Treating Pulmonary Diseases Using Alaska Pollock Gelatin
“Because it possesses extremely high bonding strength and elasticity, and it slowly breaks down in the body after surgery, it has the potential to be used as a sealant for any organ.”
Science
How Do We Sense Electric Fields?
A variety of animals are able to sense and react to electric fields, and living human cells will move along an electric field, for example in wound healing. Now a team lead by Min Zhao at the UC Davis Institute for Regenerative Cures has found the first actual “sensor mechanism” that allows a living cell detect an electric field.
A New Way to Fight Aging in the Brain
Our brain cells change with age: various genes become more or less active, the membrane that holds the nucleus together starts to degenerate, and molecules that in young cells are neatly compartmentalized become scattered and disorganized. Now scientists have found a way to transform ordinary skin cells into living cultures of aging human neurons—test beds for ways we might reverse these effects of time.
Antiviral Compound Provides Full Protection from Ebola Virus in Nonhuman Primates
Rhesus monkeys were completely protected from the deadly Ebola virus when treated three days after infection with a compound that blocks the virus’s ability to replicate.
Scientists Found a Flu Vaccine Flaw—Now They Have to Fix It
Among flu viruses, H3N2 is the one you should fear the most. It lands the most patients in hospitals. It kills the most people. Oh, and bad news: The flu shot has real trouble fighting it. Last year’s seasonal flu vaccine was particularly weak…
Nobel Prize in Chemistry Awarded to Tomas Lindahl, Paul Modrich and Aziz Sancar for DNA Studies
Their systematic work has made a decisive contribution to the understanding of how the living cell functions, as well as providing knowledge about the molecular causes of several hereditary diseases and about mechanisms behind both cancer development and aging.
2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine
The Nobel Assembly at Karolinska Institutet has decided to award the 2015 Nobel Prize in Physiology or Medicine with one half jointly to William C. Campbell and Satoshi Ōmura for their discoveries concerning a novel therapy against infections caused by…
Could Dark Matter Cause Cancer?
But what could this dark matter possibly be? Astronomers think it must interact only very weakly with ordinary mater, otherwise we would have already seen its effects.
J. Craig Venter to Sell DNA Data to Consumers
Fifteen years ago, scientific instigator J. Craig Venter spent $100 million to race the government and sequence a human genome, which turned out to be his own. Now the entrepreneur says he will sequence the medically important genes of its clients for just $250.
A Life-Changing, True Story Reveals the Secret to Success
It was frigid and damp at dawn the last day Phineas Gage arrived to work on time. As he shoved his hands in the pockets of his jacket and cut through the cold, he contemplated the challenges that lie ahead…