Monthly Archives: September 2012

Purging Stem Cells To Make Therapy Safer

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Featured Article Academic Journal Main Category: Stem Cell Research Also Included In: Biology / Biochemistry Article Date: 28 Sep 2012 - 1:00 PDT

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The study appears in a 27 September issue of the journal Stem Cells Translational Medicine.

iPS cells have properties similar to embryonic stem cells, which are "master cells" with an unlimited capacity to differentiate into any type of tissue in the body, such as brain, lung, skin, heart, and liver. Thus their potential in regenerative medicine, where damaged or diseased tissue can be repaired or replaced by growing new tissue, is huge, as senior author Timothy Nelson explains in a press release:

"Pluripotent stem cells show great promise in the field of regenerative medicine; however, the risk of uncontrolled cell growth will continue to prevent their use as a therapeutic treatment."

Nelson is Assistant Professor of Medicine and Pharmacology and works in the General Internal Medicine department and the Transplant Center at the Mayo.

The idea of using iPS cells is for doctors to be able to take some adult tissue, for example skin cells, from the patient who needs the treatment, and then turn the cells from that tissue into iPS cells.

Then, those iPS cells are coaxed to turn into the target type of cell, for instance lung cells. As a result of the coaxing the iPS cells turn into (differentiate) the target tissue type.

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Purging Stem Cells To Make Therapy Safer

GTA, Red Dead, Assassin's Creed & WoW Inspired Forza Horizon – Dev

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Published on Sep 28, 2012

Forza Horizon isnt looking to other racing games when it comes to innovating the open world racing genre according to Turn 10s creative director.

Turn 10 Studios and Playground Games are hoping it can attract a whole new generation of petrol heads by exploring games like Red Dead Redemption and GTA.

Turn 10s creative director, Dan Greenawalt, insists Forza Horizons new ideas have come from everywhere but the racing genre.

Red Dead Redemption, Assassins Creed, World Of Warcraft... I dont think its actually the racing games that have come to forefront this year, explained Greenawalt.

We didnt look at racing games at all. As racing game developers, thats not a great place to farm for innovation. The truth is the way you want to farm for innovation is to find the games that have made the connection with players that you want, then you deconstruct them and reconstruct them in your model.

This isnt he first time Forza has looked outside of the racing genre when it comes to generating ideas. Forzas original car trading system was quite obviously taken from the Pokmon series and other RPGs.

So Forza was inspired by Pokmon, Final Fantasy, not because we needed a sword/upgrade fighting system, but because they managed to compel players to do things that made no sense."

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GTA, Red Dead, Assassin's Creed & WoW Inspired Forza Horizon - Dev

How NASA will bring home pieces of Mars

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Over the next few months, NASA will map out a strategy for returning bits of Martian rock and soil to Earth, so scientists can study them for signs of past Red Planet life.

That ambitious goal should drive the space agency's next steps at Mars, according to a report released Tuesday by the Mars Program Planning Group. The report also lays out several ways Mars sample-return can be accomplished over the next decade or two, and NASA is reviewing those options now.

The agency may reveal its chosen path in February, after the White House releases its federal budget request for fiscal year 2014, NASA officials said Tuesday. In the meantime, here's a brief rundown of the scenarios they're looking at.

Multiple launches All the major options proposed by the Mars planning group share three basic components in common: a sampling rover, a Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) for blasting the collected rock and soil off the Red Planet surface and a return orbiter, which will snag the samples in space and ferry them to Earth's neighborhood.

In one scenario, these three pieces are all launched separately, with a small "fetch" rover riding along with the MAV. As its name suggests, the fetch rover will carry Red Planet dirt from the sampling rover back to the MAV. [ 7 Biggest Mysteries of Mars ]

This strategy has the advantage of spreading costs and technical challenges across three missions which could each be at least two years apart, since Mars launch windows come about every 26 months according to the planning group report.

Another option is to consolidate into two launches. The sampling rover would ride alone, while another liftoff would carry the MAV, fetch rover and return orbiter.

In this case, the orbiter would likely have to be powered by solar electric propulsion (SEP), to cut down on weight. The amount of liquid propellant needed for a traditionally powered spacecraft would be quite heavy.

A single launch Alternatively, all the pieces needed for Mars sample-return could be lofted in a single shot, the report says.

In this case, the sampling rover would carry an integrated MAV with it, eliminating the need for a fetch rover. Again, the return orbiter would be an SEP craft, which creates thrust by accelerating electrically charged atoms or molecules.

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How NASA will bring home pieces of Mars

How NASA can bring home pieces of Mars

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Over the next few months, NASA will map out a strategy for returning bits of Martian rock and soil to Earth, so scientists can study them for signs of past Red Planet life.

That ambitious goal should drive the space agency's next steps at Mars, according to a report released Tuesday (Sept. 25) by the Mars Program Planning Group. The report also lays out several ways Mars sample-return can be accomplished over the next decade or two, and NASA is reviewing those options now.

The agency may reveal its chosen path in February, after the White House releases its federal budget request for fiscal year 2014, NASA officials said Tuesday. In the meantime, here's a brief rundown of the scenarios they're looking at.

