Lifeboat Foundation

A team from Korea created more flexible neural electrodes that minimize tissue damage and still transmit clear brain signals.

Electrodes placed in the brain record neural activity, and can help treat neural diseases like Parkinson’s and epilepsy. Interest is also growing in developing better brain-machine interfaces, in which electrodes can help control prosthetic limbs. Progress in these fields is hindered by limitations in electrodes, which are relatively stiff and can damage soft brain tissue.

Designing smaller, gentler electrodes that still pick up brain signals is a challenge because brain signals are so weak. Typically, the smaller the electrode, the harder it is to detect a signal. However, a team from the Daegu Gyeongbuk Institute of Science & Technology in Korea developed new probes that are small, flexible and read brain signals clearly.

Induced pluripotent stem cells offer great therapeutic potential and are a valuable tool for understanding how different diseases develop. New research shows that such stem cell lines should be regularly screened for genetic mutations to ensure the accuracy of the disease models.

In the past 10 years, scientists have learned to create induced pluripotent stem cells (iPSC) from ordinary cells by genetic reprogramming. These cells are widely used to study diseases, as they can be differentiated to almost any cell type of the body, and they can be generated from any individual. However, a key remaining methodological challenge is that the differentiation process is subject to major technical variation for mostly unknown reasons.

HiLIFE Tenure Track Professor Helena Kilpinen and her group at the University of Helsinki use stem cells for studying the biological mechanisms of neurodevelopmental and other brain-related diseases.

Corneal transplants can be the last step to returning clear vision to many patients suffering from eye disease. Each year, approximately 80,000 corneal transplantations take place in the U.S. Worldwide, more than 184,000 corneal transplantation surgeries are performed annually.

However, rejection rates for the corneal grafts can be as high as 10%. This is largely due to poor patient compliance to the medications, which require frequent administrations of topical eyedrops over a long period of time.

This becomes especially acute when patients show signs of early rejection of the transplanted corneas. When this occurs, patients need to apply topical eyedrops hourly to rescue the corneal grafts from failure.

Could an injection of lab-cultured brain cells, created from a person’s own cells, reverse symptoms of Parkinson’s disease? That’s an idea that Aspen Neuroscience Inc., a startup based in San Diego, plans to test in human trials later this year.

In patients with Parkinson’s, neurons die and lose the ability to make the chemical dopamine, leading to erratic, uncontrollable movements. Aspen Neuroscience will test if the newly injected cells can mature into dopamine producers, stopping the debilitating symptoms of this incurable disease, says Damien McDevitt, the company’s chief executive officer. Tests in animals have shown promise, the company says.

Finding early signs of dementia in the back of the eye may be a way to catch the disease early and start preventive treatment, a study says.

Michael Levin is a biologist at Tufts University working on novel ways to understand and control complex pattern formation in biological systems.

Michael Levin links.
Michael’s Twitter: https://twitter.com/drmichaellevin.
Michael’s Website: https://drmichaellevin.org.

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A treatment that enables human beings to live to the age of 150 could be available within the next five to 10 years, one of the world’s most eminent plastic surgeons has claimed. Dr Steven Cohen, who specialises in complex aesthetic facial and regenerative surgery, believes the results of studies and advances in the medical sphere could soon pave the way to extend our lives.

Gene therapy has been headline news in recent years, in part due to the rapid development of biotechnology that enables doctors to administer such treatments. Broadly, gene therapies are techniques used to treat or prevent disease by tweaking the content or expression of cells’ DNA, often by replacing faulty genes with functional ones.

The term “gene therapy” sometimes appears alongside misinformation about mRNA vaccines, which include the Pfizer and Moderna COVID-19 vaccines. These vaccines contain mRNA, a genetic cousin of DNA, that prompts cells to make the coronavirus “spike protein.” The vaccines don’t alter cells’ DNA, and after making the spike, cells break down most of the mRNA. Other COVID-19 shots include the viral vector vaccines made by AstraZeneca and Johnson & Johnson, which deliver DNA into cells to make them build spike proteins. The cells that make spike proteins, using instructions from either mRNA or viral vector vaccines, serve as target practice for the immune system, so they don’t stick around long. That’s very, very different from gene therapy, which aims to change cells’ function for the long-term.