A group of researchers at the Technical University of Denmark and the University of Copenhagen have developed models of neural networks that make it possible to simulate how the body protects itself from disease and predict the immune system’s access codes. The human body has its own natural inbuilt defence mechanism which uses access or “pincodes” to stop microorganisms that invade the body from discovering how the entire human immune system works. Every human being on the planet has their own unique version of this defence mechanism. But the sheer complexity of the immune system has, up until now, also made it difficult for researchers to understand how the immune system functions and develop precise immunological treatments. Last year, the research team led by Associate Professor Morten Nielsen and Professor Søren Buus successfully decoded some of the pincodes. Now, the team has completed work on their project and put together a complete picture of how the immune system checks the inner and outer components of our cells for dangerous invaders. The research could have significant consequences for the treatment of cancer, infectious diseases and also for transplant operations.
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Perspectives: Decoding the immune system to target disease
For the individual patient, the artifical neural networks mean that if scientists can identify the patient’s tissue type molecules (pincodes), they can then predict all the possible samples that would be taken by the tissue type molecules and displayed in the two display windows. If the patients own immune system, for example, does not react to a particular disease the knowledge could be used to stimulate (find, isolate and produce) the necessary T cells that can see the disease antigens (viruses, cancer cells etc). On a global scale, the neural network method could help researchers to deal with all the variants/single components of a global epidemic.
“We’ll be able to find candidates for vaccines which can both help the individual as well as the whole of humanity” explains professor Søren Buus. The neural networks provide the most comprehensive knowledge of the immune system to date.
Some people have a mutation that makes them amazingly resistant to HIV — and now, scientists may have found a way to give that immunity to anyone.
Viruses enter cells and take them over, but to get inside, they need a handhold. HIV pulls itself in by grabbing onto a protein called CCR5, which decorates the surface of T-cells, which are one of the two major types of white blood cells and play an important role in helping the body fight infections. Back in the 1990’s, researchers took interest in a handful of promiscuous gay men who were able to engage in sexual relations with their HIV-positive partners with impunity. Most of them had a mutation that kept their cells from producing normal CCR5 protein.
Armed with that knowledge, scientists have developed several tactics to block the production of CCR5 or perturb its shape so that the HIV virus can’t grab onto it during the first step of its hijacking attempt. The strategy is much akin to cutting your hair before a wrestling match: It gives your opponent one less thing to grab onto.
Another great step towards curing humanity’s ailments.
This is probably only the beginning. I expect many more diseases to be cured in the coming biotech-decade.
Gandhi once said, describing his critics, “First they ignore you, then they laugh at you, then they fight you, then you win.”
After declaring, essentially out of nowhere, that he had a program to end the disease of aging, renegade biogerontologist Aubrey de Grey knows how the first three steps of Gandhi’s progression feel. Now he’s focused on the fourth.
“I’ve been at Gandhi stage three for maybe a couple of years,” de Grey said. “If you’re trying to make waves, certainly in science, there’s a lot of people who are going to have insufficient vision to bother to understand what you’re trying to say.”
This weekend, his organization, The Methuselah Foundation, is sponsoring its first U.S. conference on the emerging interdisciplinary field that de Grey has helped kick start. (Its first day, Friday, will be free and open to the public.) The conference, Aging: The Disease - The Cure - The Implications, held at UCLA, is an indication of how far de Grey has come in mainstreaming his ideas.
Less than a decade ago, de Grey was a relatively unknown computer scientist doing his own research into aging. As recently as three years ago a cadre of scientists wrote in the Nature-sponsored journal EMBO Reports, that his research program, known as Strategies for Engineered Negligible Senescence, was “so far from plausible that it commands no respect at all within the informed scientific community.” Also in 2005, MIT-sponsored magazine Technology Review went so far as to offer a $20,000 prize to anyone who could prove that de Grey’s program was “so wrong that it was unworthy of learned debate.” (No one won.)
Now, though, some scientists are beginning to view his approach — looking at aging as a disease and bringing in more disciplines into gerontology — as worthwhile, even if they still look askance at his claims of permanent reversible aging within a lifespan. The Methuselah Foundation now has an annual research funding budget of several million dollars, de Grey says, and it’s beginning to show lab results that he thinks will turn scientists’ heads.
This man will be the one to bring about biological immortality. He will be revered for it for centuries to come, too.
That is my current prediction.
