Lifeboat Foundation

A new study from Sanford Burnham Prebys has discovered a drug that can spur liver regeneration in patients with Alagille syndrome.

For the first time, research conducted by Associate Professor Duc Dong, Ph.D. has revealed that the detrimental effects of Alagille syndrome, a genetic disorder that has no cure, can be reversed using a single drug. The findings, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, have the potential to revolutionize the treatment approach for this rare condition, and could also shed light on more widespread diseases.

“Alagille syndrome is widely considered an incurable disease, but we believe we’re on the way to changing that,” says Dong, who is also the associate dean of admissions for Sanford Burnham Prebys’ graduate school. “We aim to advance this drug into clinical trials, and our results demonstrate its effectiveness for the first time.”

According to a recent study by researchers at Weill Cornell Medicine, a protein that prepares DNA

DNA, or deoxyribonucleic acid, is a molecule composed of two long strands of nucleotides that coil around each other to form a double helix. It is the hereditary material in humans and almost all other organisms that carries genetic instructions for development, functioning, growth, and reproduction. Nearly every cell in a person’s body has the same DNA. Most DNA is located in the cell nucleus (where it is called nuclear DNA), but a small amount of DNA can also be found in the mitochondria (where it is called mitochondrial DNA or mtDNA).

Summary: Examining the cognitive abilities of the AI language model, GPT-3, researchers found the algorithm can keep up and compete with humans in some areas but falls behind in others due to a lack of real-world experience and interactions.

Source: Max Planck Institute.

Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biological Cybernetics in Tübingen have examined the general intelligence of the language model GPT-3, a powerful AI tool.

“Internet memes serve as excellent checkpoints to ensure humans have the upper hand over machines,” an expert tells us.

Adding evidence to the importance of early development, a new study links neutral maternal behavior toward infants with an epigenetic change in children related to stress response.

Epigenetics are molecular processes independent of DNA that influence gene behavior. In this study, researchers found that neutral or awkward behavior of mothers with their babies at 12 months correlated with an epigenetic change called methylation, or the addition of methane and carbon molecules, on a gene called NR3C1 when the children were 7 years old. This gene has been associated with regulating the body’s response to stress.

“There is evidence of a relationship between the quality of maternal-infant interaction and methylation of this gene though these are small effects in response to a relatively small variation in interaction,” said Elizabeth Holdsworth, a Washington State University biological anthropologist and lead author of the study published in the American Journal of Human Biology.

After testing several different types of grass and other raw materials, Plantd settled on a perennial (meaning it grows back every year and doesn’t need to be re-planted) long grass that can grow 20 to 30 feet in a year.

Though grass is obviously softer than wood, it contains a similar cellulose fiber that can be broken down then reconstituted and engineered in such a way that the final product is even stronger than wood (check out this video that made the rounds on LinkedIn last year: a regular wood panel and a Plantd panel are subjected to a sledgehammer, and just one of the two withstands the test).

Continue reading “This Startup Is Making Ultra-Strong Building Panels Out of Grass” »

The lab-created compounds — never seen before — might exist naturally on icy moons in the outer solar system.

This month’s featured image is a small asteroid burning up in Earth’s atmosphere, captured by a photographer in the right place at the right time.

Remains of earwig-like insects discovered near village of Chekarda, Russia, covered in pollen.