Lifeboat Foundation

Sugar poses one of the most pressing health problems in the modern world – not least because it’s just so delicious. Rather than quitting sweets cold turkey, low-calorie alternatives to sucrose could make tasty treats that are at least less bad for us. And now, researchers from Tufts University have developed a more efficient method for producing one such sweetener, using farms of bacteria.

The sugar in question is called tagatose, which the FDA says is “generally regarded as safe.” It’s 92 percent as sweet as sucrose – regular old table sugar – but because the human digestive system doesn’t metabolize as much of it, it only has 38 percent of the calories. That, in turn, means tagatose has a much smaller effect on blood glucose and insulin, making it safe for diabetics. And to cap it off, tests show that it doesn’t contribute to cavities or tooth decay.

But, of course, there’s a catch – tagatose is a little complicated to produce. Normally, it’s done by hydrolyzing lactose to make galactose, which is then isomerized into tagatose, which then needs to be purified and crystallized into a solid, usable form. Yields from this process are low, at less than 30 percent.

When you hear the word “cyborg,” scenes from the 1980s films RoboCop or The Terminator might spring to mind. But the futuristic characters made famous in those films may no longer be mere science fiction. We are at the advent of an era where digital technology and artificial intelligence are moving more deeply into our human biological sphere. Humans are already able to control a robotic arm with their minds. Cyborgs —humans whose skills and abilities exceed those of others because of electrical or mechanical elements built into the body —are already among us.

But innovators are pushing the human-machine boundary even further. While prosthetic limbs are tied in with a person’s nervous system, future blends of biology and technology may be seen in computers that are wired into our brains.

Our ability to technologically enhance our physical capabilities—the “hardware” of our human systems, you could say—will likely reshape our social world. Will these changes bring new forms of dominance and exploitation? Will unaltered humans be subjected to a permanent underclass or left behind altogether? And what will it mean to be human—or will some of us be more than human?

Can you actually make a disease disappear? Dr Rangan Chatterjee thinks you can. Often referred to as the doctor of the future, Rangan is changing the way that we look at illness and how medicine will be practised in years to come. He highlighted his methods in the groundbreaking BBC TV show, Doctor In The House, gaining him much acclaim from patients, his contemporaries and the media.

He is the author of the international bestseller, The 4 Pillar Plan — http://amzn.to/2yGfpuB which has been released in the USA and Canada under the title, How to Make Disease Disappear — https://amzn.to/2GstJf6 Rangan’s 15 years of clinical experience in the NHS includes internal medicine, immunology and general practice. A pioneer in the emerging field of progressive medicine, he also uses techniques from other disciplines he has studied including movement kinetics and functional medicine.

Continue reading “How to make diseases disappear | Rangan Chatterjee | TEDxLiverpool” »

Much mentioned in this article I have long decided by way of the origin of these amino acids, not the now seen reaction to them… What say Ye??? r.p.berry & AEWR https://gerevivify.blogspot.com/

Supplements may appear harmless enough—but beware.

Chemotherapy-treated cancer cells that enter a non-dividing state called senescence can nevertheless boost cancer growth. The finding that these cells eat neighbouring cells reveals a mechanism that enables senescent cells to persist. Chemotherapy-treated tumours boost their survival by ingesting cells.

A sage extract has been clinically shown to increase memory performance in older adults by 60%. Measures of attention improved 2.5-fold within hours of ingestion.

By Michael Downey

Cancer cells love iron and HIF1a. Ferrous heme is life supporting while ferric heme is cytotoxic. Vit C is the protector and modulator of iron metabolism.

Just like our healthy cells, malignant cancer cells need energy to survive. Dr. Sophia Lunt explains how she intends to cut off cancer cells’ survival potential, and pioneer a new way of halting their growth.

Dr. Sophia Lunt began her training in metabolism at Princeton University, where she received her Ph.D. studying the metabolic consequences of the antibiotic drug trimethoprim. As a postdoctoral fellow at MIT, she focused on cancer metabolism, and was awarded the CDMRP PRCRP Visionary Postdoctoral Fellowship from the Department of Defense to support her research. She currently runs a research lab focused on cancer metabolism at Michigan State University.

Continue reading “Starving cancer away | Sophia Lunt | TEDxMSU” »

Just seven years after scientists announced the first use of Crispr-Cas9 gene editing technology on human cells, researchers shared new evidence this week that Crispr can be used to cure two serious genetic disorders.

On Tuesday, NPR reported that a patient in Nashville had seen a dramatic decline in her symptoms of sickle cell disease after receiving a single gene therapy treatment in July. Sickle cell, which can lead to inflammation, debilitating pain, and life-threatening circulatory problems, affects millions of people around the world.

That same day, the biotech companies behind the sickle-cell treatment, Crispr Therapeutics and Vertex, also shared promising results from their first attempt to cure a case of beta thalassemia, another genetic disorder that affects blood proteins. Nine months after receiving the experimental treatment, a patient in Germany with beta thalassemia has almost no signs of the disorder.