That’s what it was over two years ago, when I posted The Quest For Immortality and that is what my prediction will probably remain for the coming years.
Scientists at Wake Forest University Baptist Medical Center are about to embark on a human trial to test whether a new cancer treatment will be as effective at eradicating cancer in humans as it has proven to be in mice.
The treatment will involve transfusing specific white blood cells, called granulocytes, from select donors, into patients with advanced forms of cancer. A similar treatment using white blood cells from cancer-resistant mice has previously been highly successful, curing 100 percent of lab mice afflicted with advanced malignancies.
Zheng Cui, Ph.D., lead researcher and associate professor of pathology, will be announcing the study June 28 at the Understanding Aging conference in Los Angeles.
The study, given the go-ahead by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration, will involve treating human cancer patients with white blood cells from healthy young people whose immune systems produce cells with high levels of cancer-fighting activity.
The basis of the study is the scientists’ discovery, published five years ago, of a cancer-resistant mouse and their subsequent finding that white blood cells from that mouse and its offspring cured advanced cancers in ordinary laboratory mice. They have since identified similar cancer-killing activity in the white blood cells of some healthy humans.
“In mice, we’ve been able to eradicate even highly aggressive forms of malignancy with extremely large tumors,” Cui said. “Hopefully, we will see the same results in humans. Our laboratory studies indicate that this cancer-fighting ability is even stronger in healthy humans.”
The wheels of biotech keep on churning out impressive cures for all that ails us.
Curing 100% of mice with agressive cancer is more than impressive.
The cure is definitely coming. I understand people have made failed predictions about this in the past, but they were only wrong in their timing, not in their ability to see possibilities.
The difference between then and now is that today, we are seeing actual proof of the fact that cancer can indeed be cured.
A single cell is the most awesomely sophisticated molecular machine yet produced. A self-directing, self-replicating micro-factory capable of complex constructions, automated repair and even (like all good sci-fi-sounding devices) self-destruct. The first cells, however, were much less “complex mechanisms” and significantly more “Shake and Bake” - a model that we’re now ready to build ourselves.
It’s amazing how life apparently bootstraps itself together when you just throw together some basic chemicals.
We’re actually talking about a DNA replicating cell, synthesized from scratch, apparently.
How long before I get to design my own pets?
Researchers at Columbia University Medical Center have illuminated a window into how abnormalities in microRNAs, a family of molecules that regulate expression of numerous genes, may contribute to the behavioral and neuronal deficits associated with schizophrenia and possibly other brain disorders.In the May 11 issue of Nature Genetics, Maria Karayiorgou, M.D., professor of psychiatry, and Joseph A. Gogos, M.D., Ph.D., associate professor of physiology and neuroscience at Columbia University Medical Center explain how they uncovered a previously unknown alteration in the production of microRNAs of a mouse modeled to have the same chromosome 22q11.2 deletions previously identified in humans with schizophrenia.
“We’ve known for some time that individuals with 22q11.2 microdeletions are at high risk of developing schizophrenia,” said Karayiorgou, who was instrumental in identifying deletions of 22q11.2 as a primary risk factor for schizophrenia in humans several years earlier. “By digging further into this chromosome, we have been able to see at the gene expression level that abnormalities in microRNAs can be linked to the behavioral and cognitive deficits associated with the disease.”
The investigators modeled mice to have the same genetic deletion as the one observed in some individuals with schizophrenia and examined what happens in the expression of over 30,000 genes in specific areas of the brain. When they discovered that the gene family of microRNAs was affected, they suspected that the Dgcr8 gene was responsible. The Dgcr8 gene is one of the 27 included in the 22q11.2 microdeletion and has a critical role in microRNA production, so this was a logical hypothesis. Indeed, when they produced a mouse deficient for the Dgcr8 gene, and tested it on a variety of cognitive, behavioral and neuroanatomical tests, they observed the same deficits often observed in people with schizophrenia.
Scientists have created what is believed to be the first genetically modified (GM) human embryo.A team from Cornell University in New York produced the GM embryo to study how early cells and diseases develop. It was destroyed after five days.The British regulator, the Human Fertilisation and Embryology Authority (HFEA), has warned that such controversial experiments cause “large ethical and public interest issues”.
News of the development comes days before MPs are to debate legislation that would allow scientists to use similar techniques in this country.
