#Optical og Nosedeveloped to Detect Cancer, Other Diseases Researchers at the University of Adelaide in Australia are using optical spectroscopy to develop a quick,
noninvasive reath testthey believe will have the potential to screen for a variety of diseases, including diabetes, infections and cancers.
The research team, led by Dr. James Anstie, Australian Research Council (ARC) Research Fellow with the University Institute for Photonics and Advanced Sensing (IPAS), compared the instrument to an ptical dog nosewhich uses a special laser to measure the molecular content
of a sample of gas. ur device will use broadband cavity-enhanced frequency-comb spectroscopy to achieve sensitivities to molecular concentrations in the low parts-per-million,
which show that diseases like lung and oesophageal cancer, asthma and diabetes can be detected in this way,
even before external symptoms are showing. owever, Anstie told Bioscience Technology, ther conditions, although they have a clear molecular signature in the breath may be masked by the general complexity involved in getting a good repeatable sample.
That means Anstie team will need to work with medical researchers to improve sampling techniques, and improve the analysis of data coming out of the device,
which may one day allow them to be programmed to detect and ultimately treat diseases such as colon cancer and immune disorders.
with future applications that might include the early detection and treatment of inflammatory bowel disease or colon cancer.
and report on pathologies in the gut, including signs of bleeding or inflammation, the bacteria will need to remember this information and report it externally.
To enable them to do this, the researchers equipped B. thetaiotaomicron with a form of genetic memory.
and respond to signs of disease could also be used elsewhere in the body, he adds.
In addition, more advanced genetic computing circuits could be built upon this genetic toolkit in Bacteroides to enhance their performance as noninvasive diagnostics and therapeutics. or example,
and specificity when diagnosing disease with engineered bacteria, Lu said. o achieve this, we could engineer bacteria to detect multiple biomarkers,
or even in-situ synthesis of therapeutic molecules as and when they are needed. e
#Ultrasound Accelerates Skin Healing Especially for Diabetics and the Elderly Researchers from the University of Sheffield Department of Biomedical science discovered the ultrasound transmits a vibration through the skin
and wakes up cells in wounds helping to stimulate and accelerate the healing process. More than 200,000 patients in the UK suffer with chronic wounds every year at a cost of over £3. 1 billion to the NHS.
The ultrasound treatment, which also reduces the chance of wounds getting infected, is particularly effective
when treating diabetics and the elderly. There are 11 million over-65s, three million diabetics and 10 million smokers in the UK all of whom are likely to suffer problems with healing wounds.
A quarter of diabetics suffer from skin ulcers, particularly foot ulcers, due to the loss of sensation and circulation in the legs.
Lead author of the study Dr Mark Bass, from the University Centre for Membrane Interactions and Dynamics (CMIAD), said:
kin ulcers are excruciatingly painful for patients and in many cases can only be resolved by amputation of the limb. sing ultrasound wakes up the cells
and stimulates a normal healing process. Because it is just speeding up the normal processes,
the treatment doesn carry the risk of side effects that are associated often with drug treatments. he pioneering study,
which is published in The Journal of Investigative Dermatology, was carried out in collaboration with the School of Biochemistry at the University of Bristol, the Wound Biology Group at the Cardiff Institute of Tissue Engineering and Repair,
and the orthopaedic company, Bioventus LLC. Dr Bass added: ow that we have proven the effectiveness of ultrasound we need to explore the signal further.
We have found that the ultrasound signal we currently use is effective, but it is possible that by refining the treatment we could improve the effects even further. ecause ultrasound is relatively risk free we could expect to see it in broad clinical use within three or four years. ource:
The University of Sheffiel u
#Stem Cells Create Early Human Heart Development Model UC Berkeley researchers, in collaboration with scientists at the Gladstone Institutes, have developed a template for growing beating cardiac tissue from stem cells,
a senior investigator at the Gladstone Institute of Cardiovascular disease and a professor of medical genetics and cellular and molecular pharmacology at UC San francisco. his technology could help us quickly screen for drugs likely to generate cardiac birth defects,
Screening for drug toxicity To test the potential of the system as a drug-screening tool,
a drug known to cause severe birth defects. They found that at normal therapeutic doses the drug led to abnormal development of microchambers, including decreased size,
problems with muscle contraction and lower beat rates compared with heart tissue that had not been exposed to thalidomide. e chose drug cardiac developmental toxicity screening to demonstrate a clinically relevant application of the cardiac microchambers,
said Conklin. ach year, as many as 280,000 pregnant women are exposed to drugs with evidence of potential fetal risk.
