Category: Future Medicine

from the if-we-don't-get-colds-are-we-still-human? dept.
From a HealthSCOUT report: Imagine being able to fight a virus even before infection occurs. Researchers say they've done just that (at least in a petri dish), preventing cells from becoming infected with the influenza virus…Their technique employs nanodecoys, super-small molecules that bind to viruses before they enter cells and cause disease. Invented by study co-author Donald Tomalia, scientific director of the University of Michigan's Center for Biologic Nanotechnology, nanodecoys are just a few billionths of a meter across…The decoys can multiply, producing different generations that are larger than their predecessors — meaning that a larger, later-generation decoy potentially could hold a larger drug molecule in its interior zone…[co-author Esfand] also speculates that nanodecoys could be used on mucosal surfaces, such as the nasal passages, or in air-mask filters to fight biological warfare agents.

from the hurry-up-we're-aging-fast dept.
Senior Associate RFreitas writes "If anyone would like to read my recent nontechnical nanomedicine article "Say Ah!", published in the July/August 2000 issue of The Sciences, it is now online." An excerpt: "The goals of nanorobotics may seem overblown, even wacky, to people today. But consider that, as recently as 1874, the British surgeon Sir John Eric Erichsen predicted that 'the abdomen, the chest, and the brain will be forever shut from the intrusion of the wise and humane surgeon.'…The hope and the dream is that, sometime in the not-too-distant future, [miniature medical] devices will be able to eliminate virtually all the common diseases of the twentieth century, and virtually all bodily pain and suffering as well."

from the eat-right,-live-well-(and-long) dept.

Two press releases on joint research by the Buck Center for Research in Aging and Emory University describe "using drugs that help eliminate oxygen radicals — the toxic byproducts of metabolism — scientists have extended the normal lifespan of the nematode worm C. elegans by approximately 50 percent. In addition, the scientists restored a normal lifespan to mutant worms that had a mitochondrial defect causing increased oxygen radical production and rapid aging."

The drugs used in the study were actually modified versions of naturally-occurring antioxidant enzymes. The findings were reported in the 1 September 2000 issue of the jouranl Science.

from the Oh-that-explains-everything dept.

A researcher at Nankai University in Tianjin, China has found a link between degenerative brain diseases and prions. The work is described in this press release.

"This suggests a common molecular mechanism underlying the initiation stages of sporadic Alzheimer's disease and both sporadic and genetic prion diseases," says the study's lead researcher, Chi Ming Yang, Ph.D., a professor of chemistry at Nankai University. The research indicates that a source of prion-generated diseases may be damage to normal proteins caused by free radicals.

from the Gush-vs-Bore dept.
Paul Ryan brings to our attention this LA Times story on the political controversy over stem cell use. Don't we all look forward to the day when we have real nanomedicine that doesn't require these bizarre kludges?

from the that's-great-but-is-there-any-cash-involved? dept.
The official journal of the Transplantation Society (Graft) has published a "future issue" set in the year 2050, in which Senior Associate Rob Freitas gives a keynote address accepting the 31st Annual Drexler Prize in Nanomedicine on the topic "Respirocytes in Nanomedicine: The Remarkable Story of One of the First Medical Nanorobots Ever Conceived". (Artwork contributed by Senior Associates Forrest Bishop and Philip Van Nedervelde.) Congratulations in advance, Rob!