#New genetic discovery advances understanding of prostate cancer A new and important genetic discovery, which sheds light on how prostate cancers develop
and spread, has been made by an international research team led by scientists at The University of Nottingham.
Prostate cancer is one of the most common cancers affecting men. In the UK about one in eight men will develop it at some point in their lives, with older men and those with a family history of prostate cancer most at risk.
It is not yet possible to accurately distinguish between'indolent'prostate cancers, which need little, if any treatment,
and'aggressive'cancers, which require intensive interventions. Now in new research published in Oncotarget, a multi-disciplinary team at Nottingham, Weill Cornell Medical school,
Lund University in Sweden and Copenhagen University in Denmark, have identified a significant gene called mir137 that is switched off in prostate cancer cells.
"With many men continuing to die from metastatic prostate cancer, there is an urgent need to develop new ways to enable the early identification of aggressive cancers
when such tumours remain localised within the prostate gland when surgery is most effective. We also need to make sure that men with indolent disease do not receive unnecessary treatment
which can lead to urinary continence and sexual dysfunction.""The researchers studied the role of androgens in prostate cancer.
Androgens are important signaling molecules, which play an essential role in men's health by driving the development, repair and regeneration of the prostate and other tissues.
However defective and amplified androgen signaling can trigger prostate cancer and its spread. For this reason, many available prostate cancer treatments are aimed at blocking androgen signaling.
However, resistance to such therapies is a major clinical challenge. The gene identified by the team,
called mir137, is switched off in prostate cancer cells. It functions like a'dimmer switch'in normal cells to reduce androgen signaling.
In prostate cancer where mir137 is switched off, the effect of androgen signaling is increased. Therefore the loss of mir137 leads to enhanced androgen signaling which contributes to prostate cancer initiation and progression.
The study has identified also many new potential targets for the next generation of drugs to treat prostate cancer.
New research is now underway in the Mongan's laboratory at Nottingham to test the effect of various pharmacological treatments in preclinical prostate cancer studies
#Study finds how Alzheimer's-associated protein tangles spread through the brain Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators have discovered a mechanism behind the spread of neurofibrillary tangles-one of the two hallmarks of Alzheimer's disease-through the brains
of affected individuals. In a report that has been released online in the journal Nature Communications, the research team describes finding that a particular version of the tau protein,
while extremely rare even in the brains of patients with Alzheimer's disease, is able to spread from one neuron to another
and how that process occurs.""It has been postulated that tangles-the abnormal accumulation of tau protein that fills neurons in Alzheimer's disease-can travel from neuron to neuron as the disease progresses,
spreading dysfunction through the brain as the disease progresses. But how that happens has been uncertain,
"says Bradley Hyman, MD, Phd, director of the MGH Alzheimer's disease Research center and senior author of the report."
"Our current study suggests one mechanism at play is that a unique and rare type of tau has the properties we were looking for-it is released from neurons,
Several 2013 studies from Hyman's group and others showed the movement of a mutant form of tau between brain structures and resultant neurodegeneration in a mouse model.
indicating that once a certain amount of the pathologic version of the protein has been taken up,
and uptake of this form of tau is an important step in the spread of disease from one brain region to another,
"says Hyman, the John Penny Professor of Neurology at Harvard Medical school.""Since that spread likely underlies clinical progression of symptoms,
targeting the mechanisms of the spreading might hold promise to stabilize disease
#Manipulating cell signaling for better muscle function in muscular dystrophy Every heart beat and step in our daily lives is dependent on the integrity of muscles
and the proteins that keep them strong and free of injury as they contract and relax.
Researchers at the University of Michigan Health System have identified a new way of triggering the instructions normally given by the muscle protein dystrophin,
Their study published online ahead of print in PNAS Early Edition suggests a new therapeutic strategy for patients with Duchene muscular dystrophy
and the impaired nnos function that is seen in muscular dystrophy, "says Michele, senior study author and professor of molecular & integrative physiology and internal medicine at the University of Michigan."
For the study, the team activated AMPK signaling with drugs that have been used medically to protect heart tissue during surgery
the nnos activity that is reduced in muscular dystrophy was restored. The drug worked by bypassing the defective steps in the protein complex pathway,
Still the study is"an important first step to show that manipulating AMPK-nnos signaling at least has the potential to help muscle function in muscular dystrophy"
says Michele whose lab at the University of Michigan Cardiovascular Research center focuses on inherited forms of skeletal and cardiac diseases.
Their work was supported by funding from the Muscular dystrophy Association and the National institutes of health, along with funding from the U-M Cardiovascular Translational Research and Entrepreneurship training program.
