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.
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.
US House Oversight and Foreign Affairs Committees today asked Bush administration to explain the failure of US-funded "abstinence and be faithful" HIV prevention programs for youth.
Oversight Committee Chairman Henry A. Waxman, Foreign Affairs Committee Chairman Tom Lantos, and Congresswoman Barbara Lee wrote to US Global AIDS Coordinator Mark Dybul to ask how his office will respond to a recent evaluation which found that the US$15 billion dollar programs failed to serve the needs of young people who are or may become sexually active.
Independent evaluators found that most programs lacked adequate information about partner reduction, fidelity, condom use, and cross-generational and transactional sex.
Most programs did not contain age-appropriate content, especially for older youth, and failed to refer participants appropriately to more comprehensive programs, the evaluators reported.
The USAID funded study showed that while sex with adult men is a significant factor in HIV risk for adolescent girls, contributing to higher rates of infection among girls than boys the same age, few of the curricula had specific skill-based lessons to deal with issues of gender inequality, including cross-generational and commercial sex.
"Incorporating focused lessons on important gender-based issues, including cross-generational and transactional sex, is likely to be more effective than only promoting abstinence and ignoring issues of power imbalance that put youth at risk of coercive and unwanted sex," the evaluators pointed out.
Waxman, Lantos and Lee asked Dybul to describe how you plan to respond to the findings and recommendations of this report as they relate to the needs of sexually active youth.
If claims made by scientists come out true then days are not far away when they will come out with a portent weapon to cure patients with HIV infection, as a new study shows them way to remove the virus from infected cells, bringing a glimmer of hope for the more than 40 million people infected worldwide.
Actually, researchers have engineered an enzyme that attacks the DNA of the HIV virus, cutting it out of the infected cells.
Throwing more light on the hope, which this study has sprouted Alan Engelman of Harvard University’s Dana-Farber Cancer Institute, writes:
A customized enzyme that effectively excises integrated HIV-1 from infected cells in vitro might one day help to eradicate (the) virus from AIDS patients.
Well, it would be too premature to become very enthusiastic about this new finding as the enzyme is still far from being ready to use and hasn’t even been tested in animals yet. However, one thing could certainly be said that this new way would revolutionize the way HIV-infected patients are treated.
This year drugs for the treatment of HIV will receive more than 30 thousand Russians. This, as passes AMI-TASS, told journalists Rospotrebnadzora head Gennady Onishchenko. According to the report, so far, the number receiving drugs for this programme have already reached 25,000.
In addition, according to Onishchenko, in the first half of the special anti-virus therapy received 2,600 pregnant women with HIV. Most of the children receiving these drugs patients are born healthy. The distribution of such products to be easier for women introduced by the generic certificates, said the head Rospotrebnadzora.
Now in Russia, more than 386,000 HIV-positive people, including more than 1,300 children born to women patients. Another 16,141 children are registered with is not a diagnosis. First place in the spread of HIV among the federal keeps St. Petersburg, where there are 32,872 registered cases of HIV infection.
Gennady Onishchenko reported to the task of vaccination against certain infectious diseases in the first half of this year. Overall, in 2007, 15 million Russians will be vaccinated against hepatitis B, and 10 million of rubella. It is expected that these measures will help reduce the incidence of hepatitis B in 3 times and rubella 10 times.
The prevention of seasonal influenza disease in the autumn of this year to provide 22 million people, including children attending pre-school, primary school pupils, teachers and the elderl
HIV replication is a complex multi-staged process that includes crucial steps taking place on the exterior as well as the interior of the target host cell.
The first three steps involved in cell entry are termed attachment, co-receptor binding and fusion. Each step is crucial to successful viral reproduction.
Once HIV virus penetrates the cell, it releases its RNA into the cell.