The effects of changing an embryo would be permanent. Genes added to embryos or reproductive cells, such as sperm, will affect all cells in the body and will be passed on to future generations.
The technology could potentially be used to correct genes which cause diseases such as cystic fibrosis, haemophilia and even cancer. In theory, any gene that has been identified could be added to embryos.
Ethicists warn that genetically modifying embryos could lead to the addition of genes for desirable traits such as height, intelligence and hair colour.
Cells grown in the laboratory may offer a possible solution to hair loss, preliminary trials have suggested.The technique involves taking small amounts of the remaining hair cells, multiplying them, then injecting them into bald areas.Six months after treatment, 11 out of 19 patients had grown new hair, UK researchers told an Italian conference.
However, a UK specialist said further work would be needed so that the new hair looked right.
Hair loss affects two-fifths of men over 50, and can be a long-term problem for some people following radiotherapy or burns.
Currently available methods of hair transplantation involve taking large clumps of remaining follicles under local anaesthetic and moving them to the desired area, a technique dependent on the amount of hair left, as no new hair is created.
The new method, called “follicular cell implantation”, developed by UK firm Intercytex, claims to be able to provide a limitless supply of replacement hair cells, and, if other trials show it to be safe and effective, could be available within five years.
Doctors take only the dermal papilla cells - cells found in the follicle which are responsible for hair growth.
They are harvested from areas on the back of the head, which usually still have hair growth, and then bathed in a specially-developed chemical in the laboratory, before being placed back into bald areas of the scalp.
The early results suggest that most patients appear to benefit after just a few months, although the numbers involved in the trial are relatively small.
Dr Paul Kemp, Intercytex’s Scientific Officer, said that the presence of the dermal papilla cells encouraged skin cells to start building a brand new hair follicle, or rejuvenated follicles which have stopped producing hair properly.
He said: “It will revolutionise hair care, I think. People will use this when they are starting to go bald - they’ll come and see us, we’ll take a few dermal papilla cells, grow them up in the lab, freeze most of them, and inject some.
“They can keep coming back as the balding process continues. I’m convinced it will work, it’s just a question of fine-tuning the technique.”
Biotech Breakthroughs: 15 Developments That Will Eventually Affect YOUR Life
biotechnology 2 Comments »1. Self-assembling Nanofibers Heal Spinal Cord - No more quadriplegics in the future.
2. Gene Sequencing for the Masses - A personal genome scan for everybody. This will make you aware of what’s going on in your body. It will probably motivate people to live healthier lives.
3. Scientists discover “master gene” for blood vessel growth in tumors - Another great step towards a cure for cancer.
4. Genetic Future: The human genome is old news. Next stop: the human proteome - After mapping our genome, we’d also like to map the proteome. This will tell us everything about all the proteines we have in our bodies.
5. Human Protein May Offer Novel Target For Blocking HIV Infection: Successful In Lab - A step towards curing HIV and Aids.
6. Human trials to begin on ‘diabetes cure’ after terminally ill mice are returned to health - Progress towards the noble goal of curing diabetes.
7. Mad Science: Rejuvenate Your Brain with Umbilical Cord Blood - Rejuvenation. Need I say more? Death to aging!
8. Whole genome sequencing costs continue to fall: $300 million in 2003, $1 million 2007, $60,000 now, $5000 by year end - Personal genomes are about to get cheap! It’s close… just like solar power, now that I think of it.
9. Regeneration Initiative enables nerve cells on a computer chip to heal and regrow damaged nerves - Nerve regeneration. Useful if you want to cure paralysis.
10. Researchers create heart and blood cells from reprogrammed skin cells - New cells? Sign me up, buddy! When my body starts wearing out, I want new cells so I can live on for decades longer!
11. Science 2.0 — Is Open Access Science the Future? - Will science go open source? Why not… some software is open source, and look at what it has produced: Linux, one of the most stable OS’es ever to grace the planet. Imagine the results that a worldwide science project could possibly yield.
12. Scientists successfully awaken sleeping stem cells - Good, more regeneration for me!
13. Mini Stem-Cell Labs - More stem cells… (I never get enough of’em!)
14. Gene therapy experiments improve vision in nearly blind - Curing blindness with gene therapy. And keep in mind that this is just the beginning. Don’t believe me? Check back here in 10 years to see if I was right.