Multiple launches

All the major options proposed by the Mars planning group share three basic components in common: a sampling rover, a Mars Ascent Vehicle (MAV) for blasting the collected rock and soil off the Red Planet surface and a return orbiter, which will snag the samples in space and ferry them to Earth's neighborhood.

In one scenario, these three pieces are all launched separately, with a small "fetch" rover riding along with the MAV. As its name suggests, the fetch rover will carry Red Planet dirt from the sampling rover back to the MAV. [7 Biggest Mysteries of Mars]

This strategy has the advantage of spreading costs and technical challenges across three missions -- which could each be at least two years apart, since Mars launch windows come about every 26 months -- according to the planning group report.

Another option is to consolidate into two launches. The sampling rover would ride alone, while another liftoff would carry the MAV, fetch rover and return orbiter.

In this case, the orbiter would likely have to be powered by solar electic propulsion (SEP), to cut down on weight. The amount of liquid propellant needed for a traditionally powered spacecraft would be quite heavy.

A single launch

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How NASA can bring home pieces of Mars

Avita Medical Secures Additional Funding From US Department of Defense

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NORTHRIDGE, CA and CAMBRIDGE, UNITED KINGDOM--(Marketwire - Sep 28, 2012) - Regenerative medicine company Avita Medical Ltd. ( ASX : AVH ), ( OTCQX : AVMXY ) announced that it has been awarded a grant of an additional US$880K in support for its on-going pivotal US FDA trial for the use of ReCell Spray-On-Skin in the treatment of burn injuries.

The award, supplementing the $1.75 million provided in prior funding, underscores the commitment by the US Department of Defense, the US Army, and the US Armed Force Institute for Regenerative Medicine (AFIRM) to bringing the 'revolutionary' ReCell technology through the FDA approval process and cleared for sales in the US, thereby having it available for the military and civilian population.

The AFIRM program, established in March 2008, is dedicated to bringing 'transformational technologies' in regenerative medicine to wounded soldiers by developing clinical therapies and advanced treatment options. AFIRM has a special interest in using the most advanced regenerative medicine for its wounded soldiers and recognises Avita's innovative treatment for burns and other skin injuries has the benefits of using the patient's own skin, yields improved healing, reduced scar formation, and reintroduction of pigmentation into the skin.

As a first of its kind, the FDA-approved study is rigorous and highly conservative in its design. Each patient in the study receives both the standard-of-care graft treatment and the new ReCell treatment consisting of sprayed autologous cell suspension, with a host of separate assessments beyond standard care required for each enrolled patient. The study design requires similarity across patients, and, within patients, two comparable wounds for treatment, which although necessary for a randomized controlled clinical trial, imposes tight inclusion and exclusion criteria and therefore constrains the use to a particular (and small) subset of burn patients.

The approved FDA protocol permits the Company to treat 106 patients with partial-thickness thermal injuries; patients are assessed for healing and pain on a weekly basis during the initial four weeks post-treatment; at weeks 8, 12, 16, 24 and 52 the treatment site will be assessed for healing and aesthetic outcomes. Clinical data at the 16 week follow-up will be reported to the FDA in support of an application to market ReCell in the US. Approximately 75% of the required subjects have been enrolled in the study.

"We are pleased and grateful for the continued support of the US Department of Defense and AFIRM program," said Dr William Dolphin, Avita Medical's CEO. "As a first-of-its-kind study the patient selection criteria and protocol for the FDA study are stringent, requiring significant commitment from the participating surgeon and their team. AFIRM has recognized the difficulty of the protocol -- reflected in the slower than hoped for enrollment -- and, following close scrutiny and careful review, have provided additional funding in support of the study -- further indication of the importance of this innovative technology. ReCell has shown the potential to provide significant benefits over current options in the treatment of burns and other acute and chronic wounds and for a wide range of skin defects."

Dr James H. Holmes IV, Director of the Wake Forest Baptist Medical Burn Center and Program Leader for the Wake Forest-Pittsburgh Consortium of AFIRM, said, "AFIRM views the ReCell FDA study as a high priority project and recognizes ReCell as a potential game-changer in the treatment of burns and acute wounds. The AFIRM program managers have acknowledged that this is an extremely difficult study and are backing their assessment of the importance of the ReCell technology with additional funding at a time of tight budgetary constraints."

About Avita Medical Ltd.

Avita Medical (http://www.avitamedical.com/) develops and distributes regenerative and tissue-engineered products for the treatment of a broad range of wounds, scars and skin defects. Avita's patented and proprietary tissue-culture, collection and application technology provides innovative treatment solutions derived from a patient's own skin. The company's lead product, ReCell Spray-On Skin, is used in a wide variety of burns, plastic, reconstructive and cosmetic procedures. ReCell is patented, CE-marked for Europe, TGA-registered in Australia, and SFDA-cleared in China. ReCell is on market and generating early revenues. ReCell is not available for sale in the United States; in the U.S. ReCell is an investigational device limited by federal law to investigational use. A Phase III FDA trial is in process.

