Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: health – Page 7

Insulin is a key hormone that regulates metabolism in many living organisms. When food is abundant, insulin.

Insulin is a hormone produced by the pancreas, crucial for regulating blood glucose levels. It helps cells in the body absorb glucose from the bloodstream and convert it into energy or store it for future use. Insulin production and action are essential for maintaining stable blood sugar levels. In people with diabetes, the body either does not produce enough insulin (Type 1 diabetes) or cannot effectively use the insulin it does produce (Type 2 diabetes), leading to elevated levels of glucose in the blood. This can cause various health complications over time, including heart disease, kidney damage, and nerve dysfunction. Insulin therapy, where insulin is administered through injections or an insulin pump, is a common treatment for managing diabetes, particularly Type 1. The discovery of insulin in 1921 by Frederick Banting and Charles Best was a landmark in medical science, transforming diabetes from a fatal disease to a manageable condition.

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While the trial is limited to members of families with genetic mutations that all but guarantee they will develop Alzheimer’s at a young age, typically in their 30s, 40s or 50s, the researchers expect that the study’s results will inform prevention and treatment efforts for all forms of Alzheimer’s disease.

Called the Primary Prevention Trial, the new study investigates whether remternetug — an investigational antibody being developed by Eli Lilly and Company — can remove plaques of a key Alzheimer’s protein called amyloid beta from the brain or block them from accumulating in the first place. Both genetic and nongenetic forms of Alzheimer’s disease start with amyloid slowly collecting in the brain two decades before memory and thinking problems arise. By clearing out low levels of amyloid beta plaques or preventing them from accumulating during the early, asymptomatic phase of the disease, or both, the researchers hope to interrupt the disease process at the earliest stage and spare people from ever developing symptoms.

“We have seen tremendous progress in the treatment of Alzheimer disease in the past few years,” said Eric McDade, DO, a professor of neurology and the trial’s principal investigator. “Two amyloid-targeting drugs were shown to slow symptoms of the disease and have now been approved by the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as treatments for people with mild cognitive impairment or mild dementia due to Alzheimer’s disease. This provides strong support for our hypothesis that intervening when amyloid beta plaques are at the very earliest stage, long before symptoms arise, could prevent symptoms from emerging in the first place.”

The trial is part of the Knight Family Dominantly Inherited Alzheimer Network-Trials Unit (Knight Family DIAN-TU), a clinical trials platform designed to find medicines to prevent or treat Alzheimer’s disease. It is closely associated with DIAN, a National Institutes of Health (NIH)-funded international research network led by WashU Medicine that involves research institutes in North America, Australia, Europe, Asia and South America. DIAN follows families with mutations in any of three genes that cause Alzheimer’s at a young age. A child born into such a family has a 50% chance of inheriting such a mutation, and those who do so typically develop signs of dementia near the same age his or her parent did. All the participants in the Primary Prevention Trial come from such families.

“My grandfather passed away from Alzheimer’s, and so did his mother and all but one of his brothers,” said Hannah Richardson, 24, a participant in the Primary Prevention Trial. “My mom and my uncle have been participating in DIAN trials since I was about 10 years old. My mom was always very open about her diagnosis and how it spurred her advocacy for Alzheimer’s research, and I’ve always known I wanted to follow in her footsteps. I am happy to be involved in the Primary Prevention Trial and be involved in research because I know how important it is.”

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Blood clots form in response to signals from the lungs of cancer patients—not from other organ sites, as previously thought—according to a preclinical study by Weill Cornell Medicine, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and University of California San Diego Health. Clots are the second-leading cause of death among cancer patients with advanced disease or aggressive tumors.

While blood clots usually form to stop a wound from bleeding, cancer patients can form clots without injury, plugging up vessels and cutting off circulation to organs. The study, published in Cell, shows that tumors drive clot formation (thrombosis) by releasing chemokines, secreted proteins which then circulate to the lung. Once there, the chemokines prompt immune cells called macrophages to release small vesicles that attach to cell fragments (platelets), forming life-threatening clots.

The findings may lead to to determine blood clotting risk and safer therapies that target the root of the problem to prevent blood clots.

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UC Davis Health is pleased to announce that Neurosurgeon David Brandman and his team at UC Davis Neuroprosthetics Lab were selected for a 2025 Top Ten Clinical Research Achievement Award. The Clinical Research Forum presents this award to honor 10 outstanding clinical research studies published in peer-reviewed journals in the previous year. This year’s Top 10 Awards ceremony will be held on April 14 in Washington, D.C.

Brandman and his team are recognized for their groundbreaking work in developing a new brain-computer interface (BCI) that translates brain signals into speech with up to 97% accuracy — the most accurate system of its kind. Their work was published in the New England Journal of Medicine.

