Medicare’s Blue Button: Data is ‘Oxygen for Innovation’
Dr. Farzad Mostashari, National Coordinator for Health Information Technology at the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services, discusses how venture capital is a driver in healthcare information technology and data tools like The Blue Button.
Decades-old stroke damage reversible with oxygen therapy
Up to 20 years after suffering a stroke, patients in Israel are reporting remarkable improvements in brain function with calibrated oxygen treatments inside hyperbaric chambers. While treating stroke patients with hyperbaric oxygen is nothing new, the fact that it can be effective after so many years is an exciting new development according to specialists at Assaf Harofeh Medical Center.
How Medical Technology Is Saving Lives in Afghanistan
At Landstuhl Medical Center in Germany, Air Force personnel explain how they keep wounded soldiers alive on the flight back from Afghanistan.
Nanotechnology Platform for Vaccine Delivery
Virometix AG is a biotechnology company developing a new generation of vaccines and immunotherapeutic drugs for the prevention and treatment of infectious and chronic human diseases.
Rational molecular design, chemical synthesis and Virometix Vaccines’ proprietary Synthetic Virus-Like Particle platform technology allow for the rapid production and optimization of vaccine candidates with superior properties in terms of safety, efficacy and stability.
Virometix Vaccines is a spun-out company from the University of Zurich. Virometix AG was founded in October 2009, and is based in Zurich, Switzerland.
Intelligent wardrobes open the door to elderly independence
Engineers in Munich are developing an ‘intelligent’ wardrobe to assist elderly people in their day-to-day lives. Called ‘Lisa’, the wardrobe can help with routine daily tasks, while also assisting with more complex jobs like medical check-ups.
A light switch for neurons
Ed Boyden shows how, by inserting genes for light-sensitive proteins into brain cells, he can selectively activate or de-activate specific neurons with fiber-optic implants. With this unprecedented level of control, he’s managed to cure mice of analogs of PTSD and certain forms of blindness. On the horizon: neural prosthetics.
Israeli scientists see new options for infertility
Israeli scientists predict it will one day be possible to produce human eggs from the cells lining the amniotic membrane, presenting new options for infertile women. The scientists have found immature cells in the amniotic sac, which they hope to turn into mature human egg cells in the laboratory.
Evaluating the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief
The U.S. government supports programs to combat global HIV/AIDS through an initiative that is known as the President’s Emergency Plan for AIDS Relief (PEPFAR). This initiative was originally authorized in the U.S. Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Act of 2003 and focused on an emergency response to the HIV/AIDS pandemic to deliver lifesaving care and treatment in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs) with the highest burdens of disease. It was subsequently reauthorized in the Tom Lantos and Henry J. Hyde U.S. Global Leadership Against HIV/AIDS, Tuberculosis, and Malaria Reauthorization Act of 2008 (the Lantos-Hyde Act).
Evaluation of PEPFAR makes recommendations for improving the U.S. government’s bilateral programs as part of the U.S. response to global HIV/AIDS. The overall aim of this evaluation is a forward-looking approach to track and anticipate the evolution of the U.S. response to global HIV to be positioned to inform the ability of the U.S. government to address key issues under consideration at the time of the report release.
Genetic Impact of Culturally-Based Mating Systems
For many species, including humans, matings occur among a restricted pool of partners. In humans, restrictions on the choice of partners are culturally determined and frequently are the result of homophily, namely, contacts among individuals that are similar on some dimension.
Marcus Feldman, Stanford University, discusses how the dimension may itself be culturally transmitted, and its transmission may affect the transmission of other characters, which may be genetically determined, but have nothing to do with the dimension on which the mating choice is based. Socioeconomic choice of consanguineous marriage is an example; it has important consequences for genetic variation in many populations around the world.
Early HIV treatment points to ‘functional cure’
French scientists say they have found evidence of an effective HIV cure among adults, if they are treated quickly after infection.The study looked at 14 patients, whose bodies have been able to control the virus, even after they stopped taking medication.
It follows the so-called functional cure of a baby girl in the US.Speaking to Al Jazeera from London, Sarah Radcliffe, from the UK’s National AIDS Trust, said the findings are another step in the road to a full cure for HIV and AIDS.
