Lifeboat Foundation

Medical microrobots could aid doctors in providing better illness prevention and treatment. However, the majority of these gadgets are created from synthetic materials that incite in vivo immunological reactions.

Scientists have now successfully utilized lasers to precisely manipulate neutrophils, a type of white blood cell, in living fish as a natural, biocompatible microrobot for the first time, as reported in ACS Central Science.

Microrobots that are now being developed for medical use need to be injected into an animal or ingested as capsules. However, scientists have discovered that these tiny items frequently cause immunological reactions in small animals, which prevents the elimination of microrobots from the body before they can carry out their functions.

Summary: Study reveals how motor memories are formed and how they remain persistent. The findings may help illuminate the root cause of motor disorders like Parkinson’s disease.

Source: Stanford.

Why is it that someone who hasn’t ridden a bicycle in decades can likely jump on and ride away without a wobble, but could probably not recall more than a name or two from their 3rd grade class?

New work shows that neurons and other brain cells use DNA double-strand breaks, often associated with cancer, neurodegeneration and aging, to quickly express genes related to learning and memory.

Thorough evaluation of CRISPR RNA-guided nucleases off-targets in cells is required for advancing gene therapies. Here the authors report SURRO-seq for the simultaneous investigation of thousands of off-target sites for therapeutic RNA-guided nucleases in cells.

Up until recently, almost all pediatric liver cancers were classified as either hepatoblastoma or hepatocellular carcinoma. However, pediatric pathologists have noted that certain liver tumors have histological characteristics that do not readily match either of these two carcinoma models. The outcomes for patients with these tumors are poor and the tumors are less likely to respond to chemotherapy.

Dr. Pavel Sumazin, an associate professor of pediatrics at Texas Children’s Cancer and Hematology Center and Baylor College of Medicine, sought to better understand this high-risk cancer.

Scientists are shooting stem cells into space, hoping to make discoveries that help people on Earth.

Researcher Dhruv Sareen’s own stem cells are now orbiting the Earth. The mission? To test whether they’ll grow better in zero gravity.

Scientists at Cedars-Sinai Medical Center in Los Angeles are trying to find new ways to produce huge batches of a type of stem cell that can generate nearly any other type of cell in the body — and potentially be used to make treatments for many diseases. The cells arrived over the weekend at the International Space Station on a supply ship.

Continue reading “High-Flying Experiment: Do Stem Cells Grow Better in Space?” »

In a first, a patient in New Zealand has undergone gene-editing to lower their cholesterol. If it works, it could signal the start of an era in which nearly everyone might undergo a gene-edit in order to prevent disease.