Category Health/Medical

Brain composition and bipolar disorder. MRI studies . Credit: Bipolar Lives.

Naturally occurring changes in brain wiring can help patients at high genetic risk of developing bipolar disorder avert the onset of the illness, according to a new study led by researchers at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai. The study’s findings open up new avenues for researchers to explore ways the brain can prevent disease expression, also known as resilience, with the hope of developing better treatments.

Bipolar disorder, also known as manic-depressive illness, is a brain disorder that causes fluctuations in patients’ mood, energy, activity levels and the ability to carry out day-to-day tasks. Bipolar disorder is highly heritable.

Researchers used MRI to map the connectivity patterns in the brain...

In this composite image, a human nerve cell derived from a patient with Rett syndrome shows significantly decreased levels of KCC2 compared to a control cell.
Image: Gong Chen lab, Penn State University

“The most exciting part of this research is that it directly uses human neurons that originated from Rett Syndrome patients as a clinically-relevant disease model to investigate the underlying mechanism,” said Dr. Chen...

Even a cell phone camera is sufficient to examine tissue samples for tumor cells. Credit: © Fraunhofer IAP

Antibodies combat viruses and bacteria. They also attach themselves to cancer cells – in a typical, characteristic way. Fraunhofer scientists are using this property to detect cancer cells in tissue samples. Such rapid tests can already be applied by surgeons during operations – within a few minutes and without expensive equipment.

The tumor glows brightly on the bluish fluorescent MRI image. The ulcer is localized. With this information, the surgeon relies on his eyes. “Locating tumors accurately in tissue sections is not easy...

This section of a serpentine channel reactor shows the parallel reactor and feeder channels separated by a nanoporous membrane. At left is a single nanopore viewed from the side; at right is a diagram of metabolite exchange across the membrane

Lives of soldiers and others injured in remote locations could be saved with a cell-free protein synthesis system developed at the Dept of Energy’s Oak Ridge National Lab. The device, a creation of a team led by Andrea Timm and Scott Retterer of the lab’s Biosciences Division, uses microfabricated bioreactors for on-demand production of therapeutic proteins for medicines and biopharmaceuticals. Making these miniature factories cell-free, which eliminates the maintenance of a living system, simplifies the process and lowers cost.

“With this approach, ...