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Category: biotech/medical – Page 1,802

Perfectionistic cognitions appear to play a key role in clinical anxiety

A new study found that perfectionist thinking patterns contributed to posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) and generalized anxiety disorder (GAD) symptoms, over and above several known control variables. The findings were published in Cognitive Behaviour Therapy.

Perfectionism involves a desire to perform to the highest standards without allowing room for failure. People with perfectionist beliefs tend to be overly self-critical and put pressure on themselves to perform flawlessly at all times. While perfectionism is often seen as a favorable trait, the attribute has been linked to numerous anxiety disorders such as obsessive compulsive disorder (OCD) and social anxiety disorder (SAD).

Researchers have recently begun exploring the thought patterns that characterize perfectionism — called perfectionist cognitions (PC). As study author Jeremy Tyler and his team say, perfectionist cognitions include expectations about achieving perfection such as, “I can’t stand to make mistakes.” These cognitions have been linked to dysfunctional mental health symptoms like obsessions, distress, and anxiety. However, these associations have yet to be explored among a clinical population.

New genetic target for blood cancer treatment

Targeting a pathway that is essential for the survival of certain types of acute myeloid leukaemia could provide a new therapy avenue for patients, the latest research has found.

Researchers from the Wellcome Sanger Institute found that a specific genetic mutation, which is linked with poor prognosis in blood cancer, is involved in the development of the disease when combined with other mutations in mice and human cell lines.

The study, published today (30th April) in Nature Communications, provides a greater understanding of how the loss-of-function mutation in the CUX1 gene leads to the development and survival of acute myeloid leukaemia. The findings suggest that targeting a pathway that is essential for these to continue growing could lead to new targeted therapies for some patients.

New Law of Physics Helps Humans and Robots Grasp the Friction of Touch

Still calling 2025 for the debut of a robotic set of human level hands.

Although robotic devices are used in everything from assembly lines to medicine, engineers have a hard time accounting for the friction that occurs when those robots grip objects – particularly in wet environments. Researchers have now discovered a new law of physics that accounts for this type of friction, which should advance a wide range of robotic technologies.

“Our work here opens the door to creating more reliable and functional haptic and robotic devices in applications such as telesurgery and manufacturing,” says Lilian Hsiao, an assistant professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering at North Carolina State University and corresponding author of a paper on the work.

At issue is something called elastohydrodynamic lubrication (EHL) friction, which is the friction that occurs when two solid surfaces come into contact with a thin layer of fluid between them. This would include the friction that occurs when you rub your fingertips together, with the fluid being the thin layer of naturally occurring oil on your skin. But it could also apply to a robotic claw lifting an object that has been coated with oil, or to a surgical device that is being used inside the human body.

The Robot Surgeon Will See You Now

The project is a part of a much wider effort to bring artificial intelligence into the operating room. Using many of the same technologies that underpin self-driving cars, autonomous drones and warehouse robots, researchers are working to automate surgical robots too. These methods are still a long way from everyday use, but progress is accelerating.

Real scalpels, artificial intelligence — what could go wrong?

First Major Discoveries Reported From Project to Read Complete Genetic Sequences of All 70,000 Vertebrate Species

A bold project to read the complete genetic sequences of every known vertebrate species reaches its first milestone by publishing new methods and the first 25 high-quality genomes.

It’s one of the most audacious projects in biology today – reading the entire genome of every bird, mammal, lizard, fish, and all other creatures with backbones.

And now comes the first major payoff from the Vertebrate Genomes Project (VGP): near complete, high-quality genomes of 25 species, Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI) Investigator Erich Jarvis with scores of coauthors report April 28, 2021, in the journal Nature. These species include the greater horseshoe bat, the Canada lynx, the platypus, and the kākāpō parrot – one of the first high-quality genomes of an endangered vertebrate species.

Oncogene Linked to Worsening of Blood Vessel Malformations in Brain

An acquired mutation in the cancer-causing gene PIK3CA can make blood vessel malformations in the brain worse, possibly explaining why these abnormal clusters sometimes rapidly increase in size and cause stroke or seizures, shows new research.

Research from the University of Pennsylvania and Duke University shows an acquired mutation in the cancer-causing gene PIK3CA can trigger uncontrolled growth in cerebral cavernous malformations often leading to strokes or seizures in those affected.

A Man Whose Penis Fell Off Is Growing a New One on His Arm

After a mechanic from the United Kingdom lost his penis, medical innovators fashioned him a replacement out of his existing tissue — and it now rests on his left forearm.

