Lifeboat Foundation

Scientists have shown that they can detect SARS-CoV-2, the virus that causes COVID-19, in the air by using a nanotechnology-packed bubble that spills its chemical contents like a broken piñata when encountering the virus.

Such a detector could be positioned on a wall or ceiling, or in an air duct, where there’s constant air movement, to alert occupants immediately when even a trace level of the virus is present.

Continue reading “COVID-causing virus in air detected with high-tech bubbles” »

Carbenes are among the most adaptable building blocks in organic chemistry, but they may also be dangerously hot. Due to their explosivity in the lab, scientists often avoid using these very reactive molecules.

However, in a new study that was just published in the journal Science, researchers from The Ohio State University describe a new, safer method to turn these short-lived, high-energy molecules into much more stable ones.

“Carbenes have an incredible amount of energy in them,” said David Nagib, co-author of the study and a professor of chemistry and biochemistry at Ohio State. “The value of that is they can do chemistry that you just cannot do any other way.”

“Forever chemicals” have been identified in water systems that serve about 9.5 million people in just six states, according to a new analysis of state data by a congressional watchdog.

The Government Accountability Office (GAO) published a report this week saying that the toxic chemicals had been found in at least 18 percent of water systems in Illinois, Massachusetts, New Hampshire, New Jersey, Ohio and Vermont.

A study found hazardous air pollutants emitted from gas stoves in California, including benzene — a chemical known to cause to cancer in some people.

Aside from the open-sourced nature of the project, the possible widespread applications of the technology also makes it noteworthy. It could be a plausible alternative to mechanical traps, as well as chemicals that often damage the environment and target non-pest insect species. Not to mention, it’s cheaper (the paper notes that all devices cost not more than $250) and more compact than other current pest-controlling technologies.

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That being said, although the prototype is suitable for academic research, there’s a lot more to be done before it can be deployed on a larger scale. For example, the paper notes that a smaller laser point would be more effective at killing the roaches but is difficult to implement experimentally. The ability to precisely control which parts of the cockroach’s bodies were hit would also be helpful, the paper says.

A new discovery could be a game-changer for patients with type 2 diabetes. Researchers at the Diabetes, Obesity, and Metabolism Institute (DOMI) at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have discovered a therapeutic target for the preservation and regeneration of beta cells (β cells), the cells in the pancreas that produce and distribute insulin. The finding could also help millions of individuals throughout the globe by preventing insulin resistance. The study was recently published in the journal Nature Communications.

Nature Communications is a peer-reviewed, open access, multidisciplinary, scientific journal published by Nature Research. It covers the natural sciences, including physics, biology, chemistry, medicine, and earth sciences. It began publishing in 2010 and has editorial offices in London, Berlin, New York City, and Shanghai.

(http://www.pharma.unizg.hr/en/about-us/staff/gordan–lauc, 450.html) is Professor of Biochemistry and Molecular Biology at the University of Zagreb, Faculty of Pharmacy and Biochemistry, and Founder and CEO of Genos Ltd. (https://genos-glyco.com/), a research-intensive SME located in Zagreb, Croatia with core of expertise in molecular genetics and glycomics (The comprehensive study the entire complement of sugars, whether free or present in more complex molecules of an organism) and they perform contract research, contract analysis and service for numerous universities, hospitals and private individuals in Europe and overseas.

Prof. Dr. Lauc also is CSO of GlycanAge LTD (https://glycanage.com/), a company that has developed a ground-breaking test that analyses your personal glycobiome for insights in improving your health and monitoring your biological age, and Co-Director of the Human Glycome Project (https://human-glycome.org/).

Continue reading “Prof. Dr. Gordan Lauc, Ph.D. — Founder & CEO, Genos; CSO, GlycanAge; Advancing The Glycosciences” »

A simple two-carbon compound may have been a crucial player in the evolution of metabolism before the advent of cells, according to a new study published October 4 in the open access journal PLOS Biology, by Nick Lane and colleagues of University College London, U.K. The finding potentially sheds light on the earliest stages of prebiotic biochemistry, and suggests how ATP came to be the universal energy carrier of all cellular life today.

ATP, adenosine triphosphate, is used by all cells as an energy intermediate. During cellular respiration, energy is captured when a phosphate is added to ADP (adenosine diphosphate) to generate ATP; cleavage of that phosphate releases energy to power most types of cellular functions. But building ATP’s complex chemical structure from scratch is energy intensive and requires six separate ATP-driven steps; while convincing models do allow for prebiotic formation of the ATP skeleton without energy from already-formed ATP, they also suggest ATP was likely quite scarce, and that some other compound may have played a central role in conversion of ADP to ADP at this stage of evolution.