Dilated cardiomyopathy is a leading cause of death for those with DMD. Other researchers have started investigating the possibility that phosphodiesterase inhibitors,
Drugs tested by the U-M appear to correct the signaling pathway that is disrupted in muscular dystrophy at an earlier step than the phosphodiesterase inhibitors s
genetics and disease diagnosis. But carrying out such analyses requires expensive lab equipment, making its application out of reach for many people who live in resource-limited places.
After only a 10-minute run, the device could detect the Hepatitis b virus in blood serum at a level low enough to flag an early-stage acute infection,
However, fields such as medicine or controlled catalysis call for more precise distribution in order to achieve the greatest possible efficiency of the active agent.
Future applications of such a DNA walker might include a cancer detector that could roam the human body searching for cancerous cells
constantly computing whether a cancer is present.""More immediate practical applications may include deploying the DNA walker in the body
and targeted by doctors. There also may be implications for future delivery of nanoscale therapeutics. Although it may be a long march from diagnosing cancer to curing it,
"All breakthroughs begin with baby steps. Only in this case, they are the steps of a DNA walker,
"said co-author Jung. The walker is made from a single piece of DNA with two legs connected by a torso.
Their new approach created the first-ever flexible Fresnel zone plate microlenses with a wide field of view--a development that could allow everything from surgical scopes to security cameras to capture a broader perspective at a fraction of the size required by conventional lenses.
Their new approach created the first-ever flexible Fresnel zone plate microlenses with a wide field of view--a development that could allow everything from surgical scopes to security cameras to capture a broader perspective at a fraction of the size required by conventional lenses.
which to test viruses and vaccines. Professor Waterhouse made the discovery while tracing the history of the Pitjuri plant
which to test viruses and vaccines.""This plant is the'laboratory rat'of the molecular plant world,
"We have discovered that it is the plant equivalent of the nude mouse used in medical research.""
or sterile growing environments where plants were protected from disease --and space was an intriguing option."
So just as nude mice can be really good models for cancer research, 'nude'versions of crop plants could also speed up agricultural research,
which to make antibodies for pharmaceutical use e
#Researchers develop deep-learning method to predict daily activities Researchers from the School of Interactive Computing
and Ear/Harvard Medical school and Boston University have prevented successfully the development of Parkinson's disease in a mouse using new techniques to deliver drugs across the naturally impenetrable blood-brain barrier.
Their findings, published in Neurosurgery, lend hope to patients around the world with neurological conditions that are difficult to treat due to a barrier mechanism that prevents approximately 98 percent of drugs from reaching the brain and central nervous system."
"We are developing a platform that may eventually be used to deliver a variety of drugs to the brain,
"Although we are currently looking at neurodegenerative disease, there is potential for the technology to be expanded to psychiatric diseases, chronic pain,
seizure disorders and many other conditions affecting the brain and nervous system down the road.""Using nasal mucosal grafting,
a known therapeutic protein for treating Parkinson's disease, to the brains of mice. They showed through behavioral
and histological data capture that their delivery method was equivalent to direct injection of GDNF-the current gold standard for delivering this drug in Parkinson's disease despite its traumatic nature and high complication rates-in diffusing drugs to the brain.
because the therapy has been shown to delay and even reverse disease progression of Parkinson's disease. Nasal mucosal grafting is a technique regularly used in the ENT field to reconstruct the barrier around the brain after surgery to the skull base.
ENT surgeons commonly use endoscopic approaches to remove brain tumors through the nose by making a window through the blood-brain barrier to access the brain.
Once they have finished the treatment, they use adjacent nasal lining to rebuild the hole in a permanent and safe way.
with the nasal lining protecting the brain from infection just as the blood brain barrier has done. Dr. Bleier saw an opportunity to apply these techniques to the widespread clinical dilemma of delivering drugs across the barrier to the brain and central nervous system.
surgeons may create a"screen door"to allow for drug delivery to the brain and central nervous system. The technique has the potential to benefit a large population of patients with neurodegenerative disorders,
where there remains a specific unmet need for blood-brain penetrating therapeutic delivery strategies.""We see this expanding beyond Parkinson's disease,
as there are multiple diseases of the brain that do not have good therapeutic options, "Dr. Bleier said."
"It is a platform that opens doors for new discovery and could enable drug development for an underserved population."#
"##The study was supported by a grant from the Michael j fox Foundation for Parkinson's Research and represents a collaborative effort between Mass.
