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Long-awaited “Trackable” Stem Cells Attack Patients’ Brain Tumors
October 7, 2024 11:57 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsThe FDA has approved the first, long-awaited, and safe method for tracking stem cells in the human body. The approach could lead to dramatic advances in the area of regenerative medicine and cancer therapies. Progress in many stem cell research areas has been impeded by an inability to track the cells in the human body.
Science Finds “Home” of Imagination
October 3, 2024 11:49 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsScience may have found the home of humanity’s most distinctive trait: imagination. That “home” is actually a network all over the brain, supporting the idea that imagination and other key cognitive processes are born in a “mental workspace” of many neural regions firing together, not isolated regions firing alone.
Researchers Find Brain Activity Beyond the Flat Line
October 1, 2024 1:54 pm | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsA recent PLOS One study finds highly unexpected electrical activity in the hippocampus of one man, and 26 cats, with flat-lined “isoelectric” electroencephalograms (EEGs). The isoelectric flat line—so popular in movies and on TV shows—helps determine if patients are in a brain death they can’t recover from.
Hospital First to Test All Patients for Millions of Tumor Mutations
September 25, 2024 1:13 pm | by Cynthia Fox | Comments“Incredibly valuable,” is how Barrett Rollins, Chief Scientific Officer of the Dana Farber Cancer Institute, describes his hospital’s unprecedented Profile program. In that program, the largest of its kind, all adult cancer patients at two Boston hospitals—Dana Farber and Brigham Women’s—are offered some of the most extensive, next-generation-sequencing (NGS) testing in existence.
Top Neurologists Urge Obama: Map the Other Brain!
September 19, 2024 10:23 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsPresident Obama’s famous BRAIN mapping initiative is only 15%-of-a-brain initiative, said top NIH neuroscientist Douglas Fields and a growing chorus of others recently. The reason: while 85% of the brain is made of glial cells, stunningly, no governmental BRAIN publications, until recently, mentioned the word.
Improving the Process in Electron Microscopy
September 18, 2024 1:49 pm | by Mike May, PhD | CommentsThe Indiana Convention Center in Indianapolis recently hosted the Microscopy & Microanalysis 2013 (M&M13) meeting, where many vendors unveiled new tools. This article explores several of the products rolled out by some of the meeting’s sponsors, including FEI, JEOL and Leica Microsystems. In particular, the products described here deliver new ways to work with electron microscopy.
Hitting the Mark
September 17, 2024 10:54 am | by Skip Derra | CommentsResearchers from Columbia University Medical Center, working with collaborators at the Hospital for Special Surgery, created a fleet of “nano-robots” that can home in on specific cells and mark them with a fluorescent tag for drug therapy or destruction.
Migraines May Permanently Change—Even Harm—the Brain
September 16, 2024 1:29 pm | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsMigraines, once thought benign, may permanently change—even permanently harm—the brain, reveals a multi-study review and meta-analysis. Migraines associated with either “white matter abnormalities,” or brain volume deficits, may simply alter the brain’s structure. But migraines associated with “silent infarct-like lesions” may harm it.
An Explosion of New Mass-Spectrometry Tools
September 12, 2024 10:34 am | by Mike May, PhD | CommentsMass spectrometry supplies researchers and applied scientists with an expanding collection of ways to identify and analyze the components of complex samples. The expansion of applications explains the ongoing increase in the mass spectrometry market.
On the Trail of Ancient Wines and Beers
September 5, 2024 1:40 pm | by Skip Derra | CommentsPatrick McGovern is an archaeologist devoted to studying ancient artifacts and trying to piece together their role in advancing civilization. But his specialty is focused on the origins and expansion of the fermentable beverages of early civilizations, which suits him perfectly as the director of the Biomolecular Archaeology Project at the University of Pennsylvania Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology, Philadelphia.
Erectile Dysfunction: A Biomarker for Heart Disease?
September 4, 2024 11:20 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsFor the first time, it has been shown that an intensively active lifestyle can “completely prevent” bad diets from impairing sexual function, says a Johns Hopkins University urology fellow. Put another way, a recent rat study offers strong evidence that erectile dysfunction (ED) is more than just a bedroom bother. It may be one’s own natural biomarker for coronary artery disease.
Beer Without the Bummer
August 29, 2024 11:44 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsA magical hydrating beer that minimizes hangover has been brewed, Australian researchers say. By adding electrolytes, a natural body chemical and a common sports drink ingredient, the merry Aussies say they have minimized the dehydration side effects of the beverage.
Predicting Alcoholism via a Simple Pet Scan
August 27, 2024 11:37 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsA possible biomarker that may identify potential alcoholics—before they ever become alcoholics—has been found in a new study. The biomarker: a surge of the native chemical dopamine in the brain, viewed via a PET (Positron Emission Tomography) scan, when at-risk people drink.
Breastfeeding May Protect Against Cancer—And Produce Smooth Talking Kids
August 21, 2024 10:46 am | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsBreastfeeding for long periods protects kids from obesity and stuttering—while guarding their moms from breast cancer, recent studies claim. If proven true in follow-up work, these studies—added to an earlier finding that breast- feeding wards off Alzheimer’s—may have women around the world pitching their baby bottles and going au naturel on the subway.
Taming the Tumor Genetics Revolution
August 15, 2024 3:28 pm | by Cynthia Fox | CommentsDaily, some patients’ cancer care is being revolutionized by Next Generation Sequencing (NGS). Clinicians suddenly wielding the magical ability to scan patient tumors for thousands of mutations at a pop—instead of one or two—are finding many tumors’ underlying “biomarkers” are vastly different than thought.