The most commonly reported birth defects involve the heart, and the potential for generating cardiac defects is of utmost concern in determining drug safety during pregnancy.
and other UC Berkeley researchers publicly debuted a system of beating human heart cells on a chip that could be used to screen for drug toxicity.
cells along the edge experienced greater mechanical stress and tension, and appeared more like fibroblasts,
which is an imperfect model for human disease. The researchers pointed out that while this study focused on heart tissue,
#Immunotherapy Show Promise In fighting Blood Cancer In recent years, immunotherapy has emerged as a promising treatment for certain cancers.
genetically engineered to target tumors, has shown significant success against multiple myeloma, a cancer of the plasma cells that is largely incurable.
The results appeared in a study published online in Nature Medicine. Patients received an infusion of altered immune cells known as T-cells roughly 2. 4 billion of them after undergoing a stem cell transplantation of their own stem cells.
In 16 of 20 patients with advanced disease there was a significant clinical response. The scientists found that the T-cell therapy was tolerated generally well
and that modified immune cells traveled to the bone marrow, where myeloma tumors typically are showed found,
and a long-term ability to fight the tumors. Relapse was associated generally with a loss of the engineered T-cells. his study suggests that treatment with engineered T-cells is not only safe
but of potential clinical benefit to patients with certain types of aggressive multiple myeloma, says first author Aaron P. Rapoport, M d,
. the Gary Jobson Professor in Medical Oncology at the University of Maryland School of medicine. ur findings provide a strong foundation for further research in the field of cellular immunotherapy for myeloma to help achieve even better
results for our patients. he trial is published the first use of genetically modified T-cells for treating patients with multiple myeloma.
The approach has been used to treat leukemia as well as lymphoma, according to Dr. Rapoport, who is the Director of the Blood and Marrow Transplant Program at the University of Maryland Marlene and Stewart Greenebaum Cancer Center.
More than 77,000 people in the United states have multiple myeloma, with about 24,000 new cases diagnosed each year.
Patients are treated with chemotherapy and in many cases an autologous stem cell transplant but long-term response rates are low,
or didn have a complete response had periods of disease control that I believe they would not have experienced otherwise.
Dr. Rapoport and co-authors Edward A. Stadtmauer, M d.,of the University of Pennsylvania Abramson Cancer Center,
In the clinical study, patientst-cells were engineered to express an affinity-enhanced T-cell receptor (TCR) specific for a type of tumor antigen,
or protein, known as a cancer-testis antigen (CT antigen). The target CT antigens were NY-ESO-1
and LAGE-1. Up to 60 percent of advanced myelomas have been reported to express NY-ESO-1 and/or LAGE-1,
which correlates to tumor proliferation and poorer outcomes. According to Adaptimmune, the trial is published the first study of lentiviral vector mediated TCR gene expression in humans.
Of the 20 patients treated, 14 (70 percent) had a near complete or complete response three months after treatment.
Half the patients were treated at the University of Maryland Greenebaum Cancer Center and half at the University of Pennsylvania Abramson Cancer Center.
Researchers note that the response rate was better than would be expected for a standard autologous stem cell transplant.
which have been associated with another type of genetically engineered T-cells (chimeric antigen receptors, or CARS) used to treat other cancers.
The study was developed originally by Carl H. June, M d.,of the University of Pennsylvania Abramson Cancer Center,
and Dr. Rapoport, who have been research collaborators for 18 years. ultiple myeloma is a treatable but largely incurable cancer.
