Lifeboat Foundation

Researchers at Columbia Engineering have engineered probiotics to safely deliver immunotherapies within tumors. These include nanobodies against two proven therapeutic targets—PD-L1 and CTLA-4. The drugs are continuously released by bacteria and continue to attack the tumor after just one dose, facilitating an immune response that ultimately results in tumor regression. The versatile probiotic platform can also be used to deliver multiple immunotherapies simultaneously, enabling the release of effective therapeutic combinations within the tumor for more difficult-to-treat cancers like colorectal cancer. The study is published today in Science Translational Medicine.

Antibodies that target immune checkpoints, PD-L1 and CTLA-4, have revolutionized cancer immunotherapy treatments, achieving success in a subset of cancers. However, systemic delivery of these antibodies can also cause substantial side effects with high percentages of patients reporting adverse reactions. Furthermore, although combinations of these therapies are more effective than single therapy regimens, they also produce severe toxicities, sometimes leading to drug discontinuation. The team, led by Tal Danino, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, aimed to address these challenges.

“We wanted to engineer a safe probiotic vehicle capable of delivering immune checkpoint therapies locally to minimize side effects,” says Danino, who is also a member of the Herbert Irving Comprehensive Cancer Center and Data Science Institute. “We also wanted to broaden the versatility of the system by producing a range of immunotherapeutic combinations, including cytokines that could further elicit antitumor immunity, but are otherwise difficult to systemically deliver because of toxicity concerns.”

Yellowstone’s supervolcano won’t erupt anytime soon. Neither will other similar systems around the world. A new study says we’ll see many warning signs before a supervolcano erupts.

The hidden undersea continent of Zealandia underwent an upheaval at the time of the birth of the Pacific Ring of Fire.

Zealandia is a chunk of continental crust next door to Australia. It’s almost entirely beneath the ocean, with the exception of a few protrusions, like New Zealand and New Caledonia. But despite its undersea status, Zealandia is not made of magnesium- and iron-rich oceanic crust. Instead, it is composed of less-dense continental crust. The existence of this odd geology has been known since the 1970s, but only more recently has Zealandia been more closely explored. In 2017, geoscientists reported in the journal GSA Today that Zealandia qualifies as a continent in its own right, thanks to its structure and its clear separation from the Australian continent.

https://youtube.com/watch?v=OMxfffqyDtc

Last week, U.S. Senator Richard Blumenthal grilled wireless industry representatives, who admitted the industry has done ZERO health & safety studies on 5G technology. Meanwhile, dozens of independent studies indicates that 5G is a risk to all biological life. Watch the video above, on YouTube here, or on Facebook here.

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People who understand evolution are more likely to accept it, study shows. #DarwinDay

Our friends at Foresight Institute and 100 Plus Capital have started regular longevity salons to coordinate the growing longevity enthusiasm and onboard new investors into the space. You are invited to kick off this series with aperitifs and hors d’oeuvre to discuss the current innovations that have been fueling the recent optimism in the field:

Longevity Investment Take-Off: What’s Different This Time, What’s Missing?

As a friend of Lifespan.io, you are welcome to use the code lifespan.io for a 50% discount on the ticket price.

The Pueblo people created rock carvings in the Mesa Verde region of the Southwest United States about 800 years ago to mark the position of the sun on the longest and shortest days of the year, archaeologists now say.

Panels of ancient rock art, called petroglyphs, on canyon walls in the region show complex interactions of sunlight and shadows. These interactions can be seen in the days around the winter and summer solstices, when the sun reaches its southernmost and northernmost points, respectively, and, to a lesser extent, around the equinoxes — the “equal nights”— in spring and fall, the researchers said.

Mysterious-new-virus-unknown-origin-emerges-lake-Brazil.

Scientists have discovered a mysterious never-before-seen virus in a lake in Brazil and have named it after a mermaid who lured soldiers underwater to their death.

Continue reading “Scientists discover mysterious never-before-seen virus in Brazil” »