3D Printing breakthrough heralds ‘New Era’ for Advanced Skin Models

Direct 3D cell-printing of human skin with functional transwell system. Biofabrication, 2017; 9 (2): 025034 DOI: 10.1088/1758-5090/aa71c8

Direct 3D cell-printing of human skin with functional transwell system. Biofabrication, 2017; 9 (2): 025034 DOI: 10.1088/1758-5090/aa71c8

Scientists in South Korea have come up with a new method for 3D printing human skin, which both shortens the process and reduces the cost. Reporting their results today in the journal Biofabrication, the team from Pohang University of Science and Technology demonstrate a new 3D cell printing strategy, for engineering a 3D human skin model in a single step process...

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Neutrino discovery—a step closer to finding Charge-Parity Violation

The detected pattern of an electron neutrino candidate event observed by Super-Kamiokande. Credit: University of Tokyo Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-06-neutrino-discoverya-closer-charge-parity-violation.html#jCp

The detected pattern of an electron neutrino candidate event observed by Super-Kamiokande. Credit: University of Tokyo

The different rates of neutrino and anti-neutrino oscillations recorded by an international collaboration of researchers in Japan—including from Kavli IPMU—is an important step in the search for a new source of asymmetry in the laws that govern matter and antimatter. The Standard Model of particle physics describes the basic building blocks of matter and how they interact. It also makes a point that for every particle created, there is an anti-particle...

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ALMA hears Birth cry of a Massive Baby Star

ALMA hears birth cry of a massive baby star

The massive protostar is surrounded by a disk of gas and dust. The outflow is launched from the surface of the outer disk. Credit: ALMA (ESO/NAOJ/NRAO)

Stars form from gas and dust floating in interstellar space. But, astronomers do not yet fully understand how it is possible to form the massive stars seen in space. One key issue is gas rotation. The parent cloud rotates slowly in the initial stage and the rotation becomes faster as the cloud shrinks due to self-gravity. Stars formed in such a process should have very rapid rotation, but this is not the case. The stars observed in the Universe rotate more slowly.

How is the rotational momentum dissipated? One possible scenario involves that the gas emanating from baby stars...

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Potential Mechanism for BCG Vaccine Reversal of Type 1 Diabetes

Immunologic history of type 1 diabetes.

Immunologic history of type 1 diabetes.

Data presented at American Diabetes Association meeting describes a potential new mechanism by which the BCG vaccine may restore the proper immune response to the insulin-secreting islet cells of the pancreas. Presented by Denise Faustman, MD, PhD, director of the Massachusetts General Hospital Immunobiology Laboratory and principal investigator of the trial, the findings suggest that BCG may induce a permanent increase in expression of genes that restore the beneficial regulatory T cells (Tregs) that prevent the immune system from attacking the body’s own tissue.

“Many groups are looking at the ability of BCG vaccination to reverse autoimmunity,” says Faustman, who is an associate professor of Medicine at Harvard Medical School...

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