Lifeboat Foundation

A tiny but prolific world of microbes encompasses everything around us, both inside and out. Microbiomes, which are comprised of diverse communities of microbes, play a pivotal role in shaping human health, yet the intricacies of how different microbial compositions influence our well-being remain largely unknown.

In a recent study published in Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, researchers at the University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign describe a new framework they have created to predict how species within microbiomes interact with each other to create unique compositions.

“Microbes can be used in medicine, aka ‘bugs as drugs,’ and these microbial therapeutics hold the possibility of being the answer to many of the diseases we face today,” said Shreya Arya, a graduate student in the O’Dwyer lab.

Limits of large language models in precision medicine. Treating cancer is becoming increasingly complex, but also offers more and more possibilities. After all, the better a tumor’s biology and genetic features are understood, the more treatment approaches there are. To be able to offer patients personalized therapies tailored to their disease, laborious and time-consuming analysis and interpretation of various data is required. Researchers at Charité — Universitätsmedizin Berlin and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin have now studied whether generative artificial intelligence (AI) tools such as ChatGPT can help with this step. This is one of many projects at Charité analyzing the opportunities unlocked by AI in patient care.

If the body can no longer repair certain genetic mutations itself, cells begin to grow unchecked, producing a tumor.

The crucial factor in this phenomenon is an imbalance of growth-inducing and growth-inhibiting factors, which can result from changes in oncogenes — genes with the potential to cause cancer — for example.

Large language models such as that used by ChatGPT could soon become essential tools for diagnosing and treating patients. To protect people’s privacy and safety, medical professionals, not commercial interests, must drive their development and deployment.

Summary: Researchers developed ‘Anthrobots,’ microscopic biological robots made from human tracheal cells, demonstrating potential in healing and regenerative medicine.

These self-assembling multicellular robots, ranging from hair-width to pencil-point size, show remarkable healing effects, particularly in neuron growth across damaged areas in lab conditions.

Building on earlier Xenobot research, this study reveals that Anthrobots can be created from adult human cells without genetic modification, offering a new approach to patient-specific therapeutic tools.

The researchers are excited by the potential of how cells cooperate and communicate in the body and how they can be reprogrammed to create new structures and functions.

With the help of Simon Garnier at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, the team characterized the different types of Anthrobots that were produced.

They observed that bots fell into a few discrete categories of shape and movement, ranging in size from 30 to 500 micrometers (from the thickness of a human hair to the point of a sharpened pencil), filling an important niche between nanotechnology and larger engineered devices.

Continue reading “These ‘anthrobots’ created from human cells are healing neurons” »

The accelerator, an advanced wakefield laser accelerator, is under 20 feet long, generating a 10 billion electron-volt (10 GeV) electron beam.

Bjorn “Manuel” Hegelich, associate professor of physics at UT and CEO of TAU Systems, alluding to the size of the chamber where the beam was produced stated: “We can now reach those energies in 10 centimeters.”

Scientists are aiming to use this technology for assessing the resilience of space-bound electronics against radiation, capturing the 3D internal configurations of emerging semiconductor chip designs, and potentially pioneering new cancer treatments and advanced medical imaging methodologies.

Continue reading “Scientists make a laser accelerator with 10 billion electron-volt beam” »

Summary: Researchers used AI to select and generate images for studying brain’s visual processing. Functional MRI (fMRI) recorded heightened brain activity in response to these images, surpassing control images.

The approach enabled tuning visual models to individual responses, enhancing the study of brain’s reaction to visual stimuli. This method, offering an unbiased, systematic view of visual processing, could revolutionize neuroscience and therapeutic approaches.

Are robots made from frog cells (Xenopus laevis).

Scientists have developed tiny robots made of human cells that are able to repair damaged neural tissue¹. The ‘anthrobots’ were made using human tracheal cells and might, in future, be used in personalized medicine.

Developmental biologist Michael Levin at Tufts University in Medford, Massachusetts, and his colleagues had previously developed tiny robots using clumps of embryonic frog cells. But the medical applications of these ‘xenobots’ were limited, because they weren’t derived from human cells and because they had to be manually carved into the desired shape. The researchers have now developed self-assembling anthrobots and are investigating their therapeutic potential using human tissue grown in the laboratory. They published their findings in Advanced Science.

Continue reading “Tiny robots made from human cells heal damaged tissue” »

The new contest aims to spur innovation into longer ‘healthspans’ with treatments that can actually reverse age-related degradation in body, mind and immune system.