This can allow scientists to see fine features of objects such as tumors, or minute flaws within airplane wings in industrial testing, that may otherwise be unobservable due to an instrument's diffractive limit.
and training the body's own immune system to better fight cancer and infection. Now, results of a study led by Johns Hopkins investigators suggests that a device composed of a magnetic column paired with custom-made magnetic nanoparticles may hold a key to bringing immunotherapy into widespread and successful clinical use.
and rapidly multiplying immune system white blood cells known as T cells because of their potential as an effective weapon against cancer,
according to Jonathan Schneck, M d.,Ph d.,a professor of pathology, medicine and oncology at the Johns hopkins university School of medicine's Institute for Cell Engineering."
that we could use them as the basis of a therapy for cancer patients. We've taken a big step toward solving that problem,
and streamline immune cellular therapies, Schneck, Karlo Perica, a recent M d./Ph d. graduate who worked in Schneck's lab,
This process activates the T cells to ward off a virus, bacteria or tumor, as well as to make more T cells.
priming the T cells both to battle the target cancer and divide to form more activated cells.
humans with magnetic aapcs bearing antigens from tumors. They then ran the plasma through a magnetic column.
The tumor-fighting T cells bound to aapcs and stuck to the sides of the column,
which relies on other white blood cells called tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. Those cells are trained already"to fight cancer,
and researchers have shown some success isolating some of the cells from tumors, inducing them to divide,
and then transferring them back into patients. But, Schneck says, not all patients are eligible for this therapy,
because not all have tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes. By contrast, all people have naive T cells, so patients with cancer could potentially benefit from the new approach
whether or not they have tumor-infiltrating lymphocytes.""The aapcs and magnetic column together provide the foundation for simplifying
and streamlining the process of generating tumor-specific T cells for use in immunotherapy, "says Juan carlos Varela, M d.,Ph d,
. a former member of Schneck's laboratory who is now an assistant professor at the Medical University of South carolina.
The researchers found that the technique also worked with a mixture of aapcs bearing multiple antigens,
which they say could help combat the problem of tumors mutating to evade the body's defenses."
While the team initially tested the new method only on cancer antigens, Schneck says it could also potentially work for therapies against chronic infectious diseases, such as HIV.
He says that if further testing goes well, clinical trials of the technique could begin within a year and a half.##
This work was supported by the National Institute of Allergy and Infectious diseases (grant numbers AI072677 and AI44129),
the National Institute of General Medical sciences (grant number GM 07309), the National Cancer Institute (grant numbers CA 43460, CA 62924, CA 09243 and CA108835), the Troper Wojcicki
Foundation, the Virginia and D. K. Ludwig Fund for Cancer Research, the Sol Goldman Center for Pancreatic cancer Research,
safely release high doses in response to tumor secretions July 14th, 2015chemotherapeutic coatings enhance tumor-frying nanoparticles:
Duke university researchers add a drug delivery mechanism to a nanoparticle therapy already proven to target,
heat and destroy tumors July 13th, 2015super graphene can help treat cancer July 10th, 2015govt. -Legislation/Regulation/Funding/Policy Researchers Build a Transistor from a Molecule and A few Atoms July 14th, 2015world first:
Significant development in the understanding of macroscopic quantum behavior: Researchers from Polytechnique Montral and Imperial College London demonstrate the wavelike quantum behavior of a polariton condensate on a macroscopic scale and at room temperature July 14th, 2015nanospheres shield chemo drugs,
safely release high doses in response to tumor secretions July 14th, 2015better memory with faster lasers July 14th,
2015nanomedicine Agilent technologies and A*STAR's Bioprocessing Technology Institute Collaborate on New Bioanalytical Methodologies July 15th, 2015nanospheres shield chemo drugs,
safely release high doses in response to tumor secretions July 14th, 2015chemotherapeutic coatings enhance tumor-frying nanoparticles:
Duke university researchers add a drug delivery mechanism to a nanoparticle therapy already proven to target,
heat and destroy tumors July 13th, 2015magnetic hyperthermia, an auxiliary tool in cancer treatments July 8th, 2015discoveries For faster,
larger graphene add a liquid layer July 15th, 2015nanocrystalline Thin-film Solar cells July 15th, 2015better memory with faster lasers July 14th,
safely release high doses in response to tumor secretions July 14th, 2015globalfoundries Completes Acquisition of IBM Microelectronics Business:
Winner of the 2015 Lindros Award for translational medicine, Kjeld Janssen is pushing the boundaries of the emerging lab-on-a-chip technology July 7th, 201 0
They can also be used in medical and military industries. Ultrasonic bath has been used in the finishing process of the fabrics.
