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Pluripotent cells from pancreatic cancer cells first human model of cancer's progression

Pluripotent cells from pancreatic cancer cells first human model of cancer's progression | Longevity science | Scoop.it

University of Pennsylvania scientists have used stem-cell technology to create a research cell line from a patient with advanced pancreatic ductal adenocarcinoma(PDAC).

 

This first-of-its-kind human-cell model of pancreatic cancer progression was published this week in Cell Reports from the lab of Ken Zaret, PhD, professor of Cell and Developmental Biology.

 

"It is the first example using induced pluripotent stem [iPS] cells to model cancer progression directly from a solid tumor, and the first human cell line that can model pancreatic cancer progression from early to invasive stages," says Zaret, also the associate director of the Penn Institute for Regenerative Medicine.

 

 

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Swiss researchers advance "breathprinting" for health checks

Swiss researchers advance "breathprinting" for health checks | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Traditional Chinese medicine has long analyzed breath as a way to assess human health and in recent times state-of-the-art technology has been brought to this approach to diagnose various diseases and even stress. Swiss researchers at ETH Zurich and at the University Hospital Zurich are continuing to advance this field by developing a “breathprinting” technique using mass spectrometry that they hope will become competitive with the established analysis methods based on blood and urine.

The scientists modified commercial mass spectrometers to suit the experiment, adding a breath sampling inlet line to deliver exhaled breath from a mouth piece directly into the instrument. The researchers noted two important facts. The first is that the chemical breathprint of exhaled breath, based on volatile and semi-volatile metabolites, showed an individual core pattern. The second was that, during the 11-day test, the breathprint remained constant, making it useful for medical analysis.

 

 

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Vitamin E status may be reliable biomarker for Alzheimer’s: Study

Vitamin E status may be reliable biomarker for Alzheimer’s: Study | Longevity science | Scoop.it
Screening levels of vitamin E in the blood could help to improve the diagnosis of Alzheimer’s Disease, according to new research that suggests the vitamin may also aid in protection.
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Rapid point-of-care testing for multiple diseases from a drop of blood | KurzweilAI

Rapid point-of-care testing for multiple diseases from a drop of blood | KurzweilAI | Longevity science | Scoop.it

A diagnostic system using DNA powder and gold nanoparticles being developed by scientists at the University of Toronto’s Institute of Biomaterials and Biomedical Engineering could provide rapid point-of-care diagnosis of the world’s leading infectious diseases in the near future.

 

BBME PhD student Kyryl Zagorovsky has developed a rapid diagnostic biosensor that will allow technicians to test for multiple diseases at the same time with one small sample, and with high accuracy and sensitivity. The biosensor relies upon gold nanoparticles, which change color.

 

 

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Bioelectric signals can be used to detect early cancer

Bioelectric signals can be used to detect early cancer | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Biologists at Tufts University School of Arts and Sciences have discovered a bioelectric signal that can identify cells that are likely to develop into tumors. The researchers also found that they could lower the incidence of cancerous cells by manipulating the electrical charge across cells' membranes.

 

 

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Web-based info may not increase cancer screening

Offering women information on colon cancer screening via the web does not get them to take up screening any more effectively than printed materials, according to a new study.

 

"It's disappointing that the web didn't have more effect," said Dr. David Weinberg of Fox Chase Cancer Center in Philadelphia, the report's lead author.

 

 

Ray and Terry's 's insight:

Don't forget to talk to your doctor and undergo appropriate assessment. Taking the lead in your own health care is essential to promote your longest possible healthy lifespan.

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Imaging brain structures that deteriorate in Parkinson’s | KurzweilAI

A new imaging technique developed at MIT offers the first glimpse of the degeneration of two brain structures affected by Parkinson’s disease.

 

The technique, which combines several types of magnetic resonance imaging (MRI), could allow doctors to better monitor patients’ progression and track the effectiveness of potential new treatments, says Suzanne Corkin, MIT professor emerita of neuroscience and leader of the research team.

