Lifeboat Foundation

In the mid-1990’s, MEMS emerged in industrial manufacturing in a major way and MEMS components began appearing in numerous commercial products and applications including force sensors used to control brake deployment in vehicles, blood pressure sensors, inkjet printer heads, miniature analytical instruments, fiber-optic network components, air-and spacecraft control and of course military applications like surveillance and munitions guidance.

Acute myeloid leukemia (AML) is a rare and aggressive hematologic malignancy. AML progresses rapidly and is indicated by an excess of immature white blood cells. It is caused by high mutational burden over the span of a person’s life. One signature mutated gene includes the tumor suppressor gene TP53. Normally, TP53 helps make protein to stop oncogenesis or the formation of tumors. However, mutated TP53 loses that function and commonly results in AML. Unfortunately, those that have a TP53 mutation have an extremely aggressive tumor that is resistant to conventional chemotherapy drugs and results in poor prognosis. Other standard treatments include stem-cells transplants, and sometimes targeted drugs such as intracellular pathway inhibitors. Although many treatments are routine and help the patient reduce symptoms, there is no cure. Extensive research is currently being done by researchers and physicians to identify new approaches for AML treatment.

One novel therapy used in other hematologic malignancies includes chimeric antigen receptor (CAR)-T cell therapy. This therapy takes immune T cells (responsible for lysing or kill infections) from the patient or a donor and engineers them to target the tumor. Normally, these T cells would not recognize tumor growth, therefore, the engineered CAR-T cells are programmed to elicit an immune response and recognize surface markers on the tumor to lyse it. This therapy has been successful in other leukemias such as B-cell acute leukemia, and researchers are working to overcome treatment resistant AML using the same approach.

A recent article in EMBO Molecular Medicine, by Drs. Markus Manz, Stephen Boettcher and others, demonstrate that TP53-mutated AML is resistant to CAR-T cell therapy as a single agent, but can be overcome through combination therapy. Manz and Boettcher are principal investigators from the University of Zurich and the Department of Medical Oncology and Hematology at the University Hospital Zurich (USZ) and focus on mechanisms surrounding hematological diseases. The Zurich team first reported why TP53-mutated AML is resistant to CAR-T cell therapy. Using various models, it was noted that the engineered T cells quickly become ‘exhausted’ or inactive due to overstimulation or surrounding stimuli. The team further studied the underlying mechanism in this disease by concluding that TP53-deficient cells caused resistance through several metabolic pathways. Moreover, these pathways including the mevalonate and Wnt pathways were identified to improve therapeutic efficacy.

An AI tool called Mia found missed breast cancer symptoms in the scans of 11 women during an NHS test.

Colossal Biosciences, a Dallas-based biotechnology company, says it has developed the technology necessary to bring the woolly mammoth back from extinction. NBC News’ Morgan Chesky reports on the opportunities this new technology could bring as well as the concerns some scientists are raising.

Stanford and McMaster University researchers created an artificial intelligence (AI) model to design molecules that inhibit the growth of Acinetobacter baumannii, a common drug-resistant bacteria. They synthesized and validated six structurally novel molecules that demonstrated antibacterial activity against A. baumannii and other phylogenetically diverse bacterial pathogens. This study represents a significant step toward the practical application of generative AI approaches for antibiotic discovery and drug discovery in general.

The research article, “Generative AI for designing and validating easily synthesizable and structurally novel antibiotics,” was published in Nature Machine Intelligence.

Among the most critical issues in contemporary medicine is the worldwide spread of factors contributing to antibiotic resistance. In 2019, drug-resistant infections were responsible for an estimated 4.95 million deaths. As new antibiotics are being developed slower than the spread of antimicrobial resistance determinants, this figure is expected to reach 10 million annually by 2050.

A collaborative project to bring the promise of cell therapy to patients with a deadly form of brain cancer has shown dramatic results among the first patients to receive the novel treatment. In a paper published today in The New England Journal of Medicine, researchers from the Mass General Cancer Center, a member of the Mass General Brigham healthcare system, shared the results for the first three patient cases from a phase 1 clinical trial evaluating a new approach to CAR-T therapy for glioblastoma (GBM). The trial, known as INCIPIENT, is designed to evaluate the safety of CARv3-TEAM-E T cells in patients with recurrent GBM. Just days after a single treatment, patients experienced dramatic reductions in their tumors, with one patient achieving near-complete tumor regression. In time, the researchers observed tumor progression in these patients, but given the strategy’s promising preliminary results, the team will pursue strategies to extend the durability of response.

“This is a story of bench-to-bedside therapy, with a novel cell therapy designed in the laboratories of Massachusetts General Hospital and translated for patient use within five years, to meet an urgent need,” said Bryan Choi, MD, PhD, neurosurgeon and associate director of the Center for Brain Tumor Immunology and Immunotherapy, Cellular Immunotherapy Program, Mass General Cancer Center and Department of Neurosurgery. “The CAR-T platform has revolutionized how we think about treating patients with cancer, but solid tumors like glioblastoma have remained challenging to treat because not all cancer cells are exactly alike and cells within the tumor vary. Our approach combines two forms of therapy, allowing us to treat glioblastoma in a broader, potentially more effective way.”

AI technology developed by Johns Hopkins University to detect COVID-19 in lung ultrasound images, revolutionizing medical diagnostics.

In a potentially game-changing development, scientists with the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute at VTC have revealed a new understanding of sometimes fatal viral infections that affect the heart.

Traditionally, the focus has been on heart inflammation known as myocarditis, which is often triggered by the body’s immune response to a viral infection.

However, a new study led by James Smyth, associate professor at the Fralin Biomedical Research Institute, sheds new light on this notion, revealing that the virus itself creates potentially dangerous conditions in the heart before inflammation sets in.

This post is also available in: עברית (Hebrew)

Recent advancements in artificial intelligence make it increasingly harder to detect deepfake voices, and the solution might actually come from AI itself.

Scientists at Klick Labs were inspired by their clinical studies using vocal biomarkers to help enhance health outcomes and created an audio deepfake detection method that taps into signs of life like breathing patterns and micropauses in speech.