including medicine, electronics and energy. Discovered only 11 years ago, graphene is one of the strongest materials in the world, highly conductive, flexible, and transparent.
or pump liquids in miniature devices used for chemical analysis, said Dr. Carter Haines BS'11, Phd'15,
it is expected that an important step is taken in the development of nanotechnology in the field of medicine,
The bilayer structure blocks the injection of electrons into the sol-gel material providing low leakage current, high breakdown strength and high energy extraction efficiency."
and power conditioning for defense, medical and commercial applications. But it has been challenging to find a single dielectric material able to maximize permittivity, breakdown strength, energy density and energy extraction efficiency.
and the top aluminum layer to block charge injection into the sol-gel, "Perry explained."
"It's really a bilayer hybrid material that takes the best of both reorientation polarization and approaches for reducing injection and improving energy extraction."
New device offers clues (Nanowerk News) Why do some cancer cells break away from a tumor and travel to distant parts of the body?
A team of oncologists and engineers from the University of Michigan teamed up to help understand this crucial question.
Cancer becomes deadly when it spreads, or metastasizes. Not all cells have the same ability to travel through the body,
The differences in individual cancer cells are a key aspect of how cancer evolves becomes resistant to current therapies or recurs."
"A primary tumor is not what kills patients. Metastases are what kill patients. Understanding which cells are likely to metastasize can help us direct more targeted therapies to patients,
"says co-senior study author Sofia D. Merajver, M d.,Ph d.,scientific director of the breast oncology program at the University of Michigan Comprehensive Cancer Center.
The researchers believe this type of device might some day help doctors understand an individual patient's cancer.
Which cells in this patient's tumor are really causing havoc? Is there a large population of aggressive cells?
Are there specific markers or variants on those individual cells that could be targeted with treatment?"
"This work demonstrates an elegant approach to the study of cancer cell metastasis by combining expertise in engineering
"In this work, extensive studies were performed on cell lines representing various types of cancer. The new device was designed to trace how cells move, sorting individual cells by their movement.
and appearance under the microscope of metastatic cells and expressed significantly higher levels of markers associated with metastatic cancer."
"Understanding specific differences that lead some cancer cells to leave the primary tumor and seed metastases is of great benefit to develop
and even medicine. Now a team of Northwestern University researchers has found a way to print three-dimensional structures with graphene nanoflakes.
The fast and efficient method could open up new opportunities for using graphene printed scaffolds regenerative engineering and other electronic or medical applications.
assistant professor of materials science and engineering at Northwestern's Mccormick School of engineering and of surgery in the Feinberg School of medicine,
"Supported by a Google Gift and a Mccormick Research Catalyst Award, the research is described in the paper"Three-dimensional Printing Of high-Content Graphene Scaffolds for Electronic and Biomedical Applications","published in the April
so it could be used for biodegradable sensors and medical implants. Shah said the biocompatible elastomer
compact micro-actuators for aerospace, automobile, biomedical, space and robotics applications; and ultra-low thermal signature actuators for sonars and defense applications.