 

 

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Cheap, Paper-Based Blood Test Costs Only Pennies, No Lab Equipment Needed

Cheap, Paper-Based Blood Test Costs Only Pennies, No Lab Equipment Needed | Longevity science | Scoop.it

An inexpensive diagnostic test made from paper has been developed that can assess liver health in only 15 minutes and for only pennies a test.

 

The test uses a single drop of blood from a fingerprick to measure the presence of liver enzymes, and doesn’t require the presence of a laboratory, instrumentation, or syringes. If liver enzymes are present in the blood, wells within the paper will show a color change, which can be color matched to a scale to determine approximate degree of concentration.

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Scientists find blood signatures for aggressive prostate cancer - Indian Express

With the uncertaintly of the PSA test and the over treatment of thousands of men, we really need more breakthroughs in this area of research for Prostate Cancer Diagnosis.

 

I'm hopeful that this is the start of a breakthrough in non-invasive improved tests for men with Prostate Cancer.


Via Brian Shields
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Rapid genomic deep-sequencing testing pinpoints newborns' genetic diseases in a few days

Rapid genomic deep-sequencing testing pinpoints newborns' genetic diseases in a few days | Longevity science | Scoop.it

A faster DNA sequencing machine and streamlined analysis of the results can diagnose genetic disorders in days rather than weeks. 

 

Up to a third of the babies admitted to neonatal intensive care units have a genetic disease. Although symptoms may be severe, the genetic cause can be hard to pin down. Thousands of genetic diseases have been described, but relatively few tests are available, and even these may detect only the most common mutations.

 

Whole-genome sequencing could test for many diseases at once, but its cost, the complexity of the results and the turnaround time are prohibitive. In what they hope will be a prototype for other hospitals, a research team led by Stephen Kingsmore at Children’s Mercy Hospital in Kansas City, Missouri, has implemented a much faster, simpler system for finding relevant mutations in whole-genome sequences that is designed for physicians without specialized genetic training.

 

These kinds of innovation will help more hospitals bring sequencing into clinical care, says Richard Gibbs, director of the human genome sequencing centre at Baylor College of Medicine in Houston, Texas. “A lot of people are going to realize from this that the future is now.”

 

Sequencing has been used before to pinpoint the cause of mysterious diseases. In 2011, Gibbs led a team that sequenced 14-year-old twins with a neurological movement disorder and found a way to improve their treatment2. In another instance, whole-genome sequencing suggested that a mysterious case of severe inflammatory bowel disease had a genetic cause and could be relieved through a bone marrow transplant3. But both these examples required several weeks and a team of experts to resolve. The Children’s Mercy Hospital plans to offer routine sequencing in the neonatal intensive care unit by the end of the year.

 

To order a test, physicians will choose terms from pull-down boxes to describe the infant's symptoms. Software then compiles a list of potential suspect genes. After the genome is sequenced, the software hunts for and analyses mutations in only those genes, which allows it to compile a list of possible causative mutations more quickly. The team had early access to a new DNA sequencing machine from sequencing company Illumina, based in San DIego, California, that could generate a whole genome within 25 hours. The entire process, from obtaining consent to preliminary diagnosis, took 50 hours, not counting the time taken to ship DNA samples and computer hard drives between Illumina's lab in the UK, where the DNA sequencing was carried out, and the hospital, where analysis was conducted. Kingsmore estimates that the cost of sequence and analysis is $13,500 per child, including costs to verify variants in a laboratory certified to perform clinical tests.

 

Fast sequencing cannot diagnose all genetic diseases. Current sequencing technology tend to overlook mutations such as duplicated genes, for example. Nonetheless, deep sequencing will be able to provide diagnoses for many cases that would otherwise remain harrowing mysteries.


Via Dr. Stefan Gruenwald
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Newly developed nanoparticles shine from deep within biological tissue

Newly developed nanoparticles shine from deep within biological tissue | Longevity science | Scoop.it
Newly-developed nanoparticles are able to emit light through up to three centimeters of biological tissue.