45-year-old Malcolm MacDonald suffered from a perineum infection which led to a severe case of sepsis in 2014, which spread to his extremities, turning his fingers and toes black. Then it began to also affect his genitalia. “When I saw my penis go black I was beside myself,” MacDonald told The Sun. “It was like a horror film…I knew deep down it was gone and I was going to lose it. Then one day it just dropped off on to the floor.”

For two years afterwards, MacDonald says his life “fell apart”, until he was referred to Professor David Ralph, a urologist at University College London Hospital who specializes in penile reconstruction surgery.

Move over CRISPR, the retrons are coming

While the CRISPR-Cas9 gene editing system has become the poster child for innovation in synthetic biology, it has some major limitations. CRISPR-Cas9 can be programmed to find and cut specific pieces of DNA, but editing the DNA to create desired mutations requires tricking the cell into using a new piece of DNA to repair the break. This bait-and-switch can be complicated to orchestrate, and can even be toxic to cells because Cas9 often cuts unintended, off-target sites as well.

Alternative gene editing techniques called recombineering instead perform this bait-and-switch by introducing an alternate piece of DNA while a cell is replicating its genome, efficiently creating without breaking DNA. These methods are simple enough that they can be used in many cells at once to create complex pools of mutations for researchers to study. Figuring out what the effects of those mutations are, however, requires that each mutant be isolated, sequenced, and characterized: a time-consuming and impractical task.

Researchers at the Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering at Harvard University and Harvard Medical School (HMS) have created a new gene editing tool called Retron Library Recombineering (RLR) that makes this task easier. RLR generates up to millions of mutations simultaneously, and “barcodes” mutant cells so that the entire pool can be screened at once, enabling massive amounts of data to be easily generated and analyzed. The achievement, which has been accomplished in , is described in a recent paper in PNAS.

Jasmijn Kok — Juno Perinatal Healthcare — Artificial Womb Technology For Extremely Preterm Infants

Artificial womb technology for extremely preterm infants — jasmijn kok, juno perinatal healthcare.

Every year, 800000 babies are born extremely preterm (defined as less than 28 weeks of age) worldwide. These infants are usually transferred to an air-based neonatal intensive care unit to support their heart and lung development. Exposure to air, however, leads to many complications, because the lungs are not fully developed yet.

An artificial uterus, or artificial womb, is a device that would allow for extra-corporeal pregnancy, by supporting the growth of a fetus outside the body of an organism that would normally carry the fetus to term.

Juno Perinatal Healthcare (https://www.junoperinatalhealthcare.com/) is a fascinating Dutch neonatal healthcare start-up which has a mission of developing a novel, alternative environment, similar to the mother’s womb, where extremely premature babies could be transferred, where the lungs remain filled with fluid and the umbilical cord will be attached to an artificial placenta to improve their organ development and ease the transition to newborn life.

Juno Perinatal Healthcare is a companion project to a interdisciplinary consortium known as the Perinatal Life Support (PLS) Project (https://perinatallifesupport.eu/), a consortium of three European universities, Aachen, Milan and Eindhoven, to establish the first ex-vivo fetal maturation system for clinical use.

Continue reading “Jasmijn Kok — Juno Perinatal Healthcare — Artificial Womb Technology For Extremely Preterm Infants” | >

DNA building blocks regulate inflammation

Mitochondria are the energy suppliers of our body cells. These tiny cell components have their own genetic material, which triggers an inflammatory response when released into the interior of the cell. The reasons for the release are not yet known, but some cardiac and neurodegenerative diseases as well as the aging process are linked to the mitochondrial genome. Researchers at the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Aging and the CECAD Cluster of Excellence in Aging research have investigated the reasons for the release of mitochondrial genetic material and found a direct link to cellular metabolism: when the cell’s DNA building blocks are in short supply, mitochondria release their genetic material and trigger inflammation. The researchers hope to find new therapeutic approaches by influencing this metabolic pathway.

Our body needs energy—for every metabolic process, every movement and for breathing. This energy is produced in tiny components of our body , the so-called mitochondria. Unlike other cell components, mitochondria have their own genetic material, mitochondrial DNA. However, in certain situations, mitochondria release their DNA into the interior of the cell, causing a reaction from the cell’s own immune system and being associated with various diseases as well as the aging process. The reasons for the release of mitochondrial DNA are not yet known.

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