Tracy L. Kijewski-Correa, Leo E. and Patti Ruth Linbeck Collegiate Associate Professor and Associate Chair of the Department of Civil Engineering and Geological Sciences at the University of Notre Dame, is one of the 85 bright young engineers who have been selected to take part in the National Academy of Engineering’s (NAE) 17th annual U.S. Frontiers of Engineering Symposium.
Engineers ages 30 to 45 who are performing exceptional engineering and technical work in a variety of disciplines will attend the symposium, which is scheduled to run from Sept. 19 to 21 at Google headquarters in Mountain View, Calif. T
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TARRYTOWN, N.Y. — Bayer HealthCare has submitted a marketing application in Europe for VEGF Trap-Eye for the treatment of wet age-related macular degeneration, Regeneron and Bayer announced in a joint press release.
The companies are promoting VEGF Trap-Eye (aflibercept ophthalmic solution) therapy in an effort to bring awareness to alternative treatments requiring fewer injections.
“The submission of VEGF Trap-Eye for EU marketing authorization represents a significant milestone in our goal to bring this potentially important new therapy to patients with wet AMD across the globe,” Leonard S. S
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When stem-cell clinics are asked for documentation about the treatments they offer, some are quick to produce letters from lawyers instead. In the face of legal threats from clinics, the International Society for Stem Cell Research (ISSCR) has suspended a service intended to help patients wade through claims about therapies. It is now pondering its next move.
For stem-cell researchers, the worldwide proliferation of clinics offering regenerative medicine is frustrating. Many of the treatments such clinics offer — injecting a patient’s own stem cells back into his or her body in a bid to treat conditions ranging from Parkinson’s disease to spinal-cord injuries — are at best a waste of money, and at worst dangerous. “The
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Todays smartphones can now help detect eye ailments, thanks to the efforts of researchers from the MIT. Using handy off-the-shelf components, Media Lab Camera Culture led by Ramesh Raskar developed the CATRA system, a device that scans the lens of the human eye for signs of cataract, the leading cause of human blindness. The CATRA utilizes a forward scattering technique, which allows the user to respond to what they visually experience specifically. Based on what the user sees, the CATRA can make an intelligent diagnosis of the severity of the eye condition.
Watch a video demo here.
There are some types of breast cancer that might respond better to medication meant for prostate cancer, researchers in the UK have discovered. The BBC reports on findings that Cancer Research UK says is a “great surprise.”
Breast cancer in women can be driven by estrogen, which switches on genes that make cells divide uncontrollably and develop into tumors. In men, male sex hormones and androgens such as testosterone trigger prostate cancer. The BBC reports that hormone treatments like tamoxifen and aromatase inhibitors are ineffective against up to 30 percent of breast cancers, interfering with estrogen and stopping the tumor’s progress.
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Look up “transcription”—the copying of a gene’s DNA into RNA intermediaries—in any old molecular biology text book, and it all seems very simple: RNA polymerase II, the enzyme that catalyzes the reaction, assembles at the start site and starts motoring down the strand, cranking out the RNA ribbon used to construct proteins. But researchers now know that RNA polymerase II often stalls on DNA strands where it was once assumed to just barrel down.
A report from the Conaway lab at the Stowers Institute for Medical Research in the July 8, 2011, edition of the journal Cell identifies a switch that allows RNA polymerase to shift gears from neutral into drive and start transcribing. Thi
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