Eye and Ear clinicians and scientists are driven by a mission to find cures for blindness, deafness and diseases of the head and neck.
developing new treatments and cures through discovery and innovation. Mass. Eye and Ear is a Harvard Medical school teaching hospital and trains future medical leaders in ophthalmology and otolaryngology, through residency as well as clinical and research fellowships.
Internationally acclaimed since its founding in 1824, Mass. Eye and Ear employs full-time, board-certified physicians who offer high-quality
U s. News & World Report's"Best Hospitals Survey"has ranked consistently the Mass. Eye and Ear Departments of Otolaryngology and Ophthalmology as top in the nation n
#Breakthrough to the development of energy saving devices for the next generation Wide-gap semiconductors such as gallium nitride (Gan) are used widely for optical devices such as blue LED
000 Americans are on the waiting list to receive a heart transplant. With failing hearts, these patients have no other options;
which transplants are no longer necessary to repair damaged organs.""We've been able to take MRI images of coronary arteries and 3-D images of embryonic hearts and 3-D bioprint them with unprecedented resolution and quality out of very soft materials like collagens,
Feinberg leads the Regenerative Biomaterials and Therapeutics Group, and the group's study was published in the October 23 issue of the journal Science Advances.
"We should expect to see 3-D bioprinting continue to grow as an important tool for a large number of medical applications."
Quantum entanglement is a phrase more likely to be heard on popular sci-fi television shows such as"Fringe"and"Doctor Who."
#Colorado river is contaminated after mine cleanup goes wrong Workers from an environmental protection team have caused accidentally an environmental disaster releasing millions of litres of toxic wastewater into a river in Colorado.
and other medical devices have been pumped out of 3d printers, but never before has the technology proven so integral to the production of a pill.
Doctors would also have the option of adjusting doses as they like, rather than relying on drug makers to provide a pill in one dose or another.
Otherwise, hey, better medical technology thanks to 3d printing is good for everyone o
#This new high-power diamond laser can cut steel Although lasers based on diamond have been around around for several years,
Researchers propose to do this by making the plants better at handling stress. Now I know what you might be thinking tress limate changeit sounds like it time to call the plant acupuncturist.
when the plant detects stress. Beneath this superficially crude mechanism lie untold layers of regulatory nuance.
and nourish stem cells bound for injection and differentiation into heart muscle cells. It used rats with damaged hearts
e-muscularizingthe area and fixing the characteristic damage of a heart attack. The hydrogel worked like a charm;
compared with just 12%survival while suspended in a normal injection fluid. Prior studies using stem cell injection have had to resort to specialized version of cells or cell components,
or just injecting incredible numbers of the cells, but both of these approaches are costly, time consuming,
compared with just 8%for regularly stem cell therapies. The team did not invent a treatment for this heart disease,
but a booster pack that lets a preexisting treatment really kick into high gear. It can support both adult and embryonic stem cells
This comes soon after a separate team from Harvard university announced their porous hydrogel could also achieve huge increases in the effectiveness of stem cell therapies.
and biomedical engineers are even looking into using them as a bio-safe internal optical network.
#A possible broad spectrum cancer cure is in the offing, but human trials could be up to 4 years away For almost
cancer has been nipping at our heelsnd brains, stomachs, kidneys, and so on. The fossil record indicates humanity embittered relationship with the disease extends even to prehistoric times.
Over the centuries, cancer has proven a most intractable foe. One reason for this is that cancer is a big family, with numerous subtypes and categories,
a veritable medusa head which immensely complicates finding a universal cure. A remedy for one cancer is no guarantee that it will work against another type of cancer.
Worse the treatments that work against multiple types of cancer like chemotherapy and radiation are often so harsh and hazardous that doctors hesitate to prescribe them.
Badly needed is a broad spectrum cancer cure that doesn ruin the human body in the process.
Thanks to a research group studying malaria, such a cure now looks to be in the offing.
The story of this accidental discovery is important as much for what it says about the scientific process as the treatments it promises.
The researchers, a group of Danish scientists from the University of Copenhagen and the University of British columbia
were studying a malaria vaccine for pregnant women when they stumbled across what appears to be broad spectrum cancer cure in the form of a modified malaria strain.