This study reveals the promise that immunotherapy with genetically engineered T-cells holds for boosting the body ability to attack the cancer
and provide patients with better treatments and control of their disease, said E. Albert Reece, M d..,Ph d.,MBA,
vice president for medical affairs at the University of Maryland and the John Z. and Akiko K. Bowers Distinguished Professor and dean of the University of Maryland School of medicine. his trial is also an excellent example of significant
scientific advances that result from collaborations between academic medical institutions and private industry. ource: University of Marylan n
#Uncovering the Spread of Bacteria in Pneumonia Northwestern Medicine scientists have discovered the role a toxin produced by a pneumonia-causing bacterium plays in the spread of infection from the lungs to the bloodstream in hospitalized patients. rior to this study,
it was a mystery how the bacteria escaped from the lungs into the bloodstream, said Alan Hauser, M d.,Ph d,
. professor in Microbiology-Immunology and Medicine-Infectious disease. hese findings lay the foundation for future studies to further understand the mechanisms for how the escape to the bloodstream occurs.
In a paper published in PLOS Pathogens Dr. Hauser and his team used a mouse model of Pseudomonas aeruginosa (PA) pneumonia to examine how the bacterium uses its secretion system to inject a toxin, called Exos, into cells.
Exos has previously been linked to a higher incidence of infections spreading to the blood. f we can understand this at a higher level of detail,
perhaps we will be able to design inhibitors that can be flushed into the bloodstream or the lung of a person who has PA pneumonia and block this process.
If we can block these processes, we may be able to prevent bacteria from disseminating to the bloodstream during pneumonia,
said Dr. Hauser, also a member of the Robert H. Lurie Comprehensive Cancer Center of Northwestern University.
They collaborated with the Center for Advanced Microscopy to use a novel imaging technique to identify cells injected with Exos.
Dr. Hauser also found that injection of the toxin occurred in specific regions which they labeled ields of cell injectionor FOCI. e got a surprising result,
Furthermore, they determined that increased FOCI size was associated with enhanced disruption of the barrier between the lungs and bloodstream and ultimately the spreading of the bacteria in to the blood. his injection of Exos results in breakdown of a barrier between the pulmonary space and the vascular space,
Next, Dr. Hauser plans to continue studying the mechanism of how Exos leads to the formation of FOCI. his research might have implications for other bacteria that frequently cause pneumonia
Scientists from the University of Nottingham in England have discovered a fully man-made substrate that could produce billions of human embryonic stem cells and move laboratory-based research to industrial-scale biomedicine.
Stem cells are being investigated to fight a number of diseases, and have even recently been considered as an option to treat mitochondrial disease,
as the Los angeles times reported. Morgan Alexander, professor of biomedical surfaces in the School of Pharmacy at the University of Nottingham
and Chris Denning, professor of stem cell biology in the School of medicine led the research project, iscovery of a Novel Polymer for Human Pluripotent Stem Cell Expansion and Multilineage Differentiation. he possibilities for regenerative medicine are still being reached in the form of clinical trials,
when those therapies are proved to be safe and effective. Potentially, the material could benefit clinical use in the treatment of the heart, liver and brain
#Treatment Failure in Parasite Infection Tied to Virustwo new studies explain why some parasite infections,
The findings, available online in The Journal of Infectious diseases, suggest that simple changes in current treatments could improve the lives of millions of people sickened by parasite infections. ur findings may mean that treatment for Leishmania infections could be improved significantly by determining
Beverley team focused on infections in Bolivia and Peru, while the other team, led by Catherine Ronet,
```Leishmaniasis is mainly spread by sand flies. Depending on the parasite species, symptoms of infection may include large skin lesions, fever, swelling of the spleen and liver,
and sometimes disfigurement and death. The virus carried by the parasite is called Leishmaniavirus, or LRV1.
In earlier research in animals, the scientists found that Leishmania causes more severe infections when the parasite is infected with LRV1.
Bolivia and Belgium examined data on 97 leishmaniasis patients. These were gathered through a project on drug resistance,
funded by the European commission and led by co-author Jean-Claude Dujardin, Ph d.,of the Institute of Tropical Medicine, Antwerp, Belgium. n Peru,
leishmaniasis is common in people who work in agriculture and forestry, said lead author Vanessa Adaui, Ph d,
and although infections typically are not fatal, they can lead to significant scarring, social stigmatization and economic loss. ll over the world,
treatment failure is a major obstacle to the control of infectious diseases like leishmaniasis, said Dujardin. t is of uppermost importance to understand the factors contributing to this failure to better tackle it.
