“The World Health Organisation (WHO) has endorsed bedside diagnostics as the top research priority in response to the so-far 2-year long epidemic without let-up. The aim is to improve turnaround time and ease of use compared to the gold standard lab-based PCR test. These have included rapid antigen tests, alternate nucleic amplification methods and novel sensors in proxi...
While the manufacturing of biological tissue meets major societal demands, it also faces significant challenges related to process standardization and scaling up. With these challenges in mind, the French start-up Poietis has developed the Next Generation Bioprinting (NGB) platform to achieve 4D bioprinting of biological tissue in a faster, more affordable and more funct...
Sensitive, specific, and rapid diagnostic tests are critical to reducing morbidity and mortality of infectious disease patients. Viral, bacterial, and other types of infections can develop from a vast number of pathogenic and opportunistic organisms, indicating a need for versatile diagnostics that can be adapted to a wide variety of infectious etiologies. "Sensitive a...
This is to avoid that an embryo-damaging effect would only be noticed at a later stage during tests with pregnant mice. However, these cell culture tests are a highly simplified version of what takes place in the uterus. Researchers just add the test material to a culture of embryonic stem cells in a Petri dish, and can identify substances that have a direct adverse effe...
A fundamental requirement for functional tissue is that blood vessels must be able to grow in them and connect to the organism’s vascular system, so that the tissue is properly supplied with oxygen and nutrients. However, until now, almost nothing has been known about which material properties promote the growth of blood vessels. A team headed by biomedical engineer Dr ...
A classic laboratory workflow involves the arrival of samples and their testing, as samples must meet certain requirements to be meaningfully tested. Next, they are given a laboratory number and sampled so that the readings can then be analyzed. Particularly monotonous in this regard are repetitive tasks that do not actually require humans, but can be done by machines. T...
"We show that optical spectroscopy provides sensitive detection of early changes in the biomolecular composition of tumors," said Narasimhan Rajaram, associate professor of biomedical engineering. "This is important because these changes predict response to immunotherapy with immune checkpoint inhibitors. Thus, our work is the first step in determining whether Raman spec...
CD47 is a so-called "do not eat me’" signal to the immune system’s defences that protect cells from being destroyed. Virus-induced CD47 on the surface of infected cells is likely to protect them from immune system recognition, enabling the production of larger amounts of virus, resulting in more severe disease. Well-known risk factors for severe COVID-19, such as older ...
Ultra-Low Freezers are used for storing temperature-sensitive specimens, biosamples, vaccines, etc., at temperatures as low as -86°C to enable their long-term and reliable storage. The WHO Performance, Quality, and Safety (PQS) process prequalifies products and devices so that member states and UN purchasing agencies are assured of their suitability for use in immunizati...
One possible treatment, neutralizing single domain antibodies (nanobodies), has significant potential. The unique antibody produced by llamas is small, stable, and could possibly be administered as a nasal spray—an important characteristic as the antibody treatments currently in use require administration by infusion in the hospital. Now, new research shows that nanobodi...
Researchers at the McKelvey School of Engineering at Washington University in St. Louis have now developed a synthetic chemistry technology that could make this feasible. The method allows them to polymerize proteins inside of engineered microbes. Using the technology, the team engineered microbial production of the high molecular weight muscle protein, titin, which was ...
A novel artificial intelligence blood testing technology developed by researchers at the Johns Hopkins Kimmel Cancer Center was found to detect over 90 percent of lung cancers in samples from nearly 800 individuals with and without cancer. The test approach, called DELFI (DNA evaluation of fragments for early interception), spots unique patterns in the fragmentation of ...
This article was simultaneously published in DirectIndustry e-magazine. Dusty Tenney, CEO of US-based Stirling Ultracold, which manufactures three sizes of ULT freezers, operating within -20°C to -86°C, for life science and biopharma research, said: “As recently observed in Forbes, the Covid-19 pandemic will be remembered as the ‘great accelerator’ of technological tr...
