Lifeforce will reportedly draw 480-millilitre of blood from a healthy individual interested in this service. The white blood cells will be extracted from this sample to be stored at 196 degree Celsius temperature.
Del DelaRonde, co-founder of the company in Newport, UK, said that the stored sample would contain a complete range of white blood cells of an individual, which can be later generated when necessary. The process of regeneration will be conducted by exposing the stored sample to natural growth stimulators like interleukin-2.
The newly generated white blood cells can be then re-infused to a person’s body to render extra strength to the immune system and help it in fighting a fatal disease. The process would be similar to ‘adoptive therapies’ conducted on cancer patients.
According to Del DelaRonde, as quoted in New Science -
Whole new armies of white blood cells could be grown in the lab and re-infused into the patient. In the case of HIV, which progressively destroys immune cells, the process could be repeated perhaps once a year, by multiplying up and re-storing fractions of the samples
However, the system has one drawback. It might not be possible to regenerate all types of white blood cells. Some types of white blood cell, such as macrophages, have been seen as not to survive freezing conditions.
The cost of this service would be 88 dollars initially and a monthly fees of 25 dollars.
The service seems promising from the point of view that it is apparently creating a ‘back-up’ for the immune system of a human body, providing extra support to the body in time of need.
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- 11
- Sep
- 2007
New virus-zapping laser technique may replace ultrasound for disinfecting blood
How would it be if the viruses causing HIV and hepatitis C could be zapped out from the blood stream of an infected patient? No, this is no another Hollywood creation of medical wizard, but efforts of a team of scientists, who knows no word synonym to ‘impossible.’
A team of researchers have come up with a new challenge with the use of lasers. Yes, they have meticulously used ‘laser’ to blast viruses out of blood!
The new innovative technique uses a low-power laser beam with a pulse lasting just fractions of a second to rid isolated blood of dangerous pathogens – it eventually brings challenges in disinfecting blood for transfusions, and perhaps HIV and hepatitis C s well.
Blood transfusion always leaves the one receiving it with the risk of developing the infection, as the prevailing techniques, which use UV irradiation and radioisotopes, can leave a trail of blood components mutated or damaged, or both.
Johns Hopkins University student Shaw-Wei David Tsen says,
Our laser repeatedly sends a rapid pulse of light and then relaxes, allowing the solution surrounding the virus to cool off. This significantly reduces heat damage to normal blood components.
I had to repeat the experiment several times to convince myself that the laser worked this well.
So, once proved successful, the new laser technique can eventually replace the ultrasound techniques by penetrating energy-absorbing water surrounding the viruses, followed by vibrating the pathogen directly.
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Science Daily — In some ways, certain tumors resemble bee colonies, says pathologist Tan Ince. Each cancer cell in the tumor plays a specific role, and just a fraction of the cells serve as "queens," possessing the unique ability to maintain themselves in an unspecialized state and seed new tumors. These cells can also divide and produce the "worker" cells that form the bulk of the tumor.
Pathologist Tan Ince transformed normal cells into these cancerous ones (whose membranes are stained green). The transformed cells retain their sheet-forming capabilities, resembling the tumor cells found in many patients. They also possess enormous potential to create and spread tumors. As many as one in ten is a cancer stem cell. (Credit: Tan Ince)
These "queens" are cancer stem cells. Now the lab of Whitehead Member Robert Weinberg has created such cells in a Petri dish by isolating and transforming a particular population of cells from human breast tissue. After being injected with just 100 of these transformed cells, mice developed tumors that metastasized (spread to distant tissues).
"The operational definition of a cancer stem cell is the ability to initiate a tumor, so these are cancer stem cells," declares Weinberg, who is also an MIT professor of biology.
Ince didn't set out to engineer these potent cells. As a post-doctoral researcher in the Weinberg lab and gynecologic pathologist at Brigham and Women's Hospital, he was simply trying to create breast cancer models that look like real human tumors under the microscope and behave like those seen in many patients.
In more than 90 percent of human breast tumors, cancer cells resemble those lining our body's cavities. A trained pathologist can spot the similarities under a microscope. But the cancer cells previously engineered from normal breast cells for laboratory studies looked different. Ince suspected that researchers were transforming the wrong type of cells.
Now an independent investigator at Brigham and Women's Hospital and an instructor at Harvard Medical School, Ince developed a recipe for a new chemically defined culture medium and managed to grow a different type of human breast cell that ordinarily dies in culture. He transformed it into a cancer cell by inserting specific genes through a standard procedure.
