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Researchers at the University of Eindhoven in the Netherlands have developed a DNA computer that can respond to the presence of specific antibodies and make calculations, with the potential for intelligent drug delivery in the future. DNA computing involves using DNA molecules and other molecular biological components as molecular circuitry, instead of traditional silicon-based circuitry in computer devices. The DNA sequence dictates which other DNA molecules a DNA strand can interact with, allowing researchers to program DNA circuitry.

Scientists have been trying to use DNA computing as a method to detect biomarkers of disease in the body. Using this technique, a DNA computer could make calculations and perform a specific function, such as release a drug or activate an enzyme, in response to biological stimuli such as disease biomarkers.

So far, the inputs of DNA computers have been other DNA or RNA molecules, which has limited their usefulness as diagnostic or therapeutic systems. However, in this study, published in Nature Communications, scientists have developed a DNA computer that can respond to multiple antibody inputs and perform calculations to formulate an appropriate response. Antibodies are biomarkers in a variety of diseases, meaning that the new system has significant potential as an intelligent drug delivery system. The system translates the presence of an antibody into a DNA strand, that can then interact with other DNA strands in the molecular circuitry in calculating the appropriate response.

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Restorative neuroscience, the study to identify means to replace damaged neurons and recover permanently lost mental or physical abilities, is a rapidly advancing scientific field considering our progressively aging society. Redirecting immature neurons that reside in specific brain areas towards the sites of brain damage is an appealing strategy for the therapy of acute brain injury or stroke. A collaborative effort between the Center for Brain Research of Medical University of Vienna and the National Brain Research Program of Hungary/Semmelweis University in Budapest revealed that some mature neurons are able to reconfigure their local microenvironment such that it becomes conducive for adult-born immature neurons to extensively migrate. Thus, a molecular principle emerges that can allow researchers to best mobilize resident cellular reserves in the adult brain and guide immature neurons to the sites of brain damage.

The adult brain has limited capacity of self-repair.

In the aging Western society, acute brain damage and chronic neurodegenerative conditions (e.g. Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases) are amongst the most debilitating diseases affecting hundreds of millions of people world-wide. Nerve cells are particularly sensitive to microenvironmental insults and their loss clearly manifests as neurological deficit. Since the innate ability of the adult human brain to regenerate is very poor and confined to its few specialized regions, a key question in present-day neurobiology is how to establish efficient strategies that can replace lost neurons, guide competent cells to the sites of injury and facilitate their functional integration to regain lost functionality. “Cell replacement therapy” thus offers frontline opportunities to design potent therapeutic interventions.

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(Phys.org)—Physicists are getting a little bit closer to answering one of the oldest and most basic questions of quantum theory: does the quantum state represent reality or just our knowledge of reality?

George C. Knee, a theoretical physicist at the University of Oxford and the University of Warwick, has created an algorithm for designing optimal experiments that could provide the strongest evidence yet that the quantum state is an ontic state (a state of ) and not an epistemic state (a state of knowledge). Knee has published a paper on the new strategy in a recent issue of the New Journal of Physics.

While physicists have debated about the nature of the quantum state since the early days of quantum theory (with, most famously, Bohr being in favor of the ontic interpretation and Einstein arguing for the epistemic one), most modern evidence has supported the view that the quantum state does indeed represent reality.

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A team of researchers led by physics professor Immanuel Bloch has experimentally realized an exotic quantum system which is robust to mixing by periodic forces (Nature Physics, “Periodically driving a many-body localized quantum system”).

martini

When James Bond asks the barkeeper for a Martini (“shaken, not stirred”), he takes it for granted that the ingredients of the drink are miscible. If he were to place the order in a bar in the quantum realm, however, Agent 007 might be in for a surprise!

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Published: 2012/11/01 | ISBN: 311027325X | PDF | 349 pages | 12.06 MB

The subject of this book is theory of quantum system presented from information science perspective. The central role is played by the concept of quantum channel and its entropic and information characteristics. Quantum information theory gives a key to understanding elusive phenomena of quantum world and provides a background for development of experimental techniques that enable measuring and manipulation of individual quantum systems. This is important for the new efficient applications such as quantum computing, communication and cryptography. Research in the field of quantum informatics, including quantum information theory, is in progress in leading scientific centers throughout the world. This book gives an accessible, albeit mathematically rigorous and self-contained introduction to quantum information theory, starting from primary structures and leading to fundamental results and to exiting open problems.

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