Lifeboat Foundation

This talks about the 2022 polio outbreak in NYC and it’s surrounding areas due to low vaccinations to the virus.

CDC public health news, press releases, government public health news, medical and disease news, story ideas, photos.

Scientists at the Krembil Brain Institute, part of the University Health Network, have proposed a new mechanistic model (AD²) for Alzheimer’s, looking at it not as a brain disease, but as a chronic autoimmune condition that attacks the brain.

This novel research is published today, in Alzheimer’s & Dementia.

“We don’t think of Alzheimer’s as fundamentally a disease of the brain. We think of it as a disease of the immune system within the brain,” says Dr. Donald Weaver, co-Director of the Krembil Brain Institute and author of the paper.

Neurodegenerative diseases—like amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS, or Lou Gehrig’s disease), Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s—are complicated, chronic ailments that can present with a variety of symptoms, worsen at different rates, and have many underlying genetic and environmental causes, some of which are unknown. ALS, in particular, affects voluntary muscle movement and is always fatal, but while most people survive for only a few years after diagnosis, others live with the disease for decades. Manifestations of ALS can also vary significantly; often slower disease development correlates with onset in the limbs and affecting fine motor skills, while the more serious, bulbar ALS impacts swallowing, speaking, breathing, and mobility. Therefore, understanding the progression of diseases like ALS is critical to enrollment in clinical trials, analysis of potential interventions, and discovery of root causes.

However, assessing disease evolution is far from straightforward. Current clinical studies typically assume that health declines on a downward linear trajectory on a symptom rating scale, and use these linear models to evaluate whether drugs are slowing disease progression. However, data indicate that ALS often follows nonlinear trajectories, with periods where symptoms are stable alternating with periods when they are rapidly changing. Since data can be sparse, and health assessments often rely on subjective rating metrics measured at uneven time intervals, comparisons across patient populations are difficult. These heterogenous data and progression, in turn, complicate analyses of invention effectiveness and potentially mask disease origin.

Continue reading “Machine-learning method shows neurodegenerative disease can progress in newly identified patterns” »

Summary: Researchers aim to map and track cellular changes in the human brain over a lifetime.

Source: UCSD

With a five-year, $126 million grant from the National Institutes of Health (NIH), a multi-institution team of researchers at University of California San Diego School of Medicine, Salk Institute for Biological Studies and elsewhere has launched a new Center for Multiomic Human Brain Cell Atlas.

A newer-generation clot-busting drug called tenecteplase outperforms the traditional treatment for ischemic strokes in several key areas, including better health outcomes and lower costs, according to a new study published today in the American Stroke Association’s journal Stroke.

The study was led by a team of neurologists at Dell Medical School at The University of Texas at Austin and was carried out over a 15-month period at 10 Ascension Seton hospitals in Central Texas starting in September 2019.

The Dell Med Neurology Stroke Program was one of the first in the United States to make this change. Based on even the earliest results from this study, other experts across the country were convinced and made the switch from alteplase to tenecteplase at their own stroke centers, including at Ascension hospitals nationwide.

We still need to go to the gym, though.

What would you think if I told you that you could burn fat sitting down? Hang on to your hat because if you don’t like moving that much, this new development may be a turning point for you.

Continue reading “Researchers reveal soleus muscle helps to burn fat while sitting” »

It is scheduled to be completed by 2050.

Tokyo’s Metropolitan Government plans to build a high-tech, sustainable city on reclaimed land in its bay area — Tokyo Bay eSG. Announced in April 2021, the Tokyo Metropolitan Government is clearing the decks for action to make the city carbon-neutral and better able to withstand future climate and health crises.

Continue reading “Tokyo builds an eco-friendly high-end technology city on the bay” »

Imperial researchers have embedded new low-cost sensors that monitor breathing, heart rate, and ammonia into t-shirts and face masks.

Potential applications range from monitoring exercise, sleep, and stress to diagnosing and monitoring disease through breath and vital signs.

Spun from a new Imperial-developed cotton-based conductive thread called PECOTEX, the sensors cost little to manufacture. Just $0.15 produces a meter of thread to seamlessly integrate more than ten sensors into clothing, and PECOTEX is compatible with industry-standard computerized embroidery machines.

What do clouds, televisions, pharmaceuticals, and even the dirt under our feet have in common? They all have or use crystals in some way. Crystals are more than just fancy gemstones. Clouds form when water vapor condenses into ice crystals in the atmosphere. Liquid crystal displays are used in a variety of electronics, from televisions to instrument panels. Crystallization is an important step for drug discovery and purification. Crystals also make up rocks and other minerals. Their crucial role in the environment is a focus of materials science and health sciences research.

Scientists have yet to fully understand how crystallization occurs, but the importance of surfaces in promoting the process has long been recognized. Research from Pacific Northwest National Laboratory (PNNL), the University of Washington (UW), and Durham University sheds new light on how crystals form at surfaces. Their results were published in Science Advances.

Previous studies on crystallization led scientists to form the classical nucleation theory—the predominant explanation for why crystals begin to form, or nucleate. When crystals nucleate, they begin as very small ephemeral clusters of just a few atoms. Their small size makes the clusters extremely difficult to detect. Scientists have managed to collect only a few images of such processes.