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Category: health – Page 188

Bacterial extracellular electron transfer: a powerful route to the green biosynthesis of inorganic nanomaterials for multifunctional applications

Two categories of nanofabrication technologies are known as top-down and bottom-up approaches [5]. For the former, nanosized materials are prepared through the rupture of bulk materials to fine particles, and such a process is usually conducted by diverse physical and mechanical techniques like lithography, laser ablation, sputtering, ball milling and arc-discharging [6, 7]. These techniques themselves are simple, and nanosized materials can be produced quickly after relatively short technological process, but expensive specialized equipment and high energy consumption are usually inevitable. Meanwhile, a variety of efficient chemical bottom-up methods, where atoms assemble into nuclei and then form nanoparticles, have been intensively studied to synthesize and modulate nanomaterials with specific shape and size [8].

Indeed, chemical methodologies, including but not limited to, aqueous reaction using chemical reducing agents (e.g. hydrazine hydrate and sodium borohydride), electrochemical deposition, hydrothermal/solvothermal synthesis, sol–gel processing, chemical liquid/vapor deposition, have been developed up to now [5, 6]. These approaches can not only produce diverse nanomaterials with fairly high yields, but also endow fine controllability in tailoring nanostructures and properties of the products. Nevertheless, they have been encountering some serious challenges of harsh reaction conditions (e.g. pH and temperature), potential risks in human health and environment, and low cost-effectiveness. Moreover, there are biosafety concerns on products synthesized chemically using hazardous reagents, which restricts their applications in many areas, particularly in medicines and pharmaceuticals [9].

Impressively, biological methodology is becoming a favourite in nanomaterial synthesis nowadays to address challenges in chemical synthesis. Compared to chemical routes, biosynthesis using natural and biological materials as reducing, stabilizing and capping agents are simple, energy-and cost-effective, mild and environment-friendly, which is termed as “Green Chemistry” [2, 6]. More significantly, the biologically synthesized nanomaterials have much better competitiveness in biocompatibility, compared to those chemically derived counterparts. On the one hand, the biogenic nanomaterials are free from toxic contamination of by-products that are usually involved in chemical synthesis process; on the other hand, the biosynthesis do not need additional stabilizing agents because either the used organisms themselves or their constituents can act as capping and stabilizing agents and the attached biological components in turn form biocompatible envelopes on the resultant nanomaterials, leading to actively interact with biological systems [2]. As one of the most abundant biological resources, some microorganisms have adapted to habitat contaminated with toxic metals, and thus evolved powerful tactics for remediating polluted environment while recycling metal resources [7, 10], and some review articles on the biosynthesis of MNPs using diverse microorganisms including bacteria, yeast, fungi, alga, etc. and their applications have been published in recent years [1, 2, 6, 7, 10].

Surprising Finding: New Study Yields Clues to Genetic Causes of High Cholesterol

According to a recent study conducted by geneticists at the University of Pittsburgh School of Public Health in collaboration with several other organizations, including the University of Otago and the Samoan health research community, the discovery of a genetic variant that is relatively common among individuals of Polynesian descent but very rare in most other populations is providing clues to the genetic underpinnings of high cholesterol in all people.

A gastroenterologist shares 2 diet rules she follows for a healthy gut and to prevent colon cancer

With all the factors that may impact gut health, it can be hard to know what’s causing stomach troubles and potentially affecting long-term wellness.

In a recent TikTok video via Houston Methodist hospital system, gastroenterologist Dr. Neeharika Kalakota shared a few simple rules of thumb she follows to maintain a healthy gut.

As an expert on digestive health, Kalakota said she recommends that her patients stay up-to-date on colon cancer screenings and avoid colonic “cleanses,” which can wreak havoc on the bowel and rectum.

Chip lets scientists study biocement formation in real-time

Scientists from EPFL and the University of Lausanne have used a chip that was originally designed for environmental science to study the properties of biocement formation. This material has the potential to replace traditional cement binders in certain civil engineering applications.

The chip is the size of a credit card and its surface is engraved with a flow channel measuring one meter from end to end that is as thick as a human hair. Researchers can inject a solution into one end of the channel and, with the help of time-lapse microscopy, observe the solution’s behavior over several hours. Medical scientists have used similar chips for health care applications, such as to examine how arteries get clogged or how a drug spreads into the bloodstream, while environmental engineers have applied them to the study of biofilms and contaminants in drinking water.

Now, a team of civil engineers at EPFL’s Laboratory of Soil Mechanics (LMS), together with scientists from the Faculty of Geosciences and Environment at the University of Lausanne (UNIL), have repurposed the chip to understand complex transport-reaction phenomena involved in the formation of new kinds of biocement.

Federated machine learning enables the largest brain tumor study to-date, without sharing patient data

Researchers at Penn Medicine and Intel Corporation led the largest-to-date global machine learning effort to securely aggregate knowledge from brain scans of 6,314 glioblastoma (GBM) patients at 71 sites around the globe and develop a model that can enhance identification and prediction of boundaries in three tumor sub-compartments, without compromising patient privacy. Their findings were published today in Nature Communications.

“This is the single largest and most diverse dataset of glioblastoma patients ever considered in the literature, and was made possible through federated learning,” said senior author Spyridon Bakas, Ph.D., an assistant professor of Pathology & Laboratory Medicine, and Radiology, at the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. “The more data we can feed into machine learning models, the more accurate they become, which in turn can improve our ability to understand, treat, and remove glioblastoma in patients with more precision.”

Researchers studying rare conditions, like GBM, an aggressive type of brain tumor, often have patient populations limited to their own institution or geographical location. Due to privacy protection legislation, such as the Health Insurance Portability and Accountability Act of 1996 (HIPAA) in the United States, and General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) in Europe, data sharing collaborations across institutions without compromising data is a major obstacle for many healthcare providers.

UV and black light tattoos: Everything you need to know

UV tattoos use a fluorescent dye, which means the tattoo only appears under UV light. There is little evidence on whether UV tattoos are safe for human skin.

UV tattoos, also known as black light tattoos, are invisible under regular lighting and only appear under UV light due to the fluorescent compounds within the ink.

There is no regulation over UV tattoos, so there may be some potential health risks, depending on the ink’s chemicals. UV tattoos will also require similar aftercare to regular tattoos.

Electronic nanogenerator tattoos as human-machine interfaces

The field of epidermal electronics, or e-tattoos, covers a wide range of flexible and stretchable monitoring gadgets that are wearable directly on the skin. We have covered this area in multiple Nanowerk Spotlights, for instance stick-on epidermal electronics tattoo to measure UV exposure or tattoo-type biosensors based on graphene; and we also have posted a primer on electronic skin.

Taking the concept of e-tattoos a step further, integrating them with triboelectric nanogenerators (TENGs), for instance for health monitoring, could lead to next generation wearable nanogenerators and Internet-of-things devices worn directly on and powered by the skin.

In work reported in Advanced Functional Materials (“Triboelectric Nanogenerator Tattoos Enabled by Epidermal Electronic Technologies”), researchers report a tattoo-like TENG (TL-TENG) design with a thickness of tens of micrometers, that can interface with skin without additional adhesive layers, and be used for energy harvesting from daily activities.