The engineered cells proved to be extremely powerful. When Ince injected more than 100,000 of them into a mouse with a compromised immune system, it quickly developed massive, deadly tumors. In initial experiments, a few tissue slices revealed a primary tumor structure that resembled that of cancer patients with metastases.
That prompted Ince to wonder whether the cancer cells he created would metastasize if the mouse lived longer. He repeated the experiment in other mice, reducing the number of cells in the injection to as few as 100 in hopes of slowing tumor growth. The cancer cells continued to seed tumors and those tumors metastasized. In sharp contrast, scientists must inject about 1 million cells to get a tumor when working with the cancer cell lines routinely used in the laboratory.
"In the process of making a model that reflects a tumor type common in patients, I created tumor-initiating cells," Ince explains. "That was a complete surprise."
"This work could provide a boon to researchers who study these elusive cancer stem cells by offering a bountiful source of them," maintains Weinberg. "Labs can easily grow the newly created cells for use in experiments."
The study, which appears in Cancer Cell on August 13, also offers clues about the trajectory of cancer cells. A normal cell is thought to evolve progressively toward a malignant state through a series of genetic mutations. The early alterations confer uncontrolled growth, while later alterations enable the cell to migrate and invade other tissues. Over the past decades, considerable effort has gone into discovering these tumor-initiating and metastasis-initiating genetic alterations.
The new study suggests, however, that some normal cells are more prone to become tumor-initiating cells and have a higher metastatic potential when they become cancer cells than other normal cells. The culture medium Ince created favors the growth of the human breast cells with high tumor-making and metastatic potential while the standard culture medium favors cells with low tumor-making potential. Although the two types are only slightly different, the cells behave completely differently after acquiring the same mutations.
Ince confirmed this behavioral difference by taking a single human breast tissue sample, splitting it in two and growing the cells in the two culture mediums, which select for different cells. Next, he transformed the two populations with the same tumor-initiating genes, injected them in mice and watched the result. The cells that were grown in the new culture medium were 10,000 times more potent as tumor initiators and were the only ones able to metastasize. Thus genes that were previously thought to only initiate tumors initiated metastasis, which is the main cause of cancer mortality in the clinic.
"Tan has demonstrated that a critical determinant of eventual metastasis is the identity of the normal cell type that preexists in the breast and becomes the object of mutation and selection," Weinberg says.
This research is funded by the Breast Cancer Research Foundation and the National Institutes of Health.
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Free Choice + Punishment = Cooperation
By Julie J. Rehmeyer
To get people to cooperate in a venture, make participation voluntary. That's the advice from researchers whose recent study offers a solution to one of the oldest problems in game theory: How can cooperation develop if individuals can do better for themselves by cheating?
In a community garden, for example, the lazy gardener who does nothing may reap as big a share of the produce as the hardest worker.
Such antisocial behavior is reduced if cheaters face consequences. An industrious gardener may deny the slacker his share of the harvest, for example. But that raises another issue. Gardeners who pitch in but don't punish freeloaders may get just as much produce as those who punish, without the risk and trouble of punishing someone.
Short-term self-interest seems to encourage an individual either to cheat or to cooperate but not to punish. In the long run, however, everyone is better off if most people both cooperate and punish. Then cheaters don't profit, the burden of punishing is light, and many people reap the benefits of cooperation. The challenge is at the beginning: How can collective ventures get started if people can't rely on one another to cooperate?
Karl Sigmund of the University of Vienna and his colleagues have now shown that if participation in a joint venture is voluntary rather than mandatory, the odds are higher that individuals will benefit by cooperating. They published their findings in the June 29 Science.
Sigmund and his team created a computer simulation in which computer "agents" act as individuals trying to maximize their profits. Each agent begins with a pot of money and then receives a small fixed income at each step of the game.
Agents may either participate in a risky cooperative venture or sit out. At each round, every agent that participates contributes a set amount to a common pool. The program then adds up the total, increases it by a certain percentage, and splits the money equally among the participants. The catch is that the simulation also allows agents to "cheat" by contributing nothing yet still receive a share of the pool. Another agent may punish the cheaters by forcing them to pay a fine to the computer. However, the agent imposing the fine incurs some expense in doing so.
At the beginning of the game, the researchers randomly assign each agent to be a cheater, a punisher, a cooperator who doesn't punish, or a non-participant. At each new round, the computer again assigns each agent a role. The general strategy is for each agent either to continue with its previous strategy or to imitate others who are faring better, but occasionally the computer will give an agent a randomly chosen new strategy.
