Lifeboat Foundation

Baricitinib is an oral selective Janus kinase 1/2 inhibitor with known anti-inflammatory properties. This study evaluates the efficacy and safety of baricitinib in combination with standard of care for the treatment of hospitalised adults with COVID-19.

In this phase 3 double-blind, randomised, placebo-controlled trial, participants were enrolled from 101 centres across 12 countries in Asia, Europe, North America, and South America. Hospitalised adults with COVID-19 receiving standard of care were randomly assigned (1:1) to receive once-daily baricitinib (4 mg) or matched placebo for up to 14 days. Standard of care included systemic corticosteroids, such as dexamethasone, and antivirals, including remdesivir. The composite primary endpoint was the proportion who progressed to high-flow oxygen, non-invasive ventilation, invasive mechanical ventilation, or death by day 28 assessed in the intention-to-treat population. All-cause mortality by day 28 was a key secondary endpoint, and all-cause mortality by day 60 was an exploratory endpoint; both were assessed in the intention-to-treat population. Safety analyses were done in the safety population defined as all randomly allocated participants who received at least one dose of study drug and who were not lost to follow-up before the first post-baseline visit. This study is registered with ClinicalTrials-gov, NCT04421027.

Although there was no significant reduction in the frequency of disease progression overall, treatment with baricitinib in addition to standard of care (including dexamethasone) had a similar safety profile to that of standard of care alone, and was associated with reduced mortality in hospitalised adults with COVID-19.

Continue reading “Efficacy and safety of baricitinib for the treatment of hospitalised adults with COVID-19 (COV-BARRIER): a randomised, double-blind, parallel-group, placebo-controlled phase 3 trial” »

I believe the transduction theory has a great deal to offer in our scientific study of the mind–brain relationship. It is, of course, a dualist theory. It provides a framework for understanding the close link between brain states and mental states, yet at the same time, it explains mental states in a way that does not invoke nonsensical materialist metaphysics.

A successful understanding of the mind–brain relationship will necessarily involve understanding the brain as a transduction device in one way or another. Such an understanding could prove enormously fruitful and can help us move beyond the current materialist framework in which neuroscience is practiced, which has has held us so far back in our understanding of the mind and the brain. The brain is obviously material but it is just as obvious that the mind has immaterial abilities.

We accept that the ear is a transducer for sound to hearing and the eye is a transducer for light to vision. It is reasonable to infer that the brain is a transducer for thought to body. Transduction theory is a plausible approach to understanding the connection between the mind and the brain. It should be taken seriously by neuroscientists and philosophers of the mind.

A team of researchers from Australia, Canada and the U.S. has found that female octopuses sometimes throw silt at males who are attempting to mate with them. The group has written a paper describing their observations and has posted it on the bioRxiv preprint server.

Back in 2,015 members of the research team recorded instances of octopuses throwing things at other octopuses. At the time, it was not clear if the other octopuses were being intentionally targeted or if it was accidental. To find out, they went back to the same site in Jervis Bay, off the coast of Australia, a site where large numbers of Sydney octopuses live.

In making more recordings and studying them carefully, the researchers were able to see that the female octopuses engaged in multiple types of object-throwing. In most instances, throwing material such as silt or even shells was simply a means of moving material that was in the way or when building a nest. Less often, they saw what were clearly attempts by females to hurl material at a nearby male—usually, one trying to mate with her.

“We have a much deeper sense of what actions make a difference for the safety of our restaurant teams and crew,” McDonald’s USA President Joe Erlinger said during a Wednesday meeting, according to the materials.

In Wednesday’s conference call, McDonald’s executives recommended franchisees consider closing indoor seating in counties where Covid cases exceed 250 per 100,000 people on a rolling three-week average.

The unambiguous discovery of a Wigner crystal relied on a novel technique for probing the insides of complex materials.

A new hydrogel could help improve the treatment of damaged cartilage in knees and other joints. The unique properties of the gel, which provides a scaffold for cartilage cells to grow on, allow it to be implanted via keyhole surgery.

“We will start human trials soon,” says Qiuning Lin at the Shanghai Jiao Tong University in China.

Magnetic excitations in multiferroic materials accompany electric polarization, known as electromagnons. The authors develop here a general framework to study electric polarization and nonlinear optical responses of noncentrosymmetric magnets based on spin models. They theoretically demonstrate the optical excitation of electromagnon-induced dc current generation (i.e., a photovoltaic effect) from the so-called shift current mechanism.

You may not want to live near areas like this in the country.

“The problem you have here is that the NRC is simply not doing its job as a regulator. So what it has done is allowed the industry to basically determine the conditions under which this material is stored on a temporary basis across the country,” echoed retired Rear Admiral Len Hering, who served more than 30 years in the US navy and was awarded a2005presidential award for leadership in federal energy management from President George W Bush.

Continue reading “‘A combination of failures:’ why 3.6m pounds of nuclear waste is buried under a popular California beach” »