#Freshly squeezed vaccines (Nanowerk News) MIT researchers have shown that they can use a microfluidic cell-squeezing device to introduce specific antigens inside the immune systems B cells,
and implementing antigen-presenting cell vaccines. Such vaccines, created by reprogramming a patients own immune cells to fight invaders,
hold great promise for treating cancer and other diseases. However, several inefficiencies have limited their translation to the clinic,
and only one therapy has been approved by the Food and Drug Administration. While most of these vaccines are created with dendritic cells,
a class of antigen-presenting cells with broad functionality in the immune system, the researchers demonstrate in a study published in Scientific Reports("Ex Vivo Cytosolic Delivery of Functional Macromolecules to Immune Cells")that B cells can be engineered to serve as an alternative.
As cells pass through the Cellsqueeze device at high speed, narrowing microfluidic channels apply a squeeze that opens small, temporary holes in the cells'membranes.
As a result, large molecules antigens, in the case of this study can enter before the membrane reseals.
says Gregory Szeto, a postdoc at MITS Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research and the papers lead author.
A new vaccine-preparation approach Dendritic cells are the most naturally versatile antigen-presenting cells.
when for cell-based vaccines: They have a short lifespan, they do not divide when activated,
which has limited options for B-cell-based vaccine programming. Using Cellsqueeze circumvents this problem and by being able to separately configure delivery and activation,
researchers have greater control over vaccine design. Gail Bishop, a professor of microbiology at the University of Iowa Carver School of medicine and director of the schools Center for Immunology and Immune-Based Diseases, says that this paper presents a creative new approach with considerable
potential in the development of antigen-presenting cell vaccines. The antigen-presenting capabilities of B cells have often been underestimated,
but they are being appreciated increasingly for their practical advantages in therapies, says Bishop, who was involved not in this research.
This new technical approach permits loading B cells effectively with virtually any antigen and has the additional benefit of targeting the antigens to the CD8 T-cell presentation pathway
in this new study, demonstrates promise as a versatile platform for creating more effective cell-based vaccines.
Our dream is to spawn out a whole class of therapies which involve taking out your own cells, telling them what to do,
and putting them back into your body to fight your disease, whatever that may be, Sharei says.
Future steps The researchers say they now plan to refine their B-cell-based vaccine to optimize distribution and function of the immune cells in the body.
A b-cell-based approach could also reduce the amount of patient blood required to prepare a vaccine.
patients receiving cell-based vaccines must have drawn blood over several hours each time a new dose must be prepared.
and cost required to engineer cell-based vaccines. We envision a future system, if we can take advantage of its microfluidic nature,
you could do it in your hospital or your doctors office. As the biology and technology become further refined
and less expensive method for developing cell-based therapies for patients. Down the road, you could potentially get enough cells from just a normal syringe-based blood draw,
run it through a bedside device that has the antigen you want to vaccinate against, and then youd have the vaccine,
Szeto says s
#Nanotechnology helps protect patients from bone infection Leading scientists at the University of Sheffield have discovered nanotechnology could hold the key to preventing deep bone infections,
after developing a treatment which prevents bacteria and other harmful microorganisms growing. The pioneering research,
showed applying small quantities of antibiotic to the surface of medical devices, from small dental implants to hip replacements, could protect patients from serious infection.
Scientists used revolutionary nanotechnology to work on small polymer layers inside implants which measure between 1 and 100 nanometers.
Lead researcher Paul Hatton Professor of Biomaterials Sciences at the University of Sheffield, said: icroorganisms can attach themselves to implants
or replacements during surgery and once they grab onto a nonliving surface they are notoriously difficult to treat
which causes a lot of problems and discomfort for the patient. y making the actual surface of the hip replacement or dental implant inhospitable to these harmful microorganisms,
the risk of deep bone infection is reduced substantially. ur research shows that applying small quantities of antibiotic to a surface between the polymer layers
which make up each device could prevent not only the initial infection but secondary infection it is like getting between the layers of an onion skin.
Bone infection affects thousands of patients every year and results in a substantial cost to the NHS.