There are antibiotics against dangerous bacteria, but few antidotes to treat acute viral infections. Some infections can be prevented by vaccination but developing new vaccines is a long and laborious process. Now an interdisciplinary research team from the Technical University of Munich, the Helmholtz Zentrum München, and the Brandeis University (USA) is proposing a no...
One of the panelists, Dr. Farshad Guirakhoo, Chief Scientific Officer of COVAXX and Chief Scientific Officer of the American biotech Vaxxinity, approached the necessary requirements for the next generation of vaccines emerging against SARS-CoV-2 variants and, more generally, the different methods of vaccine manufacturing—which include the established use of inactivated (...
Early 2020 saw the world break into what has been described as a "war-like situation:" a pandemic, caused by the severe acute respiratory syndrome-related coronavirus 2 (SARS-CoV-2), the likes of which majority of the living generations across most of the planet have not ever seen. This pandemic has downed economies and resulted in hundreds of thousands of deaths. At the...
AI Could Tell How Your Immune System Responds to Viral Infections Experts said that there is now an AI which could predict gene patterns of the patients suffering from a viral disease. In a study entitled "AI-guided discovery of the invariant host response to viral pandemics" posted in eBiomedicine on Friday, June 11, two different gene sets have shown different actions...
Both new tests are solid-phase enzyme immunoassays and are for research use only. INNOTEST NPTX2 is intended for the quantitative determination of neuronal pentraxin-2 (NPTX2) in human CSF, and INNOTEST sTREM2 is intended for the quantitative determination of soluble Triggering Receptor Expressed on Myeloid cells 2 (sTREM2) in human CSF. “Fujirebio pioneered Alzheimer’s...
EKF Diagnostics announces that it has acquired Advanced Diagnostic Laboratory LLC (“ADL Health”), a Texas based PCR-focused testing laboratory certified under the Clinical Laboratory Improvement Amendments (“CLIA”) for high-complexity molecular diagnostics testing. ADL Health’s CLIA-certified laboratory covers the fields of clinical, forensic and microbiological tests. T...
Scientists at Sanford Burnham Prebys have identified a set of human genes that fight SARS-CoV-2 infection, the virus that causes COVID-19. Knowing which genes help control viral infection can greatly assist researchers’ understanding of factors that affect disease severity and also suggest possible therapeutic options. The genes in question are related to interferons, th...
Gent, Belgium and Tokyo, Japan – October 28, 2021: H.U. Group Holdings Inc., and its wholly-owned subsidiary Fujirebio, today announced an agreement with the Diagnostics Accelerator initiative of the Alzheimer's Drug Discovery Foundation (ADDF) to accelerate the development of a plasma pTau181 detection assay on the fully automated LUMIPULSE® G immunoassay platform. pTau...
PHILADELPHIA—A new gene therapy for one of the most common forms of congenital blindness was safe and improved patients' vision, according to initial data from a clinical trial led by researchers at the Scheie Eye Institute in the Perelman School of Medicine at the University of Pennsylvania. The therapy delivers working copies of GUCY2D to the eyes of patients who have...
Now they have around 90% of the market share in Japan. We spoke with Takashi Soematsu, Business Development Manager at TechnoMedica, who believes that the Covid-19 pandemic is a chance and an opportunity to change our mindsets. MedicalExpo e-Magazine: Could you introduce us to your company’s top products? Takashi Soematsu: TechnoMedica is a Japanese pre-analytical s...
Conceptually, implantable biosensors for health monitoring have been around for a while. The problem, however, is that once implanted, the body sees them as foreign and rejects them. Here, immune responses activate the formation of fibrous tissue which cocoons the devices’ sensors, rendering them inactive. To overcome this problem, researchers at the Johannes Gutenberg ...
