Can ‘toxic’ bilirubin treat a variety of illnesses?
Generations of medical and biology students have been instilled with a dim view of bilirubin. Spawned when the body trashes old red blood cells, the molecule is harmful refuse and a sign of illness. High blood levels cause jaundice, which turns the eyes and skin yellow and can signal liver trouble. Newborns can’t process the compound, and although high levels normally subside, a persistent surplus can cause brain damage.
Yet later this year up to 40 healthy Australian volunteers may begin receiving infusions of the supposedly good-for-nothing molecule. They will be participating in a phase 1 safety trial, sponsored...
Source: ScienceNOW - June 8, 2023 Category: Science Source Type: news
Crops grown without sunlight could help feed astronauts bound for Mars
Riverside, California—
For the first astronauts to visit Mars, what to eat on their 3-year mission will be one of the most critical questions. It’s not just a matter of taste. According to one recent estimate, a crew of six would require an estimated 10,000 kilograms of food for the trip. NASA—which plans to send people to Mars within 2 decades—could stuff a spacecraft with prepackaged meals and launch additional supplies to the Red Planet in advance for the voyage home. But even that wouldn’t completely solve the problem.
Micronutrients, including many vitamins, break down over months and will need to...
Source: ScienceNOW - June 8, 2023 Category: Science Source Type: news
How did cholesterol evolve? Oil trapped in ancient rocks hides clues
Ancient life forms may have left traces of oily molecules in rocks more than 1 billion years ago, providing new insights into the evolution of cholesterol. The molecular fossils, described today in
Nature
, suggest early organisms that relied on precursors of cholesterol were widespread on ancient Earth. Later, rising levels of oxygen allowed organisms to make the more sophisticated version of the molecule we know—and sometimes hate—today.
Cholesterol gets a bad rap for its role in heart disease, but animal cells can’t live without it. Our cell membranes are roughly 30% cholesterol; the molecule keeps...
Source: ScienceNOW - June 7, 2023 Category: Science Source Type: news
How Nutrition Education for Doctors Is Evolving
Dr. Jaclyn Albin still recalls learning about nutritional biochemistry while she was a student at The George Washington University School of Medicine & Health Sciences. But by the time she graduated in 2009, nutrition’s relevance to disease states and patient care hadn’t been addressed.
“Historically, nutrition education has been mostly rooted in biochemistry, pathology, and physiology with nutrient-focused content,” says Albin, who’s now an internist and pediatrician in Texas. “For example, we would learn about vitamin C and how it impacts various pathways in the body, as well as wh...
Source: TIME: Health - May 24, 2023 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Elizabeth Millard Tags: Uncategorized Health Care healthscienceclimate Source Type: news
Blood cells with therapeutic benefit to treat disease raises funding to progress technology
New technology to develop red blood cells that carry additional proteins within them to provide therapeutic benefit which can reach all parts of the body, has received funding to progress the innovation. (Source: University of Bristol news)
Source: University of Bristol news - May 23, 2023 Category: Universities & Medical Training Tags: Health, Research; Faculty of Life Sciences, Faculty of Life Sciences, School of Biochemistry, Institutes, Bristol BioDesign Institute; Press Release Source Type: news
Out of our minds: opium ’s part in imperial history
How a mind-altering, addictive substance was used as a weapon by one empire to subdue anotherHumans are an exquisitely intelligent and capable species of ape. Our physiology has been fine-tuned for efficient long-distance running; our hands are elegantly dextrous for manipulating and making; and our throats and mouths give us astonishing control over the sounds we make. We are virtuoso communicators, able to convey everything from physical instructions to abstract concepts, and to coordinate ourselves in teams and communities. We learn from each other, from our parents and peers, so new generations don ’t have to start f...
Source: Guardian Unlimited Science - May 23, 2023 Category: Science Authors: Lewis Dartnell Tags: Drugs Health Alcohol Tobacco industry Source Type: news
£ 1.5 million investment to bring Bristol spin-out Halo Therapeutics first antiviral spray into clinic
Clinical trials of an easy-to-use home therapeutic treatment for SARS-CoV-2 (coronaviruses) are underway following a £ 1.5 million investment into University of Bristol spin-out, Halo Therapeutics. (Source: University of Bristol news)
Source: University of Bristol news - May 22, 2023 Category: Universities & Medical Training Tags: Grants and Awards, Health, International, Research; Faculty of Life Sciences, Faculty of Life Sciences, School of Biochemistry, Institutes, Institutes, Bristol BioDesign Institute; Press Release Source Type: news
New UMD Study Shows How Mesothelioma Can Spread
Researchers at the University of Maryland are getting a better idea of why mesothelioma takes decades to develop in the body.
In a 2023 paper published in the journal Environmental Research, a team of researchers at the University of Maryland found that understanding mesothelioma involves the way immune cells “sense” and interact with particles around them.
