Lifeboat Foundation

Scientists at the Catholic University of Korea and Asan Medical Center have 3D printed a novel device that could be used to stabilize Acute Liver Failure (ALF) patients as they wait for a life-saving organ donation.

Composed of a 3D printed container and semipermeable membrane, the team’s implant allows for the rapid delivery of the drugs needed to save those in danger of succumbing to ALF. Once implanted, the device also acts as a ‘bioartificial support system,’ functioning as the patient’s liver while reducing any dysfunction caused to their other internal organs, keeping them alive until a transplant becomes available.

Many researchers are working to develop lab-grown meat, partly to reduce the environmental impact of meat production, and partly because of ethical concerns about the treatment of livestock. While some substitutes use plant-based materials to mimic meat, others aim to grow animal cells in culture to create true artificial meat.

So far, this kind of artificial meat doesn’t match the structure of the real thing. It is missing the complex layers of muscle, fat and sinew. The result is mince that can be used to make burgers, like the one famously cooked at a press conference in 2013. Now, researchers are attempting to make something that mimics a steak or chop.

A team led by Shoji Takeuchi at the University of Tokyo in Japan has found a new way to grow cow muscle cells in culture. The cells arrange themselves into long strands, resembling real muscle fibres. “We have developed steak meat with highly aligned muscle fibres that are arranged in one direction,” says Takeuchi.

Researchers determined that when introduced into damaged mouse or donated human livers, these lab-grown tissues could integrate into bile ducts and function normally.

ABOVE: A human cholangiocyte–derived organoid with nuclei in blue and the cytoplasm of bile duct cells in green FOTIOS SAMPAZIOTIS, TERESA BREVINI

Scientists have shown over the past decade or so that organoids—small, organ-like structures grown in culture from stem cells—can integrate into many organs, including the liver, lungs, and guts of mice, and repair defects. In a study published today (February 18) in Science, researchers have advanced this approach in human tissue, and demonstrate that organoids derived from adult cholangiocytes, the cells that line the bile ducts, can integrate into human livers from deceased organ donors. The findings pave the way for new treatments for liver diseases, as well as for the repair of donated organs to make more available for transplant.

Continue reading “Organoids Repair Bile Ducts” »

Translated English into code with AI.

AI research firm OpenAI has announced a new version of its Codex software, which uses machine learning to translate natural English language into code. The company is releasing Codex as a free API to a limited number of users. It could help programming become much more accessible.

The ones Teresa is handling in this Cambridge laboratory are mini bile ducts, thin tubes that carry bile from the liver to the small intestine to help with digestion.

Teresa also has gut organoids in the incubator, while down the corridor a different team is developing brain organoids.

In fact, around the world, miniatures of everything from lungs to kidneys are being coaxed gently to life. And because they function just as organs do, they are perfect for research.

On August 6 SpaceX’s Starship became the tallest rocket in the world — for about an hour.

SpaceX’s Starship SN20 was stacked in early August, making it the tallest rocket ever built. Here’s what’s next for SpaceX’s prospective Moon-bound rocket.

BBC News

A man who died is found to have had the highly infectious virus, the first human case in West Africa.

Summary: Brain connectivity at birth may impact emotional processing and social development later in childhood, especially in children born preterm. Researchers found children born preterm with a weaker uncinate fasciculus, the white-matter tract that connects brain regions associated with emotional processing, were more likely to interpret situations in a negative light.

Source: SfN

The strength of brain connections at birth may predict the future emotional and social development of babies born prematurely, according to new research published in eNeuro.

By examining MRI data from a large Open Science repository, researchers reconstructed a brain connectivity pattern, and applied it to an artificial neural network (ANN). An ANN is a computing system consisting of multiple input and output units, much like the biological brain.

Artificial neural networks modeled on human brain connectivity can effectively perform complex cognitive tasks.