A Promising New Pathway to treating Type2 Diabetes

According to the Centers for Disease Control, diabetes affects 34.2 million Americans. An additional 88 million people over the age of 18 are prediabetic, or at risk of developing diabetes.

Researchers believe the liver may hold the key to new, preventative Type 2 diabetes treatments. This year marks the 100th anniversary of the discovery of insulin, a scientific breakthrough that transformed Type 1 diabetes, once known as juvenile diabetes or insulin-dependent diabetes, from a terminal disease into a manageable condition.

Today, Type 2 diabetes is 24 times more prevalent than Type 1...

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Speedy Nanorobots could Someday Clean Up Soil and Water, Deliver Drugs

A schematic diagram showing the observation of particles moving through a generic porous material.
CREDIT
Haichao Wu

University of Colorado Boulder researchers have discovered that minuscule, self-propelled particles called “nanoswimmers” can escape from mazes as much as 20 times faster than other passive particles, paving the way for their use in everything from industrial clean-ups to medication delivery.

The findings, published this week in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, describe how these tiny synthetic nanorobots are incredibly effective at escaping cavities within maze-like environments...

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Astrophysicists detect First Black Hole-Neutron Star Mergers

A long time ago, in two galaxies about 900 million light-years away, two black holes each gobbled up their neutron star companions, triggering gravitational waves that finally hit Earth in January 2020.

Discovered by an international team of astrophysicists including Northwestern University researchers, two events—detected just 10 days apart—mark the first-ever detection of a black hole merging with a neutron star. The findings will enable researchers to draw the first conclusions about the origins of these rare binary systems and how often they merge.

“Gravitational waves have allowed us to detect collisions of pairs of black holes and pairs of neutron stars, but the mixed collision of a black hole with a neutron star has been the elusive missing piece of the family picture...

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Transient Pacemaker Harmlessly Dissolves in Body

The device, seen here mounted on the heart, could have many benefits for post-cardiac surgery patients.

Wireless, fully implantable device gives temporary pacing without requiring removal. Researchers at Northwestern and George Washington (GW) universities have developed the first-ever transient pacemaker — a wireless, battery-free, fully implantable pacing device that disappears after it’s no longer needed.

The thin, flexible, lightweight device could be used in patients who need temporary pacing after cardiac surgery or while waiting for a permanent pacemaker. All components of the pacemaker are biocompatible and naturally absorb into the body’s biofluids over the course of five to seven weeks, without needing surgical extraction.

The device wirelessly harvests energy from an e...

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