Over time, the researchers discovered, cheating becomes more and more prevalent and ruins the investment for everyone. Nearly all the agents stop participating.
But from this state of near-total non-participation, a few agents will occasionally begin to cooperate simultaneously, with no freeloaders. These groups start making more money than everyone else, and their success leads the non-participants to imitate their strategy. The small groups grow, producing a large group of punishers or a large group of non-punishing cooperators.
Big groups of non-punishing cooperators are an easy target for cheaters. One agent randomly tries cheating and makes a load of cash, and then other agents imitate the strategy, soon making it unprofitable for anyone to cooperate. But if the group consists primarily of punishers, an agent who tries cheating loses money to numerous fines, which discourages others from cheating. Groups with plenty of punishers therefore tend to be very stable and long-lasting, because they produce plenty of cooperators.
If participation were mandatory, the state of near-total non-participation could never occur, so even if a small group of cooperators arose, it wouldn't have enough influence to make cooperation the norm. The only way cooperation could evolve in that case would be for nearly all the participants to simultaneously begin to cooperate. That, however, is very unlikely.
Sigmund says the study offers insight into the early evolution of cooperation. He is skeptical, though, that game theory can lead to new strategies with powerful applications. He chuckles at claims made during the 1950s that game theory could be used to win the Cold War. "What is most important," he says, "is that this gives you insight into some elements of human behavior."
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Viva gel, an experimental sex lubricant currently being tried on women as a contraceptive, which has been designed by Australian researchers, and is also thought to help block the viruses responsible for AIDS and genital herpes. Laboratory tests done on animals showed that the microbicide gel has the power to inactivate these viruses.
Dr. Jeremy Paull, the lead researcher from Melbourne-based pharmaceutical company known as Starpharma in a conference at the International AIDS society in Sydney said that the gel can be used by heterosexual men when applied directly to them before sex. If the gel truly works, it would be of significance around the world, especially in the sub-Saharan African nations where heterosexuals are basically responsible for the rising number of HIV cases.
As per Paull, the microbicide gel contains a molecule, known as ‘dendrimer’ which prevents the viruses from infecting healthy cells by binding itself to them. The tests on the lab animals show that it has a success rate of 85 and 100% for both the viruses. Now, the concern is that will the gel be safe for human application. The first study that has already been conducted reveals that it is safe for healthy men.
Dr.Paull also said, “The prevention of herpes indication, given the level of the epidemic in the developed world, perhaps gives us a different angle.” Dr.Roberta, of the US National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, who chaired the conference session said, “I believe it may be unique in terms of development for two different indications, both genital herpes and HIV.” If the results come out positive, it will certainly be a breakthrough which will hopefully bring down the number of people suffering from the epidemic known as AIDS.
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According to the Researchers at National Cancer Institute, gene therapy proved to be successful for treatment of cancer due to the introduction of genes into human body.
The patients affected from skin cancer melanoma are treated with immune system cells (T-lymphotyces) to be taken from patient’s blood engineered to attack their tumours.
With the efforts of Surgeon Steven A Rosenberg, possible ways to manipulate human immune system were founded to fight cancer resulting in successful treatment on two patient suffering from skin cancer melanoma.
Surgeons take lymphocytes from the blood and inserted into them genes for a receptor having the ability of selecting a protein on melanoma cells called MART-1, allowing the lymphocyte to stick into a tumor cell and thereby killing it.
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Today the world is celebrating World Kidney Day. However, the situation remains quite bleak for many countries like India where according to an estimate, every year about 1.5 lakh new cases of chronic kidney disease (CKD) tumble out, giving a jarring note.
Kidney is an integral organ of our body and any problem in it is bound to play havoc with our health perhaps that is the reason why some medical experts have named chronic kidney disease (CKD) as ‘diseases multiplier’. However, India is not the only country where CKD is playing havoc but several other countries are also wriggling under the juggernaut of CKD or chronic kidney disease. Among such countries, the contribution of developing countries is comparatively higher. Following facts provide us with deeper information of CKD situation:–
1. According to an estimate, there are about 500 million people all round the globe with some kind of chronic kidney disease.