 

Scientists have developed photoluminescent nanoparticles that are able to shine through over three centimeters (1.2 inches) of biological tissue. If attached to anomalies deep beneath the skin, the nanoparticles could allow those anomalies to be seen more clearly from the outside.

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StethoCloud promises a low-cost solution to pneumonia diagnoses

StethoCloud promises a low-cost solution to pneumonia diagnoses | Longevity science | Scoop.it
StethoCloud low-cost stethoscope attachment for smartphones designed to diagnose conditions such as childhood pneumonia.
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Danny Hillis – With A Drop Of Your Blood, We’ll Soon Diagnose Your Disease Before You Even Have Symptoms | Singularity Hub

Danny Hillis – With A Drop Of Your Blood, We’ll Soon Diagnose Your Disease Before You Even Have Symptoms | Singularity Hub | Longevity science | Scoop.it

As the data piles up, preventative medicine will become a quantitative endeavor.

 

Danny Hillis believes the doctors visit of the future will be a simple blood test that measures proteins, lipids and some other key signals, which will then be plugged into a systematic database to help us treat diseases long before any symptoms arise.

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New fluid-repellent paper could lead to inexpensive diagnostic devices

New fluid-repellent paper could lead to inexpensive diagnostic devices | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Scientists at the Georgia Institute of Technology have produced a new kind of paper that repels a range of liquids, including water and oil. The new paper shows significant promise as an affordable and recyclable packaging material, but it's the paper’s potential as an inexpensive biomedical diagnostic tool that has really got the researchers excited.

 

By applying a chemical coating and creating new surface patterns at the nanometer and micron-scale, the researchers are able to reproduce the same repellent effect in the paper that is observed in the leaves of the lotus plant. This changes the paper from an absorbent material to one which repels all fluids.

 

 

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New diagnostic technology may lead to individualized treatments for prostate cancer - Cedars-Sinai

NanoVelcro Chip device captures and isolates potentially high-risk cancer cells

Via Brian Shields
Brian Shields's curator insight, April 14, 2013 11:02 AM

A great advancement may be on the horizon for the treatment of patients with Prostate Cancer.  The use of circulating tumor cells or "liquid biopsies" may prevent the need for painful and invasive procedures to obtain biopsy tissue.

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Patient safety efforts may prevent diagnostic errors

Electronic alerts and other technology-based aids may help prevent costly missed or delayed diagnoses, according to a new review of past evidence.

 

 

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Researchers say AI prescribes better treatment than doctors

Researchers say AI prescribes better treatment than doctors | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Two Indiana University researchers have developed a computer model they say can identify significantly better and less-expensive treatments than can doctors acting alone. It’s just the latest evidence that big data will have a profound impact on our health care system.

 

How much better? They claim a better than 50 percent reduction in costs and more than 40 percent better patient outcomes.

 

The idea behind the research, carried out by Casey Bennett and Kris Hauser, is simple and gets to the core of why so many people care so much about data in the first place: If doctors can consider what’s actually happening and likely to happen instead of relying on intuition, they should be able to make better decisions.

 

In order to prove out their hypothesis, the researchers worked with “clinical data, demographics and other information on over 6,700 patients who had major clinical depression diagnoses, of which about 65 to 70 percent had co-occurring chronic physical disorders like diabetes, hypertension and cardiovascular disease.” They built a model using Markov decision processes — which predict the probabilities of future events based on those immediately preceding them — and dynamic decision networks — which extend the Markov processes by considering the specific features of those events in order to determine the probabilities. Essentially, their model considers the specifics of a patient’s current state and then determines the best action to effect the best possible outcome.

 

Specifically, Bennett and Hauser found via a simulation of 500 random cases that their model decreased the cost per unit of outcome change to $189 from the $497 without it, an improvement of 58.5 percent. They found their original model improved patient outcomes by nearly 35 percent, but that tweaking a few parameters could bring that number to 41.9 percent.

 

IBM has been banging this drum loudly, most recently with two new commercial versions of its Watson system — one of which is designed to determine the best-possible course of treatment for lung cancer patient by analyzing their situations against a library of millions of pages of clinical evidence and medical research.

