Lifeboat Foundation

A new autoimmune therapy harnesses a person’s own cells to find and correct other defective cells – an answer for patients who haven’t responded to other treatments and a possible cure for diseases like lupus.

Autoimmune diseases are conditions where the body’s immune system attacks other cells in the body and causes symptoms like inflammation. This happens through autoantibodies, or antibodies that attack the self, produced by a type of white blood known as B cells.

New research tests a type of immunotherapy where T cells, another type of white blood cell, are edited to root out the defective B cells.

Circa 2019 face_with_colon_three

The most widely used methods for transdermal administration of the drugs are hypodermic needles, topical creams, and transdermal patches. The effect of most of the therapeutic agents is limited due to the stratum corneum layer of the skin, which serves as a barrier for the molecules and thus only a few molecules are able to reach the site of action. A new form of delivery system called the microneedles helps to enhance the delivery of the drug through this route and overcoming the various problems associated with the conventional formulations. The primary principle involves disruption of the skin layer, thus creating micron size pathways that lead the drug directly to the epidermis or upper dermis region from where the drug can directly go into the systemic circulation without facing the barrier. This review describes the various potential and applications of the microneedles. The various types of microneedles can be fabricated like solid, dissolving, hydrogel, coated and hollow microneedles. Fabrication method selected depends on the type and material of the microneedle. This system has increased its application to many fields like oligonucleotide delivery, vaccine delivery, insulin delivery, and even in cosmetics. In recent years, many microneedle products are coming into the market. Although a lot of research needs to be done to overcome the various challenges before the microneedles can successfully launch into the market.

With billions of dollars flooding into longevity, what role will epigenetic clocks play in measuring and intervening in aging?

When Horvath first described epigenetic clocks, scientists began to speculate that altering them could reverse aging. After all, if certain patterns of DNA methylation at certain sites in cells in certain tissues of your body are hallmarks of aging, could shifting them somehow reverse aging?

The future of mind-controlled machines might not be as far away as we think.

As director of DARPA’s Biological Technologies Office, Dr Justin Sanchez is part of a team that is looking at how to decode brain signals and use them to control robotic prosthetics.

Continue reading “Direct Neural Interface & DARPA — Dr Justin Sanchez” »

A research has revealed that taking the over-the-counter painkiller aspirin has potential benefits that outweigh the side effects. Researchers at Cardiff University reviewed the earlier studies of aspirin and cancer and published the findings in the journal Open Biology.

The surgeon breaks the patients’ thigh bones and inserts nails that are extended with a magnetic remote control every day for three months, GQ said.

More than six months after CAR-T cell treatment, five patients are in remission and have functional immune systems.

Development of medical treatment against cancer is a major research topic worldwide — but cancer often manages to circumvent the solutions found. Scientists around Tanja Weil and David Ng at the Max Planck Institute for Polymer Research (MPI-P), have now taken a closer look at the cancer’s countermeasures and aim to stop them. By disrupting the cellular components that are responsible for converting oxygen into chemical energy, they have demonstrated initial success in eliminating cells derived from untreatable metastatic cancer.

Treatment of cancer is a long-term process because remnants of living cancer cells often evolve into aggressive forms and become untreatable. Hence, treatment plans often involve multiple drug combinations and/or radiation therapy in order to prevent cancer relapse. To combat the variety of cancer cell types, modern drugs have been developed to target specific biochemical processes that are unique within each cell type.

However, cancer cells are highly adaptive and able to develop mechanisms to avoid the effects of the treatment. “We want to prevent such adaptation by invading the main pillar of cellular life — how cells breathe – that means take up oxygen — and thus produce chemical energy for growth,” says David Ng, group leader at the MPI-P.

The laser that will be the most powerful in the United States is preparing to send its first pulses into an experimental target at the University of Michigan.

Called ZEUS, the Zetawatt-Equivalent Ultrashort pulse laser System, it will explore the physics of the quantum universe as well as outer space, and it is expected to contribute to new technologies in medicine, electronics and national security.

Continue reading “First light at the most powerful laser in the US” »