The study found the geometry of contaminant particles is more important than mineral composition. This means asbestos causes an immune response once the immune system is exposed to the right shape and size of the particle.
Hijacking the Immune System
Res...
Source: Asbestos and Mesothelioma News - May 17, 2023 Category: Environmental Health Authors: Fran Mannino Tags: Clinical Trials/Research/Emerging Treatments Mesothelioma Source Type: news
When stem cells can ’t roll on a bumpy road, muscles break down
Key takeawaysStem cells travel along a collagen network to reach damaged muscle tissue and heal it.In Duchenne muscular dystrophy, stiff, scarred collagen prevents stem cells from reaching their target.A protein called sarcospan lessens this scarring and allows stem cells to do their job more successfully, pointing toward potential new treatments for the disorder.Muscles that ache after a hard workout usually don ’t hurt for long, thanks to stem cells that rush to the injured site along “collagen highways” within the muscle and repair the damaged tissue. But if the cells can’t reach their destinat...
Source: UCLA Newsroom: Health Sciences - May 12, 2023 Category: Universities & Medical Training Source Type: news
Artificial intelligence provides new insight into preventing human disease
A molecular machine, which plays an essential ‘ cargo ’ role in controlling the delivery of proteins to the surface of human cells, and is implicated in several diseases, has been identified in a landmark study using artificial intelligence (AI). The research, led by an international team of scientists, is published today [11 May] in Cell. (Source: University of Bristol news)
Source: University of Bristol news - May 11, 2023 Category: Universities & Medical Training Tags: Health, Research, International; Faculty of Life Sciences, Faculty of Life Sciences, School of Biochemistry; Press Release Source Type: news
What We Owe the Future: A Million-Year View, or How to Look at the World from the Philosophical High Ground
By KLG, who has held research and academic positions in three US medical schools since 1995 and is currently Professor of Biochemistry and Associate Dean. He has performed and directed research on protein structure, function, and evolution; cell adhesion and motility; the mechanism of viral fusion…#klg #wesjackson #landinstitute #robertjensen #peteravictors #hermandaly #hermandalys #wendellberry #petervictor #oxford (Source: Reuters: Health)
Source: Reuters: Health - May 10, 2023 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news
News at a glance: U.S. tallies old-growth forests, Canadian scientists march for higher pay, and condor poop reveals the birds ’ ancient history
FOREST ECOLOGY
U.S. boosts tally of old forests
Last year, President Joe Biden surprised forest scientists when he ordered an inventory of the government’s holdings of mature and old-growth forests by this Earth Day. It triggered a scramble by the U.S. Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to create a formal definition of what constitutes “mature” and “old-growth” forests and to apply those definitions across millions of hectares. Meeting the 22 April deadline last month,
the agencies released their findings in a report
, noting that of the nearly 72 million hectares of fo...
Source: ScienceNOW - May 4, 2023 Category: Science Source Type: news
Who wore this ancient deer pendant? DNA reveals a Stone Age woman with surprising origins
Twenty thousand years ago, someone dropped a deer-tooth pendant in a cave in southwestern Siberia, where it lay until archaeologists excavated it in 2019. Now, researchers have caught a glimpse of its last wearer. After years of effort, Elena Essel, a graduate student at the Max Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology (EVA), developed a way to extract DNA embedded in an artifact’s porous surface by sweat and skin cells. Her team’s
analysis of the ornament, reported this week in
Nature
, shows it once adorned a woman whose ancestry lay far east of the cave.
“It’s the first time to my ...
Source: ScienceNOW - May 3, 2023 Category: Science Source Type: news
Bioinformatics, data and the value of open science
University of Limerick’s Dr Maria Doyle demystifies bioinformatics for SiliconRepublic.com and explains some of the many applications for this multidisciplinary field. Bioinformatics, Dr Maria Doyle explains, “combines biology, computer science and statistics to analyse and interpret biological…#universityoflimerick #mariadoyle #siliconrepubliccom #bioinformatics #biochemistry #phd #bioinformaticians #ul #profaedínculhanes #leroopensourceand (Source: Reuters: Health)
Source: Reuters: Health - April 26, 2023 Category: Consumer Health News Source Type: news
Untangling Rosalind Franklin ’s Role in DNA Discovery, 70 Years On
Historians have long debated the role that Dr. Franklin played in identifying the double helix. A new opinion essay argues that she was an “equal contributor.” (Source: NYT Health)
Source: NYT Health - April 25, 2023 Category: Consumer Health News Authors: Emily Anthes Tags: Medicine and Health History (Academic Subject) Genetics and Heredity Biology and Biochemistry Nobel Prizes Cambridge University King ' s College London Cobb, Matthew Crick, Francis H C Watson, James D Cambridge (England) London ( Source Type: news