15. Troops’ body parts may be regrown - Great, now I won’t have to fear losing a precious, currently irreplaceable body part anymore. I’ll sleep better knowing that my arms and legs are no longer scarce commodities.
Mapping the individual - cheaply
Had one of his parents been slightly less fortunate in their choice of a mate, James Watson might not have helped discover the structure of DNA in 1953. Instead, he would have been born deaf, and then lost his sight as he became a teenager. Equally, as he is, had he been less fortunate in the genetic lottery when he chose his wife, either of their sons might have had the same fate.
This is because Watson’s complete DNA - his genome - contains a single gene for Usher’s syndrome, an inherited disorder which affects hearing and sight. Watson’s must have come from one of his parents. Usher’s is a “recessive” disease - you need two copies of the gene to be affected. About five people per 100,000 carry the gene, so Watson’s chances of being disabled weren’t large. But they were real.
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The rapidly falling cost and time needed to map your DNA
Year Cost Time 2003 $437,000,000 13 years to map 2007 $10,000,000 4 years 2008 $100,000 4 weeks 2012 $100* 2 days *Forecast
Discovery of the decade? Injection ‘could cure Alzheimer’s in minutes’
An injection that dramatically relieved the symptoms of Alzheimer’s disease within minutes would qualify as the discovery of the decade. That is exactly what was claimed yesterday for an experimental treatment being tested in America.
Scientists at the Institute for Neurological Research at the University of California have treated around 50 patients at a private clinic by injecting an anti-arthritic drug, etanercept, into the spinal column in the neck and then tilting the patients to encourage the drug to flow to the brain.
They claim 90 per cent respond to the treatment, usually within minutes, and have released videos of patients to prove it.
In one, a nurse sits down with an 82-year-old patient, Marvin Millar, who frowns and mumbles incoherently as she asks him identify everyday objects such as a bracelet and a pencil, which he is unable to do.
But five minutes after being injected with etanercept – according to the film which was supplied and edited by the clinic – he greets his wife. Visibly shocked, she says he has not recognised her for years. Mr Miller then hugs her.
Double Your Lifespan with a Drug that Mutates Your Ribosomes
aging / life extension, biotechnology No Comments »Double Your Lifespan with a Drug that Mutates Your Ribosomes
It’s been known for a while that restricting your diet will increase your lifespan, but now researchers have shown one reason why: Eating less causes your ribosomes (your cells’ protein factories) to mutate. And it’s looking like mutated ribosomes (pictured here) could be one key to life extension. The good news is that you may not have to starve yourself to mutate your ribosomes anymore. Biologists at the University of Washington have managed to induce the life-extending mutation in ribosomes with a drug that doubles the lifespan of yeast cells.
Stem cell breakthrough offers diabetes hope
Scientists have discovered a new technique for turning embryonic stem cells into insulin-producing pancreatic tissue in what could prove a significant breakthrough in the quest to find new treatments for diabetes.
The University of Manchester team, working with colleagues at the University of Sheffield, were able to genetically manipulate the stem cells so that they produced an important protein known as a ‘transcription factor’.
Stem cells have the ability to become any type of cell, so scientists believe they may hold the key to treating a number of diseases including Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and diabetes.
However, a major stumbling block to developing new treatments has been the difficulty scientists have faced ensuring the stem cells turn into the type of cell required for any particular condition - in the case of diabetes, pancreatic cells.
Man-made molecules reverse liver cirrhosis in rats
Scientists in Japan have designed artificial molecules that when used with rats successfully reversed liver cirrhosis, a serious chronic disease in humans that until now can only be cured by transplants.
Cirrhosis is the hardening or scarring of the liver, and is caused by factors such as heavy drinking and Hepatitis B and C. The disease is especially serious in parts of Asia, including China.
Cirrhosis occurs when a class of liver cells starts producing collagen, a fibrous material that toughens skin and tendons. Such damage cannot be reversed although steps can be taken to prevent further damage. In advanced cases, transplants are the only way out.
In the journal Nature Biotechnology, the researchers said they designed molecules that can block collagen production by liver “stellate cells,” which are also known to absorb vitamin A.
The scientists then loaded the molecules into carriers that were coated with vitamin A, which tricked the stellate cells into absorbing the molecules.
“By packaging the (molecules) in carriers coated with vitamin A, they tricked the stellate cells into letting in the inhibitor, which shut down collagen secretion,” the researchers wrote.
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