The most likely candidate, Lane and colleagues believed, was the two-carbon compound acetyl phosphate (AcP), which functions today in both bacteria and archaea as a metabolic intermediate. AcP has been shown to phosphorylate ADP to ATP in water in the presence of iron ions, but a host of questions remained after that demonstration, including whether other small molecules might work as well, whether AcP is specific for ADP or instead could function just as well with diphosphates of other nucleosides (such as guanosine or cytosine), and whether iron is unique in its ability to catalyze ADP phosphorylation in water.

The tremendous rise in the economic burden of type 2 diabetes (T2D) has prompted a search for alternative and less expensive medicines. Dandelion offers a compelling profile of bioactive components with potential anti-diabetic properties. The Taraxacum genus from the Asteraceae family is found in the temperate zone of the Northern hemisphere. It is available in several areas around the world. In many countries, it is used as food and in some countries as therapeutics for the control and treatment of T2D. The anti-diabetic properties of dandelion are attributed to bioactive chemical components; these include chicoric acid, taraxasterol (TS), chlorogenic acid, and sesquiterpene lactones. Studies have outlined the useful pharmacological profile of dandelion for the treatment of an array of diseases, although little attention has been paid to the effects of its bioactive components on T2D to date. This review recapitulates previous work on dandelion and its potential for the treatment and prevention of T2D, highlighting its anti-diabetic properties, the structures of its chemical components, and their potential mechanisms of action in T2D. Although initial research appears promising, data on the cellular impact of dandelion are limited, necessitating further work on clonal β-cell lines (INS-1E), α-cell lines, and human skeletal cell lines for better identification of the active components that could be of use in the control and treatment of T2D. In fact, extensive in-vitro, in-vivo, and clinical research is required to investigate further the pharmacological, physiological, and biochemical mechanisms underlying the effects of dandelion-derived compounds on T2D.

Keywords: type 2 diabetes, dandelion, chlorogenic acid, chicory acid, taraxasterol, sesquiterpene.

Abbreviations: ADP — adenosine diphosphate; AFLD — alcoholic fatty liver disease; AMPK — adenosine monophosphate-activated protein kinase; ATP — adenosine triphosphate; cAMP — cyclic adenosine monophosphate; CGA — chlorogenic acid; CoA — coenzyme A; CRA — chicory acid; DAG — diacylglycerol; DBD — DNA-binding domain; DNA — deoxyribonucleic acid; DPPH — 2,2-diphenyl-1-picrylhydrazyl; Dw — dry weight; FOS — fructose oligosaccharide; G6P — glucose-6-phosphate; GDP — guanosine 5’-diphosphate; GLP-1 — glucagon-like peptide 1; GLUT2 — glucose transporter 2; GLUT4 — muscle glucose transporter protein 4; GPCR — G protein-coupled receptor; GTP — guanosine triphosphate; HNB — 2-hydroxy-5-nitrobenzenaledehyde; HPLC — high-pressure liquid chromatography; IC₅₀ — half maximal inhibitory concentration; IDF — International Diabetes Federation; IDX-1 — islet duodenum homeobox 1; IL-1α — interleukin 1 alpha; INS-1E — rat insulinoma clonal beta-cell line; IR — insulin receptor; IRS-1 — insulin receptor substrate 1; Km — Michaelis constant; IP3 — inositol triphosphate; IRS-1 — insulin receptor substrate 1; LBD — ligand-binding domain; LC-DAD — liquid chromatography with (photo) diode array detection; LPS — lipopolysaccharide; MAPK — mitogen-activated protein kinase; NADH — nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide; NAFLD — non-alcoholic fatty liver disease; NF-κb — nuclear factor kappa B; NO — nitric oxide; PI3K — phosphatidylinositol 3 kinase; PKA — protein kinase A; PKC — protein kinase C; PPAR-γ — peroxisome proliferator-activated receptor gamma; ROS — reactive oxygen species; RxR — retinoid X receptor; SEL — sesquiterpene lactones; SUR1 — sulphonylurea receptor 1; T2D — type 2 diabetes; TAG — triacylglycerol; TNF-α — tumor necrosis factor; TO — Taraxacum officinale; TS — taraxasterol; UPLC-MS/MS — ultra-performance liquid chromatography — tandem mass spectrometry; UV/VIS — ultraviolet visible; WHO — World Health Organization.