Researchers have developed a new method to remove old cells from tissues, thus slowing down the aging process. No-one knows why some people age worse than others and develop diseases — such as Alzheimer’s, fibrosis, type-2 diabetes, or some types of cancer — associated with this aging process. One explanation for this could be the degree of efficiency of each organism’s response to the damage sustained by its cells during its life, which eventually causes them to age. That’s why scientists at the Universitat Oberta de Catalunya (UOC) and the University of Leicester have embarked on their recent work. Specifically, they have designed an antibody that acts as a smart bomb able to recognize specific proteins on the surface of these aged or senescent cells. It then attaches itself to them and releases a drug that removes them without affecting the rest, thus minimizing any potential side effects. The results of this work open the door to the development of effective treatments to delay the progress of age-related diseases and even the aging process itself in the longer term, with the aim of increasing the longevity and, above all, the quality of life of people at this stage of their lives.
Joy & Wonder
Many patients with prostate cancer are treated with drugs to which they quickly develop resistance. Now, a new study from Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis has identified an RNA molecule that suppresses prostate tumors. The scientists found that prostate cancers develop ways to shut down this RNA molecule to allow themselves to grow. However, when they implanted mice with human prostate tumor samples, the new treatment restored this so-called long noncoding RNA — and they’ve hailed it as a new strategy to treat the cancer which has developed resistance to hormonal therapies. “The drugs that we have to treat prostate cancer are effective initially, but most patients start developing resistance, and the drugs usually stop working after a year or two,” said senior author Nupam P. Mahajan, PhD, a professor of surgery. “At that point, the options available for these patients are very limited. We are interested in developing new therapies for patients who have developed resistance—and we believe the RNA molecule we’ve pinpointed may lead to an effective approach.” About one in eight men will get prostate cancer—making it the most common male cancer. It mainly affects people over age 50.
A four-year-old girl who went missing from a remote campsite more than two weeks ago in Western Australia has been found alive, local police said in a statement early Wednesday local time. The child was found by police in a private home around 30 miles from the campsite and has been reunited with her parents, the statement said. A local man is in custody and currently being questioned by detectives, it added. In a video post on the police force’s public Facebook page, deputy commissioner Col Blanch said, “It’s my privilege to announce that in the early hours of this morning, the Western Australia Police Force rescued Cleo Smith. Cleo is alive and well.” Australian Prime Minister Scott Morrison described the news as “relieving” on his official Twitter account. “What wonderful, relieving news. Cleo Smith has been found and is home safe and sound. Our prayers answered. Thank you to the many police officers involved in finding Cleo and supporting her family.” The child vanished from her family’s tent at Blowholes campsite in Macleod, about 50 kilometers (30 miles) north of the town of Carnarvon on October 16. […] “This is the outcome we all hoped and prayed for,” Blanch said.
“The Great Pacific Garbage Patch can now be cleaned,” announced Dutch entrepreneur Boyan Slat, the wonderkid inventor who’s spent a decade inventing systems for waterborne litter collection. Recent tests on his Ocean Cleanup rig called System 002, invented to tackle the 1.8 trillion pieces of plastic pollution, were a success, leading Slat to predict that most of the oceanic garbage patches could be removed by 2040. Intersections of ocean currents have created the massive floating islands of plastic trash — five slow-moving whirlpools that pull litter from thousands of miles away into a single radius. The largest one sits between California and Hawaii, and 27-year-old Slat has been designing and testing his systems out there, launching from San Francisco since 2013. GNN has reported on his original design for the floating device, but his engineering team improved upon it. System 002 successfully netted 9,000 kg, or around 20,000 lbs in its first trial. It’s carbon-neutral, able to capture microplastics as small as 1 mm in diameter, and was designed to pose absolutely no threat to wildlife thanks to its wide capture area, slow motion, alerts, and camera monitors that allow operators to spy any overly-curious marine life.
Hollywood’s Captain Kirk, 90-year-old William Shatner, blasted into space Wednesday in a convergence of science fiction and science reality. The Star Trek hero reached the final frontier aboard a ship built by Jeff Bezos’ Blue Origin company. Shatner and three other passengers soared to an estimated 107 kilometres over the West Texas desert in the fully automated capsule, then safely parachuted to the desert floor in a flight that lasted just over 10 minutes. “That was unlike anything they described,” Shatner said as the capsule descended toward Earth. “What you have given me is the most profound experience,” an exhilarated Shatner told Bezos after climbing out of the hatch. “I hope I never recover from this. I hope that I can maintain what I feel now. I don’t want to lose it. He said that going from the blue sky to the utter blackness of space was a moving experience: “In an instant you go, ‘Whoa, that’s death.’ That’s what I saw.” The jaunt made Shatner the oldest person to go to space. He eclipsed the previous age record — set by a passenger on a similar trip on a Bezos spaceship in July — by eight years.
The Kidney Project’s implantable bioartificial kidney, one that promises to free kidney disease patients from dialysis machines and transplant waiting lists, took another big step toward becoming reality—earning a $650,000 prize from KidneyX for its first-ever demonstration of a functional prototype of its implantable artificial kidney. KidneyX is a public–private partnership between the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services and the American Society of Nephrology, founded to “accelerate innovation in the prevention, diagnosis, and treatment of kidney diseases.” The Kidney Project, a nationwide collaboration, combined the two essential parts of its artificial kidney, the hemofilter and the bioreactor, and successfully implanted the smartphone-sized device for preclinical evaluation. For this advance, the team was awarded KidneyX’s Phase 1 Artificial Kidney Prize and was one of six winning teams selected out of an international field. In the last few years, The Kidney Project successfully tested the hemofilter, which removes waste products and toxins from blood, and the bioreactor, which replicates other kidney functions, like the balance of electrolytes in blood, in separate experiments.