Treating the surface of medical devices would have a greater impact on patients considered at high risk of infection such as trauma victims from road traffic collisions or combat operations,
and those who have had previous bone infections. Professor Hatton added: eep bone infections associated with medical devices are increasing in number,
especially among the elderly. s well as improving the quality of life, this new application for nanotechnology could save health providers such as the NHS millions of pounds every year.
The study, funded by the European commission and the UK Engineering and Physical sciences Research Council, is published in Acta Biomaterialia("Functionalised nanoscale coatings using layer-by-layer assembly for imparting antibacterial properties to polylactide
Now, two groups of scientists are reporting for the first time that two new nucleotides can do the same thing--raising the possibility that entirely new proteins could be created for medical uses.
A Universal Surface-Enhanced Raman Spectroscopy Substrate for All Excitation Wavelengths"),the photonics advancement aims to improve our ability to detect trace amounts of molecules in diseases, chemical warfare agents, fraudulent
"The ability to detect even smaller amounts of chemical and biological molecules could be helpful with biosensors that are used to detect cancer, Malaria, HIV and other illnesses."
#Intelligent bacteria for detecting disease Another step forward has just been taken in the area of synthetic biology.
in association with Montpellier Regional University Hospital and Stanford university, have transformed bacteria into"secret agents"that can give warning of a disease based solely on the presence of characteristic molecules in the urine or blood.
The bacteria thus programmed detect the abnormal presence of glucose in the urine of diabetic patients.
published in the journal Science Translational Medicine("Detection of pathological biomarkers in human clinical samples via amplifying genetic switches
and are considered often to be our enemies, causing many diseases such as tuberculosis or cholera. However, they can also be witnessed allies,
Since the advent of biotechnology, researchers have modified bacteria to produce therapeutic drugs or antibiotics. In this novel study
Medical diagnosis is a major challenge for the early detection and subsequent monitoring of diseases.""In vitro"diagnosis is based on the presence in physiological fluids (blood and urine, for example) of molecules characteristic for a particular disease.
Because of its noninvasiveness and ease of use, in vitro diagnosis is of great interest. However, in vitro tests are sometimes complex,
and require sophisticated technologies that are often available only in hospitals. This is where biological systems come into play.
Living cells are real nanomachines that can detect and process many signals and respond to them.
in association with Professor Eric Renard (Montpellier Regional University Hospital) and Drew Endy (Stanford university), applied this new technology to the detection of disease signals in clinical samples.
The authors used the transcriptor's amplification abilities to detect disease markers, even if present in very small amounts.
and detected the abnormal presence of glucose in the urine of diabetic patients.""We have deposited the genetic components used in this work in the public domain to allow their unrestricted reuse by other public
"Our work is focused presently on the engineering of artificial genetic systems that can be modified on demand to detect different molecular disease markers,
In future, this work might also be applied to engineering the microbial flora in order to treat various diseases, especially intestinal diseases
Air pollution is the world largest single environmental health risk, causing one in every eight deaths according to figures released last year by the World health organization.
decades of exposure to only slightly higher levels a level we wouldn even notice can increase the risk of heart and lung diseases,
stroke and cancer. o work out the factors we should be worried about, and how we can intervene,
#New composite protects from corrosion at high mechanical stress (Nanowerk News) Material researchers at the INM Leibniz Institute for New Materials will be presenting a composite material
New composite protects from corrosion at high mechanical stress. This patented composite exhibits its action by spray application,
As a result, it can withstand high mechanical stress. The coating passes the falling ball test with a steel hemispherical ball weighing 1. 5 kg from a height of one meter without chipping
or other commonly used wet chemistry processes and cures at 150-200c. It is suitable for steels, metal alloys and metals such as aluminum, magnesium and copper,
New materials for energy application, new concepts for medical surfaces, new surface materials for tribological systems and nano safety and nano bio.
#Team develops transplantable bioengineered forelimb in an animal model (w/video) A team of Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators has made the first steps towards development of bioartificial replacement limbs suitable for transplantation.
