Los resultados de un reciente estudio arrojan algo de esperanza para los pacientes de una enfermedad dolorosa y mortal como es la esclerosis lateral amiotrófica (ELA), al haber obtenido resultados positivos en las pruebas de un nuevo fármaco, masitinib, para tratar la dolencia.
Boston company creator PureTech Health already has one microbiome startup in its portfolio, Vedanta Biosciences. Today it’s unveiled a second one, Commense, with a different plan to harness the power of the trillions of microbes in and on our bodies.
When someone with a high fever walks into a rural African clinic, diagnosis could be murky. The symptoms could be those of dengue, Ebola, West Nile disease, malaria or flu, and blood work results from distant labs, if available, often takes days. Now a handful of researchers are separately working on inexpensive, paper-based diagnostic tests that accurately pinpoint the cause of a disease in minutes and could speed up treatment and prevent its spread. The lack of funds and commercial partners however, means most might languish in labs.
One step at a time, Emulate has been trying to use microchip systems to simulate organs and diseases for testing—a lung with asthma or dangerous fluid buildup, and perhaps someday a brain with Alzheimer’s. It’s part of an ambitious goal of helping to change preclinical drug development and improve the efficiency of drug-making. Now Emulate has gotten more financial backing to give it a go.
A blind woman in Texas is the first person to undergo therapy based on an emerging technology called optogenetics. If successful, the therapy will create light-sensing cells in one of her eyes and enable her to see again.
This patient and others being recruited for a clinical trial have a degenerative disease called retinitis pigmentosa. In this disease, the light-sensitive cells of the retina gradually die off. These cells pass electrical signals on to nerves that convey them to the brain.
A study released Tuesday by scientists at The Scripps Research Institute in La Jolla could lead to major changes in the way patients with transplanted organs are treated in the future to prevent rejection.
In the study published in the American Journal of Transplantation, the researchers analyzed 234 kidney transplant biopsies and discovered that around 80 percent of the genes expressed in cases of early, acute rejection were also present in instances of chronic, much later rejections.
Toshiba Corp ha acordado vender su filial de aparatos médicos a Canon Inc por 688.000 millones de yenes (US$6.100 millones), dijeron el jueves ambas compañías.
Canon ya ha pagado a Toshiba 665.500 millones de yenes en efectivo para hacerse con Toshiba Medical Systems Corp y los 22.500 millones de yenes restantes se desembolsarán más adelante, cuando la compañía forme ya parte del grupo Canon.
The el Aviv University unveiled a remote-controlled, bionic heart patch, which researchers say could become a revolutionary alternative to heart transplants for patients whose hearts have been damaged by heart attacks or cardiac disease.
The patch expands and contracts like a human heart, but regulates itself like a machine and can be paced and programmed to release drugs from afar.
“It’s very science fiction, but it’s already here, and we expect it to move cardiac research forward in a big way,” said Prof. Tal Dvir, who pioneered the invention with PhD student Ron Feiner.
Building a wristband that can accurately and consistently measure activities like steps taken or biometrics like heart rate is difficult. There are all kinds of issues to take into account, like noise from arm movements, and the ways in which different skin tones or skin translucencies might impact measurements.
Perhaps no one knows this better than the founders of Quanttus. The startup spent several years and millions of venture-capital dollars trying to develop a wrist-worn device that can measure blood pressure. Last week it released its first product, which is nowhere near realizing this dream: an iPhone app for tracking blood-pressure measurements.
The herbicide glyphosate can enter the body through food or drinking water. A new study has shown that the majority of Germans have been contaminated by the compound. EurActiv Germany reports.