The story is not without a heavy dose of irony, one of mankind oldest foes,
the Malaria virus, may contain the mechanism for curing an even worse nemesis cancer. Ali Salanti, a researcher behind the possible cancer cureor decades, scientists have been searching for similarities between the growth of a placenta
and a tumor, says Ali Salanti, who headed up one of the teams responsible for the discovery. he placenta is an organ,
which within a few months grows from only a few cells into an organ weighing approximately two pounds,
and it provides the embryo with oxygen and nourishment in a relatively foreign environment. In a manner of speaking, tumors do much the same;
they grow aggressively in a relatively foreign environment. hile studying the placenta, Ali Salanti noticed that a carbohydrate the malaria parasite attaches itself to in the placenta of pregnant women is identical to a carbohydrate found in many cancers.
It was but a small step from there to modifying a malaria strain, so that when it comes in contact with a cancer cell,
it injects a toxin that destroys the cell. In this manner, the scientists believe they have created effectively a method for identifying a wide range of cancerous cells in the body
and eliminating them. So far several rounds of animal tests have borne out their hypothesis, and a company called VAR2 Pharmaceuticals has been spun out of this research to bring the therapy to market.
Despite what looks like rapid progress, it could take roughly four years before human trials begin.
Aside from the obvious tremendous benefit that would come from a broad spectrum cancer cure, these developments highlight another nemesis to human health:
With 7. 6 million people dying of cancer a year, in the four years it will likely take to bring this cancer treatment to market,
this discovery of potential broad spectrum cancer cure would seem to make it r
#Big data driving market disruption, leaving many organizations fearing irrelevance: Study A global report by Capgemini, provider of consulting, technology and outsourcing services, in partnership with EMC Corporation, reveals that amid the market disruption being driven by Big data,
the device could have applications in voice-command electronics, medical sensing devices that use waves, like ultrasound,
and hearing aids and cochlear implants. The proof-of-concept device looks a bit like a thick, plastic, pie-shaped honeycomb split into dozens of slices.
and obesity While it has been suggested long that gut microbiota disturbances are involved in inflammatory bowel disease (IBD), obesity and metabolic syndrome,
the new findings suggest emulsifiers might be partially responsible for this disturbance and the increased incidence of these diseases.
and metabolism, finding that relatively low-level concentrations of the emulsifiers resulted in distinct alterations to the gut microbial ecosystem (microbiota) and led to low-grade inflammation and the onset of metabolic syndrome.
the research team reported that the emulsifier-induced metabolic syndrome was associated with microbiota encroachment, altered species composition and increased pro-inflammatory potential.#
#Moreover, they suggest that the broad use of emulsifying agents might be contributing to an increased societal incidence of obesity/metabolic syndrome and other chronic inflammatory diseases.##
""The dramatic increase in these diseases IBD, obesity and metabolic syndrome#has occurred despite consistent human genetics, suggesting a pivotal role for an environmental factor,
"Chassaing and his colleagues theorised that emulsifiers might affect the gut microbiota to promote these inflammatory diseases
These changes in bacterial expression triggered chronic colitis in mice genetically prone to this disorder,
or mild intestinal inflammation and metabolic syndrome, characterized by increased levels of food consumption, obesity, hyperglycemia and insulin resistance.
Who also showed that transplant of the microbiota from emulsifiers-treated mice to germfree mice was enough to transfer some parameters of low-grade inflammation and metabolic syndrome.
it would indicate a role for the food additive in driving the epidemic of obesity, its interrelated consequences and a range of diseases associated with chronic gut inflammation,
said the authors. While detailed mechanisms underlying the effect of emulsifiers on metabolism remain under study,
and metabolic syndrome,"said Andrew Gewirtz, senior author of the study.##Rather, our findings reinforce the concept suggested by earlier work that low-grade inflammation resulting from an altered microbiota can be an underlying cause of excess eating."
10.1038/nature14232#Dietary emulsifiers impact the mouse gut microbiota promoting colitis and metabolic syndrome#Authors: Benoit Chassaing, et a e
labelling, injury, sanitation and wasted raw ingredients. Increasing automation in the workplace can significantly help reduce many of these issues, with the newest generation of technologies such as lightweight robots capable of improving processes for food manufacturers.
The freeing up of employees from repetitive tasks can also help reduce costs related to worker accident and injury.
In the United states as many as 65 percent of all food factory workers had experienced injury while working on the job.
Costs related to worker injury are considerable. In addition to injury pay, they can also have a direct impact on insurance premiums, lost labour and production interruption as well as the distress of a valued team member.
Lightweight robots now have many built-in features to ensure they can work safely side-by-side with factory workers.
Alternately, riders prone to the malady could always take anti-nausea medications, though this is not a particularly practical solution for various reasons.
#3 Technology Trends Transforming Health care By Mahek Shah, MDTHE health care industry has always been changing,
but what is different about our industry now is that the pace of change has sped up.
