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In the new study, researchers instead aimed to reduce the amount of Nav1.7 that cells make in the first place. Bioengineer Ana Moreno and her colleagues at the University of California, San Diego, modified the “molecular scissors” of the gene editor CRISPR. Changes to the cutting enzyme Cas9 caused it to bind to DNA that makes Nav1.7 without slicing it, effectively preventing the Nav1.7 protein from being made. The researchers enhanced this silencing effect by hitching Cas9 to a repressor, another protein that inhibits gene expression.

The researchers tested the Cas9 approach—and a similar approach using another gene-editing protein known as a zinc finger—in mice given the chemotherapy drug paclitaxel, which can cause chronic nerve pain in cancer patients. The team measured pain by poking the animals’ paws with a thin nylon filament. Paclitaxel prompted mice to withdraw from gentler pokes, indicating that a normally nonpainful stimulus had become painful. But 1 month after an injection of the gene-silencing treatment into their spinal fluid, rodents responded much like mice that had never gotten paclitaxel, whereas untreated rodents remained hypersensitive, the team reports today in.

The approach could also prevent pain when given before paw injections of either the inflammation-causing compound carrageenan or a molecule called BzATP that increases pain sensitivity. And treated mice behaved no differently from untreated ones when their opposite paw—not inflamed by carrageenan—was exposed to a hot surface. That’s an encouraging initial sign that the injection didn’t silence Nav1.7 so completely that it creates a dangerous numbness to all pain, Moreno says. Behavioral tests so far haven’t turned up evidence of potentially concerning side effects; the injections didn’t appear to alter the animals’ movement, cognition, or anxiety levels.

A new book from Steve Jobs biographer Walter Isaacson offers an incisive portrait of the gene editing field that is changing modern medicine.

Materials capable of performing complex functions in response to changes in the environment could form the basis for exciting new technologies. Think of a capsule implanted in your body that automatically releases antibodies in response to a virus, a surface that releases an antibacterial agent when exposed to dangerous bacteria, a material that adapts its shape when it needs to sustain a particular weight, or clothing that senses and captures toxic contaminants from the air.

Scientists and engineers have already taken the first step toward these types of autonomous materials by developing “active” materials that have the ability to move on their own. Now, researchers at the University of Chicago have taken the next step by showing that the movement in one such active material—liquid crystals—can be harnessed and directed.

This proof-of-concept research, published on February 182021, in the journal Nature Materials, is the result of three years of collaborative work by the groups of Juan de Pablo, Liew Family Professor of Molecular Engineering, and Margaret Gardel, Horace B. Horton Professor of Physics and Molecular Engineering, along with Vincenzo Vitelli, professor of physics, and Aaron Dinner, professor of chemistry.

Researchers from the Polytechnic University of Valencia (UPV) have come up with and patented a new system for manufacturing beams that aims to revolutionize the architecture, construction and civil engineering sectors. They are manufactured with 3D-printed plastic pieces that can be assembled as if they were pieces of Lego adding a high-performance layer of concrete in the most compressed area.

Its advantages, according to its creators, are several: they weigh up to 80% less than concrete or metallic beams, which means that no heavy cranes or lorries are needed to carry and install them; they save time and money on labor and materials; and they can be printed and assembled in situ, which facilitates their installation anywhere, regardless of how difficult it is to reach. In addition to all of this, it uses recycled plastics as the raw material, giving a new life to this product and thus helping move towards more sustainable construction.

The development of these innovative beams is the result of almost three years of research. “Our goal was to propose an alternative to the current reinforced concrete beams. These are made using profiles built for the length of the piece, which requires expensive installation and are hard to transport,” says José Ramón Albiol, lecturer at the Higher Technical School of Construction Engineering (ETSIE) of the Polytechnic University of Valencia. Following numerous hours of tests and trials, the combination of 3D printing, plastics and concrete provided optimum results. And last October they patented the system.

Tissue engineering has long-depended on geometrically static scaffolds seeded with cells in the lab to create new tissues and even organs. The scaffolding material—usually a biodegradable polymer structure—is supplied with cells and the cells, if supplied with the right nutrients, then develop into tissue as the underlying scaffold biodegrades. But this model ignores the extraordinarily dynamic morphological processes that underlie the natural development of tissues. Now, researchers at the University of Illinois Chicago have developed new 4D hydrogels—3D materials that have the ability to change shape over time in response to stimuli—that can morph multiple times in a preprogrammed or on-demand manner in response to external trigger signals. In a new Advanced Science study, the UIC researchers, led by Eben Alsberg, show that these new materials may be used to help develop tissues that more closely resemble their natural counterparts, which are subject to forces that drive movement during their formation.

This is a detailed summary of plasma dilution and at 58:38 the future is explained where they will publish human results from 25 people, then start a company whose first order of business will be phase 3 trials with more people and placebo and hopefully funding. It appears you can pay to have the procedure. The hopeful start is this year in may.

Irina will present her recent findings on plasma dilution, showing that age-reversing effects, such as rejuvenating tissues in mice, can be achieved by.
diluting the blood plasma of old mice: Rejuvenation of three germ layers tissues by exchanging old blood plasma with saline-albumin.

Continue reading “Tissue Rejuvenation via Plasma Dilution | Irina Conboy, UC Berkeley” »

Code of the Wild (Documentary) at Hello Tomorrow in Paris.

www.codeofthewild.org to watch the trailer and explore the film.

Continue reading “The Future of Genetic Engineering — George Church” »

Muscle constitutes the largest organ in humans, accounting for 40% of body mass, and it plays an essential role in maintaining life. Muscle tissue is notable for its unique ability for spontaneous regeneration. However, in serious injuries such as those sustained in car accidents or tumor resection which results in a volumetric muscle loss (VML), the muscle’s ability to recover is greatly diminished. Currently, VML treatments comprise surgical interventions with autologous muscle flaps or grafts accompanied by physical therapy. However, surgical procedures often lead to reduced muscular function, and in some cases result in a complete graft failure. Thus, there is a demand for additional therapeutic options to improve muscle loss recovery.

A promising strategy to improve the functional capacity of the damaged muscle is to induce de novo regeneration of skeletal muscle via the integration of transplanted cells. Diverse types of cells, including satellite cells (muscle stem cells), myoblasts, and mesenchymal stem cells, have been used to treat muscle loss. However, invasive muscle biopsies, poor cell availability, and limited long-term maintenance impede clinical translation, where millions to billions of mature cells may be needed to provide therapeutic benefits.

Bonny Lemma. Originally published in the HIR Winter 2019 Issue.

Jennifer Lopez has one more industry to add to her illustrious résumé: molecular biology. In 2016, she was asked to be the executive producer of a new futuristic bio-crime drama for NBC called C.R.I.S.P.R. While that project is a work of science fiction, the CRISPR technology that it is based on is very real.

CRISPR, or Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short Palindromic Repeats, is not just a gene editing technique, but also a phenomenon that carries significant implications for the future of biotechnology. Therefore, the interactions between the countless players in this field and the objectives driving them are crucial to understanding of CRISPR and the promise it holds.