"explains Harald Ott, MD, of the MGH Department of Surgery and the Center for Regenerative medicine, senior author of the paper."
Over the past two decades a number of patients have received donor hand transplants, and while such procedures can significantly improve quality of life,
they also expose recipients to the risks of lifelong immunosuppressive therapy. While the progenitor cells needed to regenerate all of the tissues that make up a limb could be provided by the potential recipient
the experience of patients who have received hand transplants is promising.""In clinical limb transplantation, nerves do grow back into the graft, enabling both motion and sensation,
The actuators are customizable to accommodate each patient's specific hand size and pathology. Image:
A team of undergraduate students also contributed to an early glove design as part of his ES227 Medical device Design Course.
which could help patients suffering from muscular dystrophy, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), incomplete spinal cord injury, or other hand impairments to regain some daily independence and control of their environment.
in relation to making it customizable for the specific pathologies of each individual and understanding what control strategies work best
"For patients suffering from muscular dystrophy, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), and incomplete spinal cord injury, the soft robotic glove could allow them to regain some of their daily independence through robotic gloveassisted hand functions.
Walsh and his team have also been aided in their work through key expertise from two other Wyss Core Faculty members George Whitesides, Ph d,
Down the road, the team is interested in developing the glove beyond an assistive device to a rehabilitation tool for various hand pathologies,
. who is also the Judah Folkman Professor of Vascular Biology at Harvard Medical school and Boston Children's Hospital and Professor of Bioengineering AT SEAS."
For the authors of the research, finding a nanothermometer sensitive enough at this scale is a great step forward in the field of nanotechnology, with applications in biology, chemistry, physics and even in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases s
#Injectable nanoelectronics for treatment of neurodegenerative diseases It's a notion that might be pulled from the pages of science-fiction novel-electronic devices that can be injected directly into the brain,
and treat everything from neurodegenerative disorders to paralysis. It sounds unlikely, until you visit Charles Lieber's lab. A team of international researchers, led by Lieber, the Mark Hyman, Jr.
would it be possible to deliver the mesh electronics by syringe needle injection, a process common to delivery of many species in biology and medicine-you could go to the doctor
and you inject this and you're wired up.'"'"Though not the first attempts at implanting electronics into the brain-deep brain stimulation has been used to treat a variety of disorders for decades-the nano-fabricated scaffolds operate on a completely different scale.
and administered like any other injection. After injection, the input/output of the mesh can be connected to standard measurement electronics
so that the integrated devices can be addressed and used to stimulate or record neural activity.""These type of things have never been done before, from both a fundamental neuroscience and medical perspective,
"Lieber said.""It's really exciting-there are a lot of potential applications.""Going forward, Lieber said, researchers hope to better understand how the brain
whose speed and precision make them useful for cataract and other eye surgeries. A femtosecond is one-quadrillionth,
reduce pollution-related health problems and eliminate emissions from the United states. There is very little downside to a conversion, at least based on this science."
such as viral disease markers, which appear when the immune system responds to incurable or hard-to-cure diseases,
including HIV, hepatitis, herpes, and many others. The sensor will enable doctors to identify tumor markers,
whose presence in the body signals the emergence and growth of cancerous tumors. The sensitivity of the new device is characterized best by one key feature:
according to its developers, the sensor can track changes of just a few kilodaltons in the mass of a cantilever in real time.
One Dalton is roughly the mass of a proton or neutron, and several thousand Daltons are the mass of individual proteins and DNA molecules.
So the new optical sensor will allow for diagnosing diseases long before they can be detected by any other method,
stretchy electronic sensors are also capable of detecting harmful levels of UV radiation known to trigger melanoma.
and shortening the time to market of medicines in order to fully exploit them before patents run out.