 

So, although we won’t hear “Paging Dr. Watson” at the hospital anytime soon, there’s an increasingly high chance our doctors will retire to their offices with our charts and ask a computer system of some sort what might be wrong with us and how they might best fix it.

 


Via Dr. Stefan Gruenwald
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PredictAD software promises early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s

PredictAD software promises early diagnosis of Alzheimer’s | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Scientists at VTT Technical Research Centre in Finland have developed new software called PredictAD that could significantly boost the early diagnosis of Alzheimer's disease.

 

The comparative software contrasts patient’s measurements with those of other patients kept in large databases, then visualizes the status of the patient with an index and graphics.

 

The support system and imaging methods were developed by VTT and Imperial College London.

 

The researchers used material compiled in the U.S. by the Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative based on the records of 288 patients with memory problems. Nearly half of them, or 140 individuals, were diagnosed with Alzheimer’s disease on average 21 months after the initial measurements, which is about the same as the current European average of 20 months.

 

 

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Quick Test Speeds Search for Alzheimer's Drugs: Compound Restores Motor Function and Longevity to Fruit Flies | ZeitNews

Quick Test Speeds Search for Alzheimer's Drugs: Compound Restores Motor Function and Longevity to Fruit Flies | ZeitNews | Longevity science | Scoop.it
An efficient, high-volume technique for testing potential drug treatments for Alzheimer's disease uncovered an organic compound that restored motor function and longevity to fruit flies with the disease, according to new research that could help...

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Scanadu unveils its first medical home diagnostic tools

Scanadu unveils its first medical home diagnostic tools | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Ready for home diagnostic tools?

 

Scanadu is one of the many companies already on the case.

 

SCOUT, a palm-sized device designed by Yves Behar that Scanadu says will accurately read a variety of vital signs when held to the temple for a period of under 10 seconds. Data collected by the device is transmitted via Bluetooth to a smartphone, where the Scanadu app will display pulse transit time, pulse rate, electrical heart activity, temperature, heart rate variability and blood oxygenation. The data can also be transmitted to the user’s doctor. 

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Detecting early-stage diseases with the naked eye | KurzweilAI

Detecting early-stage diseases with the naked eye | KurzweilAI | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Imperial College London scientists have developed a prototype ultra-sensitive sensor that would enable doctors to detect the early stages of diseases and viruses with the naked eye.

 

 

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New tech converts regular paper into powerful medical diagnostic tool

New tech converts regular paper into powerful medical diagnostic tool | Longevity science | Scoop.it

A group of researchers at the University of Washington has found a way to isolate and identify medically interesting molecules using little more than scraps of office paper, a Ziplock bag and a cheap diluted solvent.

 

If properly developed, the system – which requires minimal costs and know-how to build and operate – could be made to administer a wide range of medical tests nearly free of charge.

 

 

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Hand-held 3D scanner could simplify medical imaging

Hand-held 3D scanner could simplify medical imaging | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Engineers have developed a hand-held scanning device that provides real-time three-dimensional images of the insides of patients’ bodies.

 

The scanner utilizes optical coherence tomography (OCT), which has been described as “optical ultrasound,” in that it uses reflected light – as opposed to reflected sound – to image internal structures.

 

 

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Simple eye tracking test used to identify early signs of Alzheimer’s

Simple eye tracking test used to identify early signs of Alzheimer’s | Longevity science | Scoop.it

As researchers look for better ways to diagnose Alzheimer’s disease in its early stages, one promising detection methodology to emerge is a simple eye tracking procedure developed by scientists at Lancaster University in conjunction with Royal Preston Hospital.

 

The results of such tests can help flag initial signs of memory impairment that are associated with the onset of the disease.

 

 

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Glove Tricorder gives a hands-on diagnosis

Glove Tricorder gives a hands-on diagnosis | Longevity science | Scoop.it

Med Sensation's Glove Tricorder is outfitted with numerous sensors to detect breast cancer and other internal medical problems when placed on different areas of the body.

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