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Summary: A new genetic engineering strategy significantly reduces levels of tau in animal models of Alzheimer’s disease. The treatment, which involves a single injection, appears to have long-last effects.

Source: Mass General.

Researchers have used a genetic engineering strategy to dramatically reduce levels of tau–a key protein that accumulates and becomes tangled in the brain during the development of Alzheimer’s disease–in an animal model of the condition.

The Research Group on Synthetic Biology for Biomedical Applications at Pompeu Fabra University in Barcelona, Spain, has designed a cellular device capable of computing by printing cells on paper. For the first time, they have developed a living device that could be used outside the laboratory without a specialist, and it could be produced on an industrial scale at low cost. The study is published in Nature Communications and was carried out by Sira Mogas-Díez, Eva Gonzalez-Flo and Javier Macía.

We currently have many electronic devices available to us such as computers and tablets whose computing power is highly efficient. But, despite their power, they are very limited devices for detecting biological markers, such as those that indicate the presence of a disease. For this reason, a few years ago ‘biological computers’ began to be developed—in other words, living cellular devices that can detect multiple markers and generate complex responses. In them, the researchers leverage biological receptors that allow detecting exogenous signals and, by means of synthetic biology, modify them to emit a response in accordance with the information they detect.

So far, cellular devices have been developed that must operate in the laboratory, for a limited time, under specific conditions, and must be handled by a specialist in molecular biology. Now, a team of researchers from Pompeu Fabra University has developed new technology to ‘print’ cellular devices on paper that can be used outside the laboratory.

Research papers come out far too rapidly for anyone to read them all, especially in the field of machine learning, which now affects (and produces papers in) practically every industry and company. This column aims to collect some of the most relevant recent discoveries and papers — particularly in but not limited to artificial intelligence — and explain why they matter.

This week brings a few unusual applications of or developments in machine learning, as well as a particularly unusual rejection of the method for pandemic-related analysis.

Continue reading “Deep science: AI is in the air, water, soil and steel” »

The regeneration of damaged central nervous system (CNS) tissues is one of the biggest goals of regenerative medicine.

Most stroke victims don’t receive treatment fast enough to prevent brain damage. Scientists at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, College of Engineering and College of Medicine have developed technology to “retrain” cells to help repair damaged brain tissue. It’s an advancement that may someday help patients regain speech, cognition and motor function, even when administered days after an ischemic stroke.

Engineering and medical researchers use a process created by Ohio State called tissue nanotransfection (TNT) to introduce genetic material into cells. This allows them to reprogram skin cells to become something different—in this case vascular cells—to help fix damaged brain tissue.

Continue reading “New technology ‘retrains’ cells to repair damaged brain tissue in mice after stroke” »

The future of aviation, planes of the future.

As the aviation industry attempts to recover from the devastating effects of the pandemic, we take a in depth look at the future of flying. Will we soon be boarding commercial jets made in China? Or flying faster than the speed of sound? And what will the planes actually look like? Answers to these questions and more as Rob Watts reports on the future of flight.

Continue reading “A new global rivalry? Airbus, Boeing, Comac and the future of aviation” »

Today at 1 PM PST.

On Sunday, February 212021, at 1 p.m. U.S. Pacific Time, the U.S. Transhumanist Party invites Dr. Aubrey de Grey of the SENS Research Foundation, for an in-depth conversation about recent developments in the quest to reverse the damage of biological aging. The discussion will cover current in rejuvenation research and advocacy, as well as delve into how the prospects for reaching longevity escape velocity have changed since Dr. de Grey’s remarks at the U.S. Transhumanist Party Discussion Panel on Life Extension nearly 4 years ago in 2017.

Continue reading “U.S. Transhumanist Party Virtual Enlightenment Salon with Aubrey de Grey” »

I will look at the idea that all disease could be almost stopped in its tracks with a universal treatment for aging. A lot of people ask when we will cure aging and the answer is it may well be here sooner than many realise.

It doesn’t matter how good the treatments are that we develop for cancer, heart disease, alzheimers, and any other of a number of the most common ways we finally die, it is really just a game of whack a mole. If you survive one, just wait a few years and another will get you.

Continue reading “An End To Aging — The Mother Of All Disease” »

The report said the wildlife farms were part of a project the Chinese government has been promoting for 20 years.

Daszak said: “They take exotic animals, like civets, porcupines, pangolins, raccoon dogs and bamboo rats, and they breed them in captivity,” NPR cited. He added that the project was a means to “alleviate rural populations out of poverty,”

Continue reading “WHO thinks it knows where COVID-19 originated” »

The development of gene therapy, in particular gene editing using the CRISPR-Cas9 method, has prompted a lively discussion around the world about how deeply you can interfere with the human genome. The creators of this method have turned to the world community, including lawyers, to undertake a public discussion of the implications that it can create (The National Academies of Sciences Engineering Medicine, 2015). The most important problem to be resolved in the future, in my opinion, will be the issue of establishing very clear legal principles of liability for damages resulting from the editing of genes in human embryos and reproductive cells. However, before this happens, it is necessary to show the possible legal problems that may arise and that will certainly appear in future legislative work in the world. Questions must be asked to which world legal experts will need to seek answers. The goal of this paper is to show the possible legal problems and ask questions related to the liability for damages resulting from the editing of genes in human embryos and reproductive cells that will be answered in the future.

Private law considerations will be based on Polish law, although it should be pointed out that the conclusions derived from them appear to be of universal nature for different legal systems. Despite the fact that legal considerations will refer to the regulation of Polish law, the subject of the analysis will also be the differences in the legal qualification of reproductive cells and embryos in other European legislations. It seems that nowhere in the world are there special regulations regarding the liability for damage related to the genetic editing of reproductive cells or embryos. Therefore, there is a need to present new challenges for classic private law institutions, such as legal abilities, torts, or liability for damages. Due to the lack of uniform European regulations and different conflicts of rights the subject of analysis will not be wrongful life and wrongful birth actions, but only claims of prenatal damage to a child.

The first major legal problem facing the international community is, of course, the question of the legal acceptability of the editing of genes of human reproductive cells and embryos (van Dijke et al., 2018). In this regard, it should be pointed out that despite the initial demand to ban such editing, over time, increasingly more scientists have pointed to the fact that it is not possible to maintain such a moratorium (Doudna and Sternberg, 2017). Jiankui’s presentation at the Second International Summit on Human Genome Editing on November 272018, showed that the introduction of a moratorium on genetic modifications of embryos in Europe, the condemnation of such research by a group of 120 of the greatest geneticists, even the Chinese regulations (Zhang and Lie, 2018) will not limit its conduct (Cyranoski and Ledford, 2018). Globalization of the medical market means that if any procedures are allowed on other continents, they will also become available to Europeans (Lunshof, 2016).