Tech

Metabolism experts are increasingly convinced that obesity and many of the pathogenic changes it entails, such as Metabolic Syndrome and type 2 diabetes, are a result of chronic inflammatory processes in fatty (adipose) tissue. The adipose tissue of obese people exhibits higher-than-normal quantities of almost all types of immune and inflammatory cells.

It's a notion that might be pulled from the pages of science-fiction novel - electronic devices that can be injected directly into the brain, or other body parts, and treat everything from neurodegenerative disorders to paralysis.

It sounds unlikely, until you visit Charles Lieber's Harvard lab.

Imaging lung cancer requires both precision and innovation. With this aim, researchers have developed a technique for clinical positron emission tomography (PET) imaging that creates advanced whole-body parametric maps, which allow quantitative evaluation of tumors and metastases throughout the body, according to research announced at the 2015 Annual Meeting of the Society of Nuclear Medicine and Molecular Imaging (SNMMI).

Columbia University scientists have developed a computational method to investigate the relationship between birth month and disease risk. The researchers used this algorithm to examine New York City medical databases and found 55 diseases that correlated with the season of birth. Overall, the study indicated people born in May had the lowest disease risk, and those born in October the highest. The study was published in the Journal of American Medical Informatics Association.

For being so small, fruit flies have had a large impact on genetic research. Thomas Werner, an assistant professor of biological sciences at Michigan Technological University, has bridged the miniscule and the massive in an effort to better understand the mechanisms behind several unique features of fruit fly genes.

Glasgow, United Kingdom: Non-invasive prenatal testing (NIPT) for Down's syndrome is feasible, acceptable to parents, and could be introduced into the National Health Service (NHS), UK researchers say. The results of a National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) study carried out by the first NHS laboratory to provide NIPT testing will be reported to the annual conference of the European Society of Human Genetics today (Saturday).

Today the U.S. Food and Drug Administration's (FDA) joint meeting of the Bone, Reproductive and Urologic Drugs Advisory Committee, and the Drug Safety and Risk Management Advisory Committee determined by an 18 to 6 vote that the benefit/risk profile of ADDYI (flibanserin) supports FDA approval for Hypoactive Sexual Desire Disorder (HSDD) in premenopausal women, but only if certain risk management options beyond labeling are implemented.

n artificial intelligence system has for the first time reverse-engineered the regeneration mechanism of planaria--the small worms whose extraordinary power to regrow body parts has made them a research model in human regenerative medicine.

Treatment options for chronic hepatitis C, a serious and life-threatening infection, have improved substantially and several new regimens with shorter durations and improved efficacy and safety profiles are now available.

Groups have raised concerns about the evidence used to support the approval of some newer drugs, however, and the issue has been used to cast doubt on their efficacy and even to question treatment or deny reimbursement.

Amgen announced the initiation of the ARROW trial(1), a global Phase 3 study evaluating the benefit of Kyprolis (carfilzomib) for Injection administered once-weekly with dexamethasone versus the current U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved twice-weekly administration schedule in patients with relapsed and refractory multiple myeloma who have received prior treatment with bortezomib and an immunomodulatory agent (IMiD).

In recent years, the biopharmaceutical industry has seen an explosion in the availability of Big Data that can generate valuable insights. Despite this, the inherent costs and challenges that come with utilizing Big Data have caused the biopharmaceutical sector to embrace Big Data analytics much slower than other industries.

Singapore -- Scientists from A*STAR's Bioinformatics Institute (BII) have developed an analytical model and computational tool to rapidly and accurately predict the occurrence and locations of R-loop Forming Sequences (RLFSs) in any genome or artificial nucleic acid sequences. R-loops, which are three-stranded RNA and DNA hybrid structures, can be crucial to many normal biological processes and have also been associated with triggering mutations, DNA breaks and diseases.

SanDisk Corporation introduced the new SanDisk Z400s SSD, which they are touting as a cost effective solid-state drive (SSD) designed to replace hard-disk drives (HDDs) in computing platforms and embedded applications.

They say the Z400s outperforms HDDs by 20X, while providing 5x the reliability with 20x lower average power consumption, all at a price point on par with HDDs.

Many have recently questioned the efficacy of the most common antidepressant medications, the selective serotonin reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs). The conclusion that these drugs are ineffective is however partly based on a misinterpretation of the outcome of the clinical trials once conducted to demonstrate their efficacy. This was the finding of a study conducted by researchers at the Sahlgrenska Academy.

A drug that promotes weight loss in obese mice by causing them to burn off excess calories is reported in a study published in Nature Communications this week. The drug causes the mice to generate more brown and beige fat, which are specialised tissues that burn lipid molecules to generate heat.