For example, athenahealth was able to push Ebola-related patient travel history questions to its EHR athenaclinicals within an hour of the media frenzy over a Dallas hospitals inability to treat Ebola patient Thomas Duncan.
as a result of the hospital sending him home first. Traditional software implementations are just not capable of pushing seamless updates in near real-time like cloud-based EHRS can.
enabling doctors to concentrate more on what they do best: practice medicine and improve the quality of life for patients.
These other services create a better experience for both patient and provider. The cloud-based EHR field is crowded;
Imagine a diabetics biochip detecting blood glucose levels within personalized parameters, and then initiating appropriate, immediate,
We are in the early innings of the wearable game in health care as the Apple Apple Watch demonstrated;
Imagine a diabetics biochip detecting blood glucose levels within personalized parameters, and then initiating appropriate, immediate,
Sensors will soon provide doctors valuable feedback for a range of chronic conditions: a pacemakers use in heart arrhythmias, efficacy (or side effects) of prescribed medications,
and dosing compliance, including chemotherapy. These devices represent the possibility of consumerization within health care. Patient-centric devices beyond just smartphones or even watches will help not only awarenes,
but more importantly personal control of health. They will create a progressive model of care, in which health care institutional involvement whether hospital, clinic,
or doctors office occurs at later stages when most needed. This will lead to both financial and time savings for consumers and providers,
as well as a better health care experience. Big data analytics & Patient Access Analytics will provide valuable insights in operations and more importantly
at the point of care. But analytics alone won't be a panacea unless organizations and providers must also have more robust patient access tools.
whereby algorithms and other powerful digital technologies become an essential tool in the doctor's toolkit.
hospitals and chip makers, to name two, and even the U s. Department of defense. Central to the concept of onsite generation that links with microgrids is energy storage,
#Can Apple And IBM Change Health care? Five Big Questions Today, at a glitzy press conference at IBM new Watson headquarters in Manhattan swank Silicon Alley, IBM IBM and Apple Apple announced that they are partnering with Japan Post,
which already has a massive Big data-style collection of health care information, to both know more about its customers
including medical appointments. These workers will bring the senior citizen an ipad, and sit with them
The app will remind patients to take their medicines (the fictional anecdote used by IBM executives to explain that used a woman who kept forgetting her blood pressure medicine
The executives didn mention any telemedicine component where patients could directly connect with doctors or nurses,
but it easy to imagine one. The customers won pay for the ipad, although there may be a nominal fee for the service,
That depends on whether patients can really be sure that a company they trust (like Apple) can protect their data from one they probably don (any company in U s. health care.
the patient high blood pressure would mean that getting her to take her medicine more often would improve her life.
As Cook noted, the U s. health care market is fragmented. No insurance company here has the reach that Japan Post does.
including one related to home health care that is being done by Express Scripts Express Scripts. Will this work?
IBM and Apple deserve huge congratulations for the way they are taking on the problem of improving health care for seniors especially
since it is a problem health care companies are failing to solve. This is a big deal.
It very possible, maybe even likely, that an ipad giveaway program, paired with the right apps, could make senior citizens with chronic health problems healthier and more independent.
#Medical marijuana Sparks New Technology The emerging cannabis industry has created not only thousands of new jobs, it has also given birth to a new technology niche.
The low hanging fruit was the copy cat web design for internet cannabis sites based on already popular traditional internet sites.
and Weedmaps is the rouponof cannabis with its daily deals. Weedhire is the equivalent of Monster. com for its marijuana jobs.
government agencies have also been challenged with meeting the specific requirements of complicated cannabis legislation. Since each state is unique in its regulations,
It was one of only a handful of American companies at the World Cannabis Conference in Spain.
NIC targets the government as its client in the cannabis space. It specializes in helping the government agencies tasked with creating a marijuana department.
but in January it moved to the Department of health where NIC implemented a new system that doctors
Product testing is another cannabis hot button issue. In the early months of retail marijuana in Colorado, customers became confused as to how much THC was in the product they bought.
Amercanex is creating a cannabis commodity exchange with the plan for a futures market. Not unlike the other commodities exchange, this platform will allow cannabis farmers to lock in prices for their crops
and for buyers to secure their inventory. Steve Janjic, CEO of Amercanex said his company is looking ahead to
He said the problem with the cannabis tech companies is a lack of access to institutional money.
Banking is another problem for the cannabis industry causing businesses to become very creative in order to process transactions.
if Bank of america decides cannabis won get them in trouble with the Feds. In the meantime these new companies aren letting any grass grow beneath their fee t
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