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Category: biotech/medical

Anatomically accurate digital twin of 2-year-old’s brain uncovers neural signatures linked to autism

For decades, researchers have been trying to understand the biological roots of autism spectrum disorder (ASD), a common neurodevelopmental condition that shapes how people communicate, learn and interact with the world. One of the major hurdles is that the brain’s neural networks are extraordinarily complex. Existing models still lack the detail needed to capture both the brain’s structure and its dynamic activity in a unified manner.

In a recent study published in PLOS Digital Health, researchers created a new system called FEDE (high FidElity Digital brain modEl) that builds a digital twin, a detailed computer replica or virtual copy of a real-world object. In this study, it was a virtual copy of the brain of a 2-year-old child with ASD.

To build FEDE, researchers combined maps of the child’s brain structure obtained using MRI with mathematical modeling to create a digital brain that can simulate both how the brain is built and how it functions.

Graphene plasmon cavities enable advanced and scalable terahertz photodetectors

How could we noninvasively distinguish between healthy and cancerous tissue? And how could we increase the speed of wireless communications? These two seemingly unrelated questions may share the same answer: terahertz (THz) light. Spanning frequencies between 0.3 and 20 THz, THz light interacts with matter without causing damage and allows for faster data transfer than radio waves. It is thus ideal for advancing many applications in biomedicine and telecommunications, for which simple yet sensitive and fast detectors are needed.

The challenge, however, is enormous: When detectors are fast enough and operate at room temperature, they suffer from high noise levels; and when noise is minimized, some work only within a narrow frequency range and under cryogenic cooling, while others offer broadband operation but at much slower response times. Far from defeated, researchers keep seeking ways to develop the (close to) ideal THz detector—one that could potentially turn noninvasive melanoma diagnosis or high-speed wireless communication into a reality.

ICFO researchers Dr. Domenico De Fazio, Dr. Sebastián Castilla, Dr. Karuppasamy P. Soundarapandian, Dr. Simone Marconi, Riccardo Bertini and Dr. Roshan K. Kumar, led by ICREA Prof. Frank Koppens, together with Instituto de Nanociencia y Materiales de Aragón (INMA), Universidad de Zaragoza, University of Ioannina, Queen Mary University of London, University of Manchester and Catalan Institute of Nanoscience and Nanotechnology (ICN2), have now taken a step forward in that direction. The team designed a novel device based on monolayer graphene that, under liquid nitrogen cooling, emits a strong electric signal when struck by THz radiation. The results, published in ACS Photonics, open a route to build practical, tunable and selective THz detectors.

When the Virus Knows the Answer Before We’ve Asked the Question : How Scientists Are Learning to Forecast Pandemics Before They Happen

Climate change as the macro engine for viral emergence The BA.3.2 “Cicada” variant’s hidden evolution Yeast-display technology and viral forecasting Pan-coronavirus vaccine development at La Jolla Institute How conserved viral regions unlock universal defenses.

Scientists can now force a virus to evolve in a test tube — and predict a pandemic before it starts. Heliox explores the 2026 yeast-display breakthrough that reproduced Omicron’s exact mutations in just two generations, connects it to the climate-driven migration of bat populations worldwide, and asks: are we approaching the day when we vaccinate against a pandemic that hasn’t happened yet?

Blocking a female-only GABA signal that helps glioblastoma evade immunity may boost survival

Researchers have identified a critical biological difference in how glioblastoma develops in male and female laboratory models, pinpointing an immune pathway that fuels tumor growth only in females. The study shows that the neurotransmitter GABA boosts the cancer-protecting activity of immune cells in female models—but not male models—and that blocking that signal improved outcomes. The findings could one day lead to new drug targets and therapeutics specifically for women. The paper is published in the journal Nature Cancer.

Men and women experience many diseases very differently. Certain diseases present more commonly in one sex than in the other, some conditions may cause different symptoms in men and women, and some treatments work better—or not at all—for one sex over the other.

Cancer is no exception. There are major differences in male and female immune systems, and this system is critical both for cancer growth and for successfully becoming cancer-free. For example, some immunotherapies work better in men than in women, and vice versa.

An AAV variant selected through NHP screens robustly transduces the brain and drives secreted protein expression in NHPs and mice

Tecedor et al. used directed evolution to engineer AAVs with enhanced ependymal and brain delivery after injection into the cerebrospinal fluid. I think it would be interesting to try lumbar puncture delivery of these AAVs as well to see if they maintain decent biodistribution. (See my other post about Hinderer et al.’s paper: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.omtm.2020.04.012).

AAV capsid variants enriched for transduction of ventricular lining cells and brain parenchyma reduce the dose required for gene therapy to the CNS.

Exclusive: Janelia sunsets rodent work, launches transparent fish project

Wow, this is an interesting turn of events: Janelia launching a 10-year $1B effort to study the Danionella fish as a model organism for understanding the nervous system. (Note: this is different from zebrafish). I’m intrigued by the direction, but I also feel for those researchers at Janelia who had the rug pulled out from under them. It’s a tricky situation.

The Janelia Research Campus is launching two new projects: whole-brain imaging of a transparent fish called Danionella and an “AI-in-the-loop” tool to help parse all the imaging data, the facility announced last week.

As part of the change, Janelia is also shuttering two programs and plans to phase out projects that use rodent models, The Transmitter has learned. Janelia is funded by the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI), a private nonprofit biomedical research institution.

Investigators who run rodent labs have roughly three years to wrap up their projects and find new positions, and Janelia plans to provide each researcher with an additional $1 million in transition funding, says Gerald Rubin, head of biology and senior group leader at Janelia. The move does not affect external research funded by the HHMI, including the HHMI Investigators and Hanna H. Gray Fellows programs, Rubin adds.

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