2. Out of these patients, about 1.5 million people are alive through peritoneal dialysis or transplantation.
3. The global cost for dialysis and transplantation over the next decade is most likely to surpass $1 trillion.
4. By the next decade, global figure of patients with CKD is more likely to double.
5. Inflammatory diseases of the kidney, infections, obstruction in the urinary tract and inherited disorders like polycystic kidney disease have, especially been held responsible for this much of rise of in CKD in the world.
6. 85 percent of the patients with CKD dwell in the developing countries.
7. In China, the economy will lose US$558 billion over the next decade due to effects on death and disability attributable to chronic cardiovascular and renal disease.
After going through these smoldering facts, it becomes quite clear that the world has a serious challenge ahead. Today we make vows to uproot horrific diseases like HIV/AIDS, Polio, Bird-flu, etc., etc. but somewhere it seems that amid the vociferation of such vows CKD fails to have its share of attention, which is quite a deplorable issue.
I strongly believe that along with other burning health issues we should also carve out a concrete strategy against CKD, otherwise the dream of a healthy world would never come true.
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A tumor paint developed by researchers at Seattle Children’s Hospital Research Institute and Fred Hutchinson Cancer Research Center will help surgeons see where a tumor begins and ends more precisely by illuminating the cancerous cells. The study, published in the July 15, 2007 issue of Cancer Research, shows that the tumor paint can help surgeons distinguish between cancer cells and normal brain tissue in the operating room. The paint is a scorpion-derived peptide called chlorotoxin that is linked to the molecular beacon Cy5.5.Until now there has been no way to allow surgeons to see tumors “live” during
"My greatest hope is that tumor paint will fundamentally improve cancer therapy,” said James M. Olson, MD, PhD, of Seattle Children’s Hospital and The Hutchison Center who is the senior author of the study. “By allowing surgeons to see cancer that would be undetectable by other means, we can give our patients better outcomes.”
Olson led the team that included neurosurgeons, engineers and biologists. The bioconjugate, Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 which, when injected, emits a near-infrared light, was created in his laboratory at the Hutchinson Center. In mouse models, the team demonstrated that they could light up brain tumors as small as 1 millimeter in diameter without lighting up the surrounding normal brain tissue. In a prostate cancer model, as few as 200 cancer cells traveling in a mouse lymph channel could be detected.
Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 is applicable to many cancers, but is especially helpful to surgeons operating on brain tumors. Not only would it reveal whether they’d left behind any bits of tumor, it would also help them avoid removing normal tissue. Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 activates within hours and it begins binding to cancer cells within minutes. The Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 signal lasts for 14 days, illuminating cancer cells. Contrast agents currently in use only last for a few minutes.
“I feel fortunate to be working with gifted scientists to bring this revolutionary imaging technique from the laboratory to the bedside,” said Richard Ellenbogen, MD, Pediatric Neurosurgeon, Seattle Children's Hospital and co-investigator on the study. “This development has the potential to save lives and make brain tumor resection safer.”
Surgery remains a primary form of cancer therapy. Despite advances in surgical tools, surgeons currently rely on color, texture or blood supply to differentiate tumor from normal tissue, a distinction that is often subtle and imperfect. The limitations of this method contribute to cancer growth or patient mortality that is potentially preventable. The tumor painting technique combines a visual guide for the surgeon with the potential for significant improvement in accuracy and safety.
Tumor painting has been successfully tested in mice and the pilot safety trials are complete. Olson and his team are preparing the necessary toxicity studies before seeking approval from the Food and Drug Administration to begin clinical trials. Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 could be used in operating rooms in as little as 18 months. All clinical studies will have consenting adult participants.
Olson and his team believe that Chlorotoxin:Cy5.5 has the potential to be used in the future as a non-invasive screening tool for early detection of skin, cervical, esophageal, colon and lung cancers. It is also useful in identifying positive lymph nodes which could mean a significant advancement for breast, prostate and testicular cancers.
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UK goes ’smoke free’ from today with the ban that restricts smokers to fag in workspace and any other enclosed public place.The ban has been basically forwarded to protect passive smokers. Also, the ban can make people lessen up or give up smoking. Moreover, if the ban succeeds in its noble cause, it is good news for everyone and also for their sex life. Yes, if you remember smoking can give way to many sexual problems.
Smoking is bad for health and we all know that, but most of us don’t seem to care. Smoking has many bad effects on our physical health. It harms the lungs and also constricts blood flow. It is also a cause for late reactions and loss of patience. Apart from these physical and mental problems, fagging is particularly dangerous for men as it causes them difficulty in getting and maintaining an erection. If smoked for a long time it can also give rise to impotence or erectile dysfunction in men. For women who are pregnant smoking can lead to many dysfunctions in the baby and also cause a ‘dead birth.’ It also weakens our senses, especially taste and smell, which are an indispensable part of a good sex life.
