Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog – Page 694

Cell surface proteins play a crucial role in cell communication and in sensing changes in the extracellular environment.

Professor Akihiko Ito and Dr. Fuka Takeuchi from the Department of Pathology at Kindai University Faculty of Medicine, Japan, set out to seek answers to this critical question. They investigated the impact of anti-CADM1 antibodies on neuronal activity, and their findings were made available online on 22 August 2024 and published in the journal Life Sciences on 11 September 2024. the study.

The team injected 3E1, the anti-CADM1 ectodomain antibody, under the mouse skin to study its localization on nerve fibers. Immunohistochemical and immunofluorescence studies revealed that the injected 3E1 was exclusively localized on peripheral nerves in the dermis. The lead author of the study, Prof. Ito highlights, “As CADM1 can recruit neuronal receptors to the plasma membrane, we hypothesized that this accumulation of 3E1 may blunt neuronal sensitivity, i.e., have an analgesic effect, via altering the expression of CADM1 on nerve fibers. However, to our knowledge, there have been no studies that attempted to develop drugs in terms of inhibiting CADM1 in nerves.”

Analgesic effects were tested using a formalin-induced chemical-inflammatory pain test and video-recorded behavior analysis at 6-, 12-, and 24-hours post-injection. Mice injected with 3E1 exhibited less pain-related behaviors when compared with controls, with analgesic effects lasting up to 24 hours, which is significantly longer than the duration of 5 to 8 hours reported for the local anesthetic levobupivacaine.

Continue reading “New antibody targeting nerve cells offers long-lasting pain relief” | >

Researchers at the University of California, Irvine and other international institutions have for the first time achieved atomic-scale observations of grain rotation in polycrystalline materials. Widely used in electronic devices, aerospace technologies, automotive applications and solar energy systems, these substances have long been studied for their unique properties and structural dynamics.

Read more | >

“It’s exciting to see the high efficiency and versatility of eePASSIGE, which could enable a new category of genomic medicines,” added Gao. “We also hope that it will be a tool that scientists from across the research community can use to study basic biological questions.”

Prime improvements

Many scientists have used prime editing to efficiently install changes to DNA that are up to dozens of base pairs in length, sufficient to correct the vast majority of known pathogenic mutations. But introducing entire healthy genes, often thousands of base pairs long, in their native location in the genome has been a long-standing goal of the gene-editing field. Not only could this potentially treat many patients regardless of which mutation they have in a disease-causing gene, but it would also preserve the surrounding DNA sequences, which would increase the likelihood that the newly installed gene is properly regulated, rather than expressed too much, too little, or at the wrong time.

Read more | >

In a groundbreaking discovery, the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) has presented data that directly challenges our current understanding of the universe. For years, cosmologists have pegged the universe’s age at approximately 13.8 billion years. Yet, the new JWST findings suggest that this may be a vast underestimation. But how has one telescope managed to disrupt such a long-held belief?

The universe’s secrets are vast, but none has been as puzzling as the presence of ‘impossible early galaxies’—so named due to their peculiar formation periods.

According to existing models, these galaxies, emerging during the cosmic dawn, roughly 500 to 800 million years post-big bang, shouldn’t have evolved disks and bulges so quickly. “It’s akin to seeing a toddler with the wisdom of an octogenarian,” says a scientist, explaining the paradox.

Read more | >

Navigating the frontiers of longevity: therapeutic plasma exchange and its implications.

Therapeutic plasma exchange (TPE) has emerged as a contentious longevity treatment, touted for its potential to rejuvenate the body.

In another effort to live longer, wealthy Silicon Valley-ites are ditching young blood for plasma exchange.

Continue reading “Bye-bye, blood boys; hello, plasma glow-up” | >

Company Awarded AFRL Contract to Investigate the Delivery of Five-to-Ten-Ton Capacity Containers Anywhere in the World in 90 Minutes

LOUISVILLE, Colo. – October 3, 2024 – Sierra Space, a leading commercial space company and defense-tech prime that is Building a Platform in Space to Benefit Life on Earth® and protect economic freedom in the Orbital Age®, announced today that it has been awarded a competitive, firm-fixed-price contract for the Rocket Experimentation for Global Agile Logistics (REGAL) program by Air Force Research Laboratory (AFRL). This new contract aims to revolutionize logistics and materiel returns from space, placing Sierra Space at the forefront of defense and space logistics innovation.

Earlier this year, the company unveiled its Sierra Space Ghost decelerator – a revolutionary logistics spacecraft designed for rapid payload return from Earth orbit – and shared the results of successful beta flight testing. The REGAL contract will support efforts to conceptually design and scale this new breakthrough technology, with the goal of landing critical supplies anywhere on the planet within 90 minutes.

Read more | >