“Our team is very honored that our study was selected among the nation’s best published clinical research studies. Our work demonstrates the most accurate speech neuroprosthesis (device) ever reported,” said Brandman, co-director of the Neuroprosthetics Lab. He is an assistant professor in the UC Davis Department of Neurological Surgery.

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Mitochondria are well known as the powerhouses of the cell. These crucial, energy generating organelles even have their own little genomes, and make their own proteins. Mutations in mitochondrial DNA (mtDNA) can cause some serious diseases, and dysfunctional mitochondria have been associated with a wide variety of health disorders. Researchers have also found links between mitochondrial defects and diabetes.

There are special cells in the pancreas known as beta cells, which is where insulin is generated. When these cells are lost due to an autoimmune attack, type 1 diabetes arises. Some studies have determined that there are abnormal mitochondria in the beta cells of some diabetes patients.

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Our guts are home to trillions of bacteria, and research over the last few decades has established how essential they are to our physiology—in health and disease. A new study from EMBL Heidelberg researchers shows that gut bacteria can bring about profound molecular changes in one of our most critical organs—the brain.

The new study, published in the journal Nature Structural & Molecular Biology, is the first to show that bacteria living in the gut can influence how proteins in the brain are modified by carbohydrates—a process called glycosylation. The study was made possible by a new method the scientists developed—DQGlyco—which allows them to study glycosylation at a much higher scale and resolution than previous studies.

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The ancient Greek statue of Apoxyomenos, also known as the “Croatian Apoxiomenos,” is a remarkable ancient Greek bronze statue depicting an athlete scraping oil and dust from his body with a strigil, a tool used by ancient Greeks for cleaning themselves after exercise.

It dates back to the 2nd or 1st century BC and was discovered in 1996 by a Belgian tourist diving off the Croatian island of Lošinj in the Adriatic Sea.

This statue is significant not only for its artistic quality but also because it is one of the few large-scale ancient bronze statues to have survived largely intact.

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As temperatures drop, norovirus cases increase and more of its RNA ends up in sewage. This year, wastewater samples in the United States show norovirus levels have already passed the previous two seasonal peaks.

The “Ferrari of viruses” is having a banner season. Norovirus, which races through cruise ships, homes, and long-term care facilities, is experiencing a remarkable winter surge in the Northern Hemisphere, sending large numbers of people racing to the bathroom and many others to the hospital, and in rare cases, proving fatal. In the United States, for example, 91 outbreaks of the intestinal virus occurred in the first week of December 2024, far above the previous maximum, 65, for the same week between 2010 and 2024. And levels of its genes in U.S. wastewater are an order of magnitude above last year.

“The early data for the early part of the season is certainly supporting that we’re going to have a pretty intense norovirus year,” says Lisa Lindesmith, who studies the virus at the University of North Carolina (UNC) at Chapel Hill. Some of the surge may be due to a new variant of the virus, unfamiliar to many people’s immune systems, and the resumption of cruises and other gatherings that the COVID-19 pandemic interrupted. And there’s no vaccine anywhere in sight: The most advanced candidate just failed a key trial and others won’t be ready for several years.

Norovirus thrives in cold climes, causing explosive diarrhea and vomiting that typically only last for a day. But several weeks after people recover, they can still shed the virus, and it can remain infectious for long periods on surfaces. It’s notoriously resistant to many disinfectants, and studies in adult volunteers have shown just a trace of virus is enough to sicken a person. Oysters are also a source of infection, because the filter-feeding mollusks concentrate the virus from contaminated water in their tissues. U.S. health officials issued several warnings about infected oysters in December, and France has banned oyster harvesting in certain regions because of norovirus outbreaks.

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A study confirms the positive effects of exercise on insulinInsulin is a hormone produced by the pancreas, crucial for regulating blood glucose levels. It helps cells in the body absorb glucose from the bloodstream and convert it into energy or store it for future use. Insulin production and action are essential for maintaining stable blood sugar levels. In people with diabetes, the body either does not produce enough insulin (Type 1 diabetes) or cannot effectively use the insulin it does produce (Type 2 diabetes), leading to elevated levels of glucose in the blood. This can cause various health complications over time, including heart disease, kidney damage, and nerve dysfunction. Insulin therapy, where insulin is administered through injections or an insulin pump, is a common treatment for managing diabetes, particularly Type 1. The discovery of insulin in 1921 by Frederick Banting and Charles Best was a landmark in medical science, transforming diabetes from a fatal disease to a manageable condition. tabindex=0 insulin signaling proteins in the brain.

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