These are enough reasons for you to quit smoking and if you still need more, keep on reading. No one likes yellow teeth, bad breath and smoke smell coming from the fingers and this is what smoking basically leaves you with. These things can as well put off your partner in the bed. Overall, smokers lead an unhealthy lifestyle which also makes them socially less acceptable. They also ignore food and have a bad, irregular diet system that results in poor health. Those who don’t fag lead better lifestyles, eat healthy diets and in turn also have better and enjoyable sex. You can always ask a friend or a family member to help you quit smoking and if you have a good will power, you alone are enough. You can also contact counselors or log on to the various websites, whose alone aim is to help people quit smoking. Gosmokefree and Quit are two of such websites.
As the French philosopher, Albert Schweitzer said, “Every patient carries her or his own doctor inside”, I hope you do too. Best of luck for your efforts to quit this deadly sin!
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According to a top prosecutor from Panama, since July 2006 about 94 people in the region have died due to consumption of medicines tainted with diethylene glycol and some 293 more deaths are still under investigation. The prosecutor, Dimas Guevara has claimed that in spite of the fact that the tainted medicine has been cleared off the market in October, deaths continue.
The officials have confirmed 51 deaths due to the tainted medicine and it is quite clear that the number has been increasing. The chemical, diethylene glycol, commonly used in antifreeze was found to be present in medicines like antihistamine tablets, calamine lotion, cough syrup and rash ointment. These medicines were manufactured in a government laboratory in Panama itself.
However, the investigations revealed that the chemical came from a Chinese company, which sold it to a Spanish company labeled as a 99.5% pure glycerin. The company in turn sold it to Panama’s Medicom SA that sold it to the laboratory. For conducting the investigation, officials also had to dig up the corpses of victims who had died last year. Later, the tests confirmed that they were killed by the contaminated medicines.
In connection with the deaths, three Medicom executives are facing charges for crimes against public health. Well, China badly needs to improve its image.
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Seetha, a 25 year old, was married to Ram and lived with his parents in a rural village in India. She was not from a wealthy family and her parents promised her in laws to give her dowry later. Days became months and months became years. Her in laws were restless about the fact that dowry was late and they ill-treated her. Even her husband did not have a say. One day, she was murdered. She had paid the dowry with her life.
This is not a rare incident in India, but they are not publicised. Dowry is a payment made to a woman’s in-laws upon her engagement or marriage as a gift to her new family. It is a common thing to exceed dowries to the family’s annual income. According to official crime statistics in India, 6,822 women were killed in 2002 because of such violence. Small community studies have also indicated that dowry demands have played an important role in women being burned to death and in deaths of women labelled as suicides.
Dowry murder is just one example where traditions serve badly for women. According to the United Nations Development Fund for Women (UNIFEM) report these violations include female genital mutilation or cutting (FGM), dowry murder, so-called “honour killings,” and early marriage. They lead to death, disabilities, and physical and psychological dysfunction for millions of women annually. These victims are found mainly in the Africa, South Asian and the Middle East.
Film makers like Deepa Mehtha have attempted to break the conspiracy of silence by exposing this social malady in their works. In her Oscar nominate film ‘Water’, one gets a glimpse of the widows who were kept apart for the sake of the traditions. The main character in the film Chuyiya, a seven-year-old widow, tells the whole world about the tragedy of early marriage system in India.
Women in these societies are frustrated by the lack of progress made in tackling these social ills.
"It is a pity that no proper action is taken to stop violations," said Meera from India.
Many people in the West are unaware of the scale of the problem. Those who had heard about these abuses labelled them as the extreme cases, but pointed out that women in US and Europe are not immune to discrimination in the name of tradition.
“These are extreme examples,” Andrea from USA said. “Many people do not realize that even certain Western traditions hurt women. For example, I do not intend on changing my last name when I get married. If you research the origin of this tradition, you will be shocked at the misogyny. I love my last name; it represents my amazing family and all their struggles. Some say, well don't you want your family to be united? Of course, in Italy, women don't change their last name; does that mean their family is not a unit?”
The traditionalists are offering stiff resistance to bringing about social change that would lead to the making the situation better. Women continue to be harassed, exploited, and murdered, all in the name of tradition.