of frailty-related proteomic alterations across the lifespan, revealing critical windows that may inform targeted intervention programs.

Compound amino acid synergizes ceftazidime-avibactam to eradicate extracellular and facultative intracellular MDR pathogens

This study demonstrates that the FDA-approved drug 18AA potently resensitizes multidrug-resistant pathogens to ceftazidime-avibactam. It achieves this by activating two bacterial pathways, the inosine-CusS/R-CusC axis and the proton motive force, to promote antibiotic influx, offering a readily translatable strategy against formidable infections.

RNA barcodes fast-track brain connection mapping

“When engineering a computer, you need to know the circuitry of the central processing unit. If you don’t know how everything is wired together, you can’t understand its function, optimize it or fix it when something breaks. We are approaching the brain the same way,” said study leader Boxuan Zhao, a professor of cell and developmental biology at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign.

“Our technology enables simultaneous mapping of thousands of neural connections with single-synapse resolution —a capability that doesn’t exist in any current technology. It is directly applicable to understanding circuit dysfunction in neurodegenerative diseases and could provide a platform for developing circuit-guided therapeutic interventions,” he said.

Abstract: Patients with recurrent kidney stone disease stand to benefit from personalized diagnostics

In this Research Article, Ruxandra Bachmann-Gagescu & team integrate blood and urine biochemistry with genetics to improve interpretation of genetic findings in adults with kidney stone disease—the approach has prognostic value, enabling personalized risk assessment.

3Department of Molecular Life Sciences, University of Zurich, Zurich, Switzerland.

4National Center of Competence in Research (NCCR) Kidney. CH, Bern, Switzerland.

5Department of Nephrology and Hypertension, Inselspital, Bern University Hospital, University of Bern, Bern, Switzerland.

ADJUVANT Randomized Controlled Trial: Rationale and Design

ADJUVANT: Testing if IV tirofiban is non-inferior to thrombolysis before endovascular thrombectomy for acute ischemic stroke. Read about the upcoming trial.

BackgroundIntravenous thrombolysis followed by endovascular thrombectomy (EVT) is a first‐line recommended strategy for thrombolysis‐eligible patients with stroke due to acute large‐vessel occlusion. Tirofiban, one of the most used glycoprotein IIb/IIIa receptor inhibitors, has been increasingly advocated to counteract different stages of thrombosis mediated by activated platelets. It is unclear whether tirofiban could be used as an alternative to thrombolysis as adjuvant medicine for EVT. This trial aims to assess whether intravenous tirofiban plus EVT is noninferior to intravenous thrombolysis bridging with EVT in patients with acute ischemic stroke due to large‐vessel occlusion who are eligible for thrombolysis.

Neoantigens and their potential applications in tumor immunotherapy

The incidence of malignant tumors is increasing, the majority of which are associated with high morbidity and mortality rates worldwide. The traditional treatment method for malignant tumors is surgery, coupled with radiotherapy or chemotherapy. However, these therapeutic strategies are frequently accompanied with adverse side effects. Over recent decades, tumor immunotherapy shown promise in demonstrating notable efficacy for the treatment of cancer. With the development of sequencing technology and bioinformatics algorithms, neoantigens have become compelling targets for cancer immunotherapy due to high levels of immunogenicity. In addition, neoantigen-based vaccines have demonstrated potential for cancer therapy, primarily by augmenting T-cell responses. Neoantigens have also been shown to be effective in immune checkpoint blockade therapy.

Plastic bottles transformed into Parkinson’s drug using bacteria

A drug to treat Parkinson’s disease can be made from waste plastic bottles using a pioneering method, a study shows. The approach harnesses the power of bacteria to transform post-consumer plastic into L-DOPA, a frontline medication for the neurological disorder. It is the first time a natural, biological process has been engineered to turn plastic waste into a therapeutic for a neurological disease, researchers say.

Scientists at the University of Edinburgh engineered E. coli bacteria to turn a type of plastic used widely in food and drink packaging—polyethylene terephthalate, or PET—into L-DOPA. The process involves first breaking down PET waste—some 50 million tonnes of which are produced annually—into chemical building blocks of terephthalic acid. Molecules of terephthalic acid are then transformed into L-DOPA by the engineered bacteria through a series of biological reactions.

Using the new technique to produce L-DOPA is more sustainable than traditional methods of making pharmaceuticals, which rely on the use of finite fossil fuels, the team says.

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