The researchers found that treatment failed to cure more than 50 percent of patients with parasites infected with the LRV1 virus
. But the failure rate was only 24 percent in patients with parasites that were free of the virus. The standard treatment for leishmaniasis differs based on the parasite species that causes the infection
Parasites infected with the virus were harder to cure, he said. Based on the new research, it may be possible to develop clinical tests to identify virus-infected parasites.
The scientists are investigating how viral infection makes leishmaniasis more difficult to cure. According to Beverley, the parasites infected with the virus may be interacting with patientsimmune systems in a way that disrupts treatment.
Another, more likely possibility is that an increase in parasites spurred by the virus may make it more challenging for treatment to completely eliminate the parasites. number of other human parasites bear viral infections that are reminiscent of LRV1 in Leishmania,
#Software Turns Smartphones into Tools for Medical Research Jody Kearns doesn't like to spend time obsessing about her Parkinson's disease.
"The thing with Parkinson's disease is there's not much you can do about it, "she said of the nervous-system disorder,
but has no cure.""So when I heard about this, I thought, `I can do this.'"
'"Smartphone apps are the latest tools to emerge from the intersection of health care and Silicon valley,
and doctors together online, applying massive computing power to analyze DNA and even developing ingestible"smart"pills for detecting cancer.
Scientists overseeing the studies say the apps could transform medical research by helping them collect information more frequently and from more people, across larger and more diverse regions,
"said Dr. Michael Mcconnell, a Stanford university cardiologist, who's using an app to study heart disease."
"It's one thing that people have with them every day.""While the studies are in early stages,
in some cases, may be more reliable than a doctor's observations. These can be correlated with other health or fitness data and even environmental conditions, such as smog levels, based on the phone's GPS locater.
Google Inc. says it's developing a health-tracking wristband specifically designed for medical studies.
But if smartphones hold great promise for medical research experts say there are issues to consider
Apple had created previously software called Healthkit for apps that track iphone owners'health statistics and exercise habits.
and helping to democratize medicine, "Williams said in an interview. Apple launched its Researchkit program in March with five apps to investigate Parkinson's, asthma, heart disease, diabetes and breast cancer.
A sixth app was released last month to collect information for a long-term health study of gays and lesbians by the University of California,
a University of Rochester neurologist who's leading the Parkinson's app study called mpower.""Participating in clinical studies is often a burden,
Dorsey said that's more objective than a process still used in clinics, where doctors watch patients tap their fingers
and assign them a numerical score. Some apps rely on participants to provide data. Elizabeth Ortiz, a 48-year-old New york nurse with asthma, measures her lung power each day by breathing into an inexpensive plastic device.
She types the results into the Asthma Health app which also asks if she's had difficulty breathing or sleeping,
or taken medication that day.""I'm a Latina woman and there's a high rate of asthma in my community,
"said Ortiz, who said she already used her iphone"constantly"for things like banking and email."
and anyone else who suffers from asthma.""None of the apps test experimental drugs or surgeries.
Instead, they're designed to explore such questions as how diseases develop or how sufferers respond to stress, exercise or standard treatment regimens.
Stanford's Mcconnell said he also wants to study the effect of giving participants feedback on their progress,
or reminders about exercise and medication. In the future, researchers might be able to incorporate data from participants'hospital records,
Some studies will always require in-person interaction or supervision by a doctor, experts say. But by reaching more people and gathering more data, advocates say smartphone apps can help doctors answer more subtle questions about a disease."
"Diseases like asthma are complicated very. They're not caused by a single gene or environmental influence,"said Eric Schadt,
a genomics professor who's using an iphone app to study asthma at New york's Icahn School of medicine at Mount sinai."
"The only hope you have of really going further in resolving this disease is for researchers to get to more people
#In CRISPR Advance, Scientists Successfully Edit Human T cells In a project spearheaded by investigators at UC San francisco,
Because these immune-system cells play important roles in a wide range of diseases, from diabetes to AIDS to cancer, the achievement provides a versatile new tool for research on T cell function,
as well as a path toward CRISPR/Cas9-based therapies for many serious health problems. Using their novel approach,
a protein that has attracted intense interest in the burgeoning field of cancer immunotherapy, as scientists have shown that using drugs to block PD-1 coaxes T cells to attack tumors.