Researchers then created a prototype BOC to assess the toxicological risk of new candidate compounds
representing a liver, tumour, heart muscle and neurological system, and they developed early prototypes with six and eight compartments that the project demonstrated could be extended to human cell cultures. arly-stage backing from the EU has helped really us develop a robust prototype
The engineered organ has implications for everything from rapid production of immune therapies to new frontiers in cancer or infectious disease research.
Germinal centers are a sign of infection and are not present in healthy immune organs.
the organ could be used to study specific infections and how the body produces antibodies to fight those infections from Ebola to HIV. ou can use our system to force the production of immunotherapeutics at much faster rates,
he said. Such a system also could be used to test toxic chemicals and environmental factors that contribute to infections or organ malfunctions.
The process of B cells becoming germinal centers is understood not well, and in fact, when the body makes mistakes in the genetic rearrangement related to this process,
blood cancer can result. n the long run, we anticipate that the ability to drive immune reaction ex vivo at controllable rates grants us the ability to reproduce immunological events with tunable parameters for better mechanistic understanding of B cell development and generation of B cell tumors,
as well as screening and translation of new classes of drugs, Singh said g
#3d potential through laser annihilation (Nanowerk News) Whether in the pages of H g wells, the serial adventures of Flash gordon,
used in targeted surgeries, precision manufacturing and in the exploration of materials at the nanoscale.
The relationship between genes and specific traits is complicated more than simple one-to-one relationships between genes and diseases.
but scientists are just beginning to explore how, specifically, genetic variations affect health and disease. Two major statistical challenges to finding these connections involve analysing associations between many different genetic variants and multiple traits,
"But the simple models we use to do this are too simplistic to uncover the complex dependencies between sets of genetic variants and disease phenotypes."
and a favorable fracture behavior including self-healing ability. Key to the success are the supramolecular bonds within the soft polymer matrix.
but at substantial stress levels, the bonds can open up and provide fracture energy dissipation by stick/slip interactions and frictional sliding of the platelets against each other."
"These so-called sacrificial bonds allow full control over the material on different levels, because, depending on their amount,
"He said that makes it ideal for medical applications because the microrobotic tentacles can't damage tissues or even blood vessels.
#Smart insulin patch could replace injections for diabetes Painful insulin injections could become a thing of the past for the millions of Americans who suffer from diabetes, thanks to a new invention from researchers at North carolina State university and the University
painless patch could lower blood glucose in a mouse model of type 1 diabetes for up to nine hours.
More preclinical tests and subsequent clinical trials in humans will be required before the patch can be administered to patients,
A paper describing the work is published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. e have designed a patch for diabetes that works fast,
and the UNC Diabetes Care Center. he whole system can be personalized to account for a diabetic weight and sensitivity to insulin,
Diabetes affects more than 387 million people worldwide, and that number is expected to grow to 592 million by the year 2035.
Patients with type 1 and advanced type 2 diabetes try to keep their blood sugar levels under control with regular finger pricks and repeated insulin shots, a process that is painful and imprecise.
MD, Phd, co-senior author of the PNAS paper and the director of the UNC Diabetes Care Center, said,
njecting the wrong amount of medication can lead to significant complications like blindness and limb amputations,
or even more disastrous consequences such as diabetic comas and death. Researchers have tried to remove the potential for human error by creating losed-loop systemsthat directly connect the devices that track blood sugar
they had to figure out a way to administer them to patients with diabetes. Rather than rely on the large needles
The researchers tested the ability of this approach to control blood sugar levels in a mouse model of type 1 diabetes.
They gave one set of mice a standard injection of insulin and measured the blood glucose levels,
They also found that the patch did not pose the hazards that insulin injections do.
Injections can send blood sugar plummeting to dangerously low levels when administered too frequently. he hard part of diabetes care is not the insulin shots,
or the blood sugar checks, or the diet but the fact that you have to do them all several times a day every day for the rest of your life,
the director of the North carolina Translational and Clinical Sciences (NC Tracs) Institute and past president of the American Diabetes Association. f we can get these patches to work in people,
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