Ira Pastor, ideaXme life sciences ambassador, interviews Dr. Eric Van Gieson, Program Manager in the Biological Technologies Office (BTO) at DARPA. https://www.darpa.mil/staff/dr-eric-van-gieson
Ira Pastor Comments
Nearly 4 in 10 American adults reported engaging in dangerous cleaning practices to prevent COVID-19, such as washing food with bleach, using household disinfecting products on their skin or intentionally inhaling vapors from cleaning products, according to a recent survey.
A report from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) follows an earlier study describing an increase in calls to poison control centers regarding exposure to household cleaners, during the COVID-19 pandemic.
The first patients have been dosed in a study of LY-CoV555, the lead antibody from Lilly’s collaboration with AbCellera. See our blog at: https://www.futuretimeline.net/blog/2020/06/4-covid-19-antibodies.htm
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Paleontologists at St Petersburg University created the most detailed virtual 3D-model of the endocranial cast and blood vessels of the head of an ankylosaurian.
Paleontologists from St Petersburg University have been the first to study in detail the structure of the brain and blood vessels in the skull of the ankylosaur Bissektipelta archibaldi. It was a herbivorous dinosaur somewhat similar in appearance to a modern armadillo. The first three-dimensional computer reconstruction of a dinosaur endocast made in Russia — a digital cast of its braincase — was of help to the scientists. It made it possible to find out that ankylosaurs, and Bissektipelta in particular, were capable of cooling their brains, had an extremely developed sense of smell, and heard low-frequency sounds. However, their brain was one and a half times smaller than that of modern animals of the same size.
Ankylosaurs appeared on Earth in the middle of the Jurassic — about 160 million years ago — and existed until the end of the dinosaur era, which ended 65 million years ago. These herbivorous animals were somewhat reminiscent of modern turtles or armadillos, were covered with thick armor, and sometimes even had a bony club on the tail. The researchers became interested in the uniquely-preserved remains of ankylosaurs from Uzbekistan. Although these fossils have been known for 20 years, only now have the scientists had a unique opportunity to study the specimens from the inside using cutting-edge methods.
Researchers suggest that an innovative handheld UV light device could effectively sanitize surfaces, killing pathogens including SARS-CoV-2.
When Plato set out to define what made a human a human, he settled on two primary characteristics: We do not have feathers, and we are bipedal (walking upright on two legs). Plato’s characterization may not encompass all of what identifies a human, but his reduction of an object to its fundamental characteristics provides an example of a technique known as principal component analysis.
Now, Caltech researchers have combined tools from machine learning and neuroscience to discover that the brain uses a mathematical system to organize visual objects according to their principal components. The work shows that the brain contains a two-dimensional map of cells representing different objects. The location of each cell in this map is determined by the principal components (or features) of its preferred objects; for example, cells that respond to round, curvy objects like faces and apples are grouped together, while cells that respond to spiky objects like helicopters or chairs form another group.
The research was conducted in the laboratory of Doris Tsao (BS ‘96), professor of biology, director of the Tianqiao and Chrissy Chen Center for Systems Neuroscience and holder of its leadership chair, and Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator. A paper describing the study appears in the journal Nature on June 3.
In the last few months, millions of people around the world stopped going into offices and started doing their jobs from home. These workers may be out of sight of managers, but they are not out of mind. The upheaval has been accompanied by a reported spike in the use of surveillance software that lets employers track what their employees are doing and how long they spend doing it.
Companies have asked remote workers to install a whole range of such tools. Hubstaff is software that records users’ keyboard strokes, mouse movements, and the websites that they visit. Time Doctor goes further, taking videos of users’ screens. It can also take a picture via webcam every 10 minutes to check that employees are at their computer. And Isaak, a tool made by UK firm Status Today, monitors interactions between employees to identify who collaborates more, combining this data with information from personnel files to identify individuals who are “change-makers.”
A study by Monash Biomedicine Discovery Institute (BDI) expands the understanding of the molecular pathways that control T cell function and survival and how it relates to declining T cell immunity in the elderly.
The findings, published in Nature Communications, led by Monash BDI’s Professor Nicole La Gruta and Dr. Kylie Quinn (formerly of Monash University BDI, now Vice-Chancellor’s Research Fellow at RMIT University), outline that the increased metabolism of T cells observed with advanced age was an indication that they were working harder merely to survive.
This contradicts previous knowledge, which suggested an increased metabolism was indicative of T cell function, and will have implications for the development of targeted interventions such as vaccines or immunotherapies to treat age-related immune dysfunction.
HOUSTON, June 2, 2020 /PRNewswire/ — Cellenkos Inc., a privately held, clinical stage biotech company announced today that the US Food & Drug Administration (FDA) has cleared the way to initiate a Phase 1 clinical trial of CK0802 (Cryopreserved Cord Blood Derived T-Regulatory Cells) for treatment of COVID-19 associated acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). The trial is designed as a randomized, double-blinded, placebo-controlled study to assess safety and preliminary efficacy in this hospitalized patient population.
“We appreciate FDA’s expedited review of our plans to evaluate CK0802 in critically ill, intubated patients suffering from ARDS, a deadly complication of COVID-19”, said Elizabeth J Read, MD, Chief Technology Officer, Cellenkos Inc. “Preliminary observations in two intubated COVID-19 ARDS patients, who received cryopreserved cord blood T-regulatory cells under FDA Emergency Use Authorization after failing tociluzumab, were promising. In the forthcoming Phase 1 randomized trial, CK0802 will be assessed for both toxicity and 28-day treatment success, as co-primary outcomes.”
“Use of allogeneic, off-the-shelf cord blood-derived T-regulatory cells has emerged as a promising therapeutic strategy for the treatment of inflammatory disorders, specifically in terms of interrupting and arresting the cytokine storm unleashed by COVID-19 infection,” said Dr Siddhartha Mukherjee, MD, PhD, Columbia University, New York, scientific advisor and collaborator on the multi-center clinical trial. “Rather than indiscriminate therapy with a drug such as an inhibitor of single cytokine such as IL-6, the T-regulatory cells can potentially calm inflammation exactly where it is most active, without causing a more general “global” immunosuppression that would be harmful in a virally infected patient. Planned correlative assays during the clinical trial will provide insights into the mechanism of action of CK0802 and its relation to clinical outcomes.”