The CRISPR/Cas9 system has captured the imagination of both scientists and the general public, because it makes it possible to easily
are an obvious candidate for medical applications of the technology, as these cells not only stand at the center of many disease processes,
but could be gathered easily from patients, edited with CRISPR/Cas9, then returned to the body to exert therapeutic effects.
But in practice, editing T cell genomes with CRISPR/Cas9 has proved surprisingly difficult, said Alexander Marson, Ph d.,a UCSF Sandler Fellow,
There are a lot of potential therapeutic applications and we want to make sure wee driving this as hard as we can.
and medicine. t been great to be part of this exciting collaboration, and I look forward to seeing the insights from this work used to help patients in the future,
and eventually for therapeutic use. e tried for a long time to introduce Cas9 with plasmids or lentiviruses,
He hopes that Cas9-based therapies for T cell-related disorders, which include autoimmune diseases as well as immunodeficiencies such as ubble boy disease,
will enter the clinic in the future. here actually well-trodden ground putting modified T cells into patients.
There are companies out there already doing it and figuring out the safety profile, so there increasing clinical infrastructure that we could potentially piggyback on as we work out more details of genome editing,
Parkinson's disease May Begin In The Gut, Aarhus University Study A major epidemiological registry-based study from Aarhus University and Aarhus University Hospital indicates that Parkinson's disease begins in the gastrointestinal tract.
The study is the largest in the field so far. The chronic neurodegenerative Parkinson disease affects an increasing number of people.
However, scientists still do not know why some people develop Parkinson's disease. Now researchers from Aarhus University and Aarhus University Hospital have taken an important step towards a better understanding of the disease.
New research indicates that Parkinson's disease may begin in the gastrointestinal tract and spread through the vagus nerve to the brain."
"We have conducted a registry study of almost 15,000 patients who have had the vagus nerve in their stomach severed.
Between approximately 1970-1995 this procedure was a very common method of ulcer treatment. If it really is correct that Parkinson's starts in the gut and spreads through the vagus nerve,
then these vagotomy patients should naturally be protected against developing Parkinson's disease, "explains postdoc at Aarhus University Elisabeth Svensson on the hypothesis behind the study.
A hypothesis that turned out to be correct:""Our study shows that patients who have had the the entire vagus nerve severed were protected against Parkinson's disease.
Their risk was halved after 20 years. However, patients who had had only a small part of the vagus nerve severed where not protected.
This also fits the hypothesis that the disease process is strongly dependent on a fully or partially intact vagus nerve to be able to reach
The research project has just been published in the internationally recognised journal Annals of Neurology. The first clinical examination The research has presented strong evidence that Parkinson's disease begins in the gastrointestinal tract and spreads via the vagus nerve to the brain.
Many patients have suffered also from gastrointestinal symptoms before the Parkinson's diagnosis is made.""Patients with Parkinson's disease are constipated often many years before they receive the diagnosis,
which may be an early marker of the link between neurologic and gastroenterologic pathology related to the vagus nerve,"says Elisabeth Svensson.
Previous hypotheses about the relationship between Parkinson's and the vagus nerve have led to animal studies and cell studies in the field.
However, the current study is the first and largest epidemiological study in humans. The research project is an important piece of the puzzle in terms of the causes of the disease.
In the future the researchers expect to be able to use the new knowledge to identify risk factors for Parkinson's disease
and thus prevent the disease.""Now that we have found an association between the vagus nerve and the development of Parkinson's disease,
it is important to carry out research into the factors that may trigger this neurological degeneration,
so that we can prevent the development of the disease. To be able to do this will naturally be a major breakthrough,
"says Elisabeth Svensson. Facts Parkinson's disease is a chronic and neurodegenerative disease which affects approx. 1 out of every 1, 000 people.
The first signs of the disease are seen most often between the ages of 50-60.
The researchers carried out a registry study involving 14 883 patients who had undergone a vagotomy.