Since the beginning of the pandemic, scientists have been scrambling to identify antiviral drugs to treat COVID patients with severe and life-threatening symptoms. Unfortunately, until now, this search has dug up very few viable options. Antivirals such as Remdesivir and Ruxolitinib are notoriously ineffective at treating COVID patients. To understand why these drugs fa...
All viruses mutate as they make copies of themselves to spread and thrive. SARS-CoV-2, the virus the causes COVID-19, is proving to be no different. There are currently more than 4,000 variants of COVID-19, which has already killed more than 2.7 million people worldwide during the pandemic. The UK variant, also known as B.1.1.7, was first detected in September 2020, and...
EKF Diagnostics announces that it will be demonstrating its new STAT-Site® WB dual analyte measurement system at the 2021 AACC Annual Scientific Meeting & Clinical Lab Expo. As EKF’s first face-to-face event since COVID-19 restrictions began, this will be the premiere of the new handheld analyzer for reliable and efficient β-ketone and glucose measurement from whole bloo...
Using high-resolution mass spectrometry (MS) techniques to profile the complex signature of metabolites in sebum samples from more than 200 participants with and without Parkinson’s disease, the researchers identified novel diagnostic sebum-based biomarkers for Parkinson’s disease, and uncovered subtle, but fundamental changes as the disease progresses. The results poin...
Unlocking the power of the human genome is a feat that no one organization can fully accomplish on its own. That's why, back in 2014, Illumina created the world’s first business accelerator focused solely on creating an innovation ecosystem for the genomics industry. Now in its sixth year, the Illumina Accelerator has just selected nine new genomics companies to join it...
Around the world, multiple studies are now ongoing to determine whether supplements of common nutrients and vitamins could help ward off infections of SARS-CoV-2, the coronavirus that causes Covid-19 or even treat the disease by limiting its inflammatory effect on the lungs and other organs. What is clear is that the greatest benefit of supplements is likely for people w...
To cause COVID-19, the SARS-CoV-2 virus must force its way into people’s cells – and it needs an accomplice. Cholesterol, the waxy compound better known for clogging arteries, helps the virus open cells up and slip inside, Howard Hughes Medical Institute Investigator Clifford Brangwynne’s lab reports. Without cholesterol, the virus cannot sneak past a cell’s protectiv...
Gent, Belgium – August 18, 2021: Fujirebio Europe announces the CE marking of the Lumipulse G SARS-CoV-2 S-IgG assay, a quantitative antibody assay for a fully automated CLEIA (chemiluminescent enzyme immunoassay) system. The quantitative measurement of IgG antibodies to SARS-CoV-2 Spike (S) Receptor Binding Domain (RBD) can help in the assessment of immune response to t...
A novel computational drug screening strategy combined with lab experiments suggest that pralatrexate, a chemotherapy medication originally developed to treat lymphoma, could potentially be repurposed to treat COVID-19. Haiping Zhang of the Shenzhen Institutes of Advanced Technology in Shenzhen, China, and colleagues present these findings in the open-access journal PLOS...
A sizeable fraction of patients hospitalized with breathing problems also have diarrhea, nausea and vomiting, suggesting that when the virus does get involved in the GI tract it increases the severity of the disease. In a review published in mBio, microbiologist Heenam Stanley Kim, from Korea University's Laboratory for Human-Microbial Interactions, examined emerging ...
At the 2021 virtual Digestive Disease Week, Duke University gastroenterologist Deborah Fisher, MD, and engineering professor Sonia Grego, PhD, showed that toilets enabled with artificial intelligence can analyze stool samples for signs of acute or chronic gastrointestinal disease, such as bleeding, infections or even inflammatory bowel disease. “The flush toilet is the ...
The team found high accuracy in predicting the probability of COVID-19 infection using routine blood tests, which can help hospitals reduce the number of patients referred for scarce PCR testing. "Nine months into this pandemic, we now have a better understanding of how to care for patients with COVID-19," says lead author and University of Vermont Assistant Professor...