The research project was supported by the Danish Parkinson's disease Association and PROCRIN (Program for Clinical Research Infrastructure
#Disabled People Pilot A Robot Remotely With Their Thoughts, Ecole Polytechnique Federale de Lausanne Study Disabled People Pilot A Robot Remotely With Their Thoughts Using a telepresence system developed at EPFL,
19 people including nine quadriplegics were able to remotely control a robot located in one of the university laboratories.
This multi-year research project aims to give a measure of independence to paralysed people.
For someone suffering from paralysis or limited mobility, visiting with other people is extremely difficult.
was able to interact with whoever the robot crossed paths with. ach of the 9 subjects with disabilities managed to remotely control the robot with ease after less than 10 days of training,
Will robots soon become a fact of daily life for people suffering from a disability?
#Enriched Blood cells Preserve Cognition In Mice With Features Of Alzheimer's disease, Cedars-Sinai Medical center Study Enriched Blood cells Preserve Cognition In Mice With Features Of Alzheimer's disease Los angeles-July 6,
2015 Cedars-Sinai researchers have tested successfully two new methods for preserving cognition in laboratory mice that exhibit features of Alzheimer's disease by using white blood cells from bone marrow
and a drug for multiple sclerosis to control immune response in the brain. Under the two approaches, immune cells from outside the brain were found to travel in greater numbers through the blood into the brain.
The study showed measurable benefits in mice an encouraging step toward further testing of these potentially powerful strategies in human trials.
During the progression of Alzheimer's disease, these cells are found to be defective. In this study, the researchers discovered that immune cells infiltrating the brain from the blood effectively resisted various abnormalities associated with the condition."
"These cells appear to work in the brain in several ways to counter the negative effects associated with Alzheimer's disease,
"said Maya Koronyo-Hamaoui, Phd, assistant professor of neurosurgery and biomedical sciences at Cedars-Sinai, and the senior author of the article published in Brain, a journal of Oxford university Press."
"The increasing incidence of Alzheimer's disease and the lack of any effective therapy make it imperative to explore new strategies, especially those that can target multiple abnormalities in such a complicated disease,"Koronyo-Hamaoui added.
In Alzheimer's disease, a protein fragment known as amyloid-beta builds up at the synapses of neurons the point where neuron-to-neuron communication occurs.
As a result, synapses are lost and cognitive function becomes severely impaired. Immune cells in the brain that are exposed to increasing concentrations of the toxic protein fragment deteriorate
and lose their ability to attack and clear away the buildup. Over time these cells themselves go awry,
contributing to harmful inflammation and becoming toxic to the neurons. During the course of the disease, cells that support the brain's structure and function also fail at the cellular and molecular levels,
steadily impairing memory and learning functions. In efforts to boost an effective immune response, the Cedars-Sinai scientists have devised ways to"recruit"white blood cells known as monocytes from bone marrow to attack the protein fragments
The researchers evaluated two such methods and their therapeutic potential. In one, they extracted a specific type of monocytes from the bone marrow of healthy young mice
A second group of sick mice received weekly under-the-skin injections of glatiramer acetate,
an FDA-approved drug used for the treatment of multiple sclerosis; the drug has been shown to foster the migration of white blood cells from the bloodstream to the brain.
All three groups experienced a substantial decrease in Alzheimer's-like pathology and symptoms. The varied approaches were effective in"recruiting"protective monocytes to"lesion sites"in the brain,
removing protein fragments and reducing harmful inflammation through the secretion of chemicals that regulate immunity at the molecular level,
said Koronyo-Hamaoui, the head of Cedars-Sinai's neuroimmunology laboratory at themaxine Dunitz Neurosurgical Institute and a faculty member in the Department of Neurosurgery and Department of Biomedical sciences.
In this study glatiramer acetate was further found to profoundly affect monocytes'function, she added.""This study provides the evidence that a subgroup of unmodified monocytes,
the article's first author and a research associate in the Department of Neurosurgery. Koronyo added that the study gives unprecedented details about monocyte numbers migrating into brain lesion sites
and the compounds they secrete, and shows that the body's natural monocytes can have direct effects on the integrity of synapses.
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