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Avita Medical Secures Additional Funding From US Department of Defense

Medicine drop, Recovery walk set for Saturday

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The Greenville Police Department and federal Drug Enforcement Administration will hold an Operation Medicine Drop from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. on Saturday at the Town Common.

The event aims to prevent prescription drug abuse by collecting unwanted, unused or expired medicines for law enforcement to properly destroy.

The effort also protects waterways by discouraging residents from flushing medicines down toilets or sinks, which could affect wildlife in local waters. Throwing medicines away in the trash also poses safety and health hazards.

The disposal service is free, anonymous and open to the public.

The Pitt County Coalition on Substance Abuse also will hold its third annual Walk for Recovery 1-mile walk and run from 9 a.m. to noon on Saturday.

The organization also will be collecting unwanted medicines.

In April alone, medicine drops nationwide collected 276 tons of prescription drugs from more than 5,600 sites. In the four previous events, more than 775 tons of pills were collected.

Greenville police report rates of prescription drug abuse are high, as well as the accidental poisonings and overdoses. The majority of abused prescription drugs are obtained from family and friends, police said.

For more information about Operation Medicine Drop, contact Matt Lambeth at 752-0483. For information regarding the walk, contact the Pitt County Coalition on Substance Abuse at 321-1481 or pcconsa@gmail.com.

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Medicine drop, Recovery walk set for Saturday

Complementary medicine may help soldiers with PTSD

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Complementary medicine techniques known as healing touch and guided imagery can help reduce symptoms of post-traumatic stress disorder in military personnel who have been in combat, a new study says.

The study included 123 active-duty U.S. Marines who had at least one of the following post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) symptoms: flashbacks of their traumatic experience, nightmares, intrusive thoughts, emotional numbness, insomnia, irritability, exaggerated startle response, avoidance of people or places that remind them of the traumatic experience, or exaggerated emotional responses to trauma.

The participants were assigned to receive either standard treatment for PTSD or standard treatment plus healing touch and guided imagery. There were six complementary therapy sessions over three weeks.

Healing touch is described as an energy-based treatment meant to restore and balance the human biofield in order to decrease pain and promote healing. It is sometimes used in surgery or other medical procedures to help patients relax and reduce pain and anxiety. Guided imagery uses imagination and visualization to help reduce stress and anxiety and enhance overall well-being.

The study found that patients who received standard treatment plus these complementary therapies had greater improvement in quality of life and lower levels of depression and cynicism than those who received standard treatment alone.

The study, published in the September issue of the journal Military Medicine, was led by the Scripps Center for Integrative Medicine in San Diego. It also involved the Samueli Institute in Alexandria, Va.

"Service members are seeking out non-drug complementary and integrative medicine as part of their overall care and approach to wellness," Dr. Wayne Jonas, president and chief executive officer of Samueli Institute, said in a Scripps news release.

"This treatment pairs deep relaxation with a self-care approach that can be used at home" he said. "The results of this study underscore the need to make effective, non-stigmatizing treatments for PTSD available to all our service members."

Although the study found an association between these complementary techniques and reduced PTSD symptoms, it did not prove that a cause-and-effect relationship exists.

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Complementary medicine may help soldiers with PTSD

New program to ease doctor shortage, medical school debt

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HONOLULU

Hawaii is launching a new program to attract doctors and nursesto under-served areas, by offering to help then payoff their medical school loans.

Gov. Neil Abercrombie announced this latest health care outreach Thursday at the John A. Burns School of Medicine.

Thanks to $300,000 in seed money from the Queens Medical Center and the Hawaii Medical Services Association,the state will be able to get matching federal funds to hire primary care doctors, nurse practitioners and physician assistants in rural areas.

"Sometimes it's harder to get them there because primary care pays lower, and certain positions in rural areas pay lower. But, this can assure people that at least they dont have to worry about their school loans," said Dr. Kelly Withy, director of the Hawaii Area Health Education Center.

Besides helping to provide care to areas like Molokai, Hana, Maui and Pahoa on the Big Island, the program will also cover staff at prison clinics as well the community health centers on Oahu.

Big Island Sen Josh Green came to the islands under a similarly structured program years ago. The National Health Corps launched him from Pittsberg, to Kau.

"I went into family practice and I would have had enormous debt. Kau had no doctor and that's how we provided healthcare for Kau in Big Island for many years. This program is a direct product of the experience that I had," said Green.

The new program will pay $40,000 in school loans each year, in exchange for working in a high-need area.

"For full-time service, it is $40,000. We would like to add part -time which is $20,000. We would like to add other services as behavioral health and dental," Withy said.

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Sun-Liberty Preview

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League MVP Tina Charles just led the Connecticut Sun to their first playoff win in four years. Star Cappie Pondexter likely needs to answer with a bounce-back effort if the New York Liberty are to avoid a second straight first-round exit.

As Charles and the top-seeded Sun try to earn a spot in the Eastern Conference finals, Pondexter and the Liberty look to keep their season alive by tying this series Saturday night.

Charles was named the WNBA Most Valuable Player earlier Thursday and received the honor that night before helping Connecticut win Game 1 of this semifinal series. She scored a game-high 17 points and blocked four shots in the 65-60 home win.

"I got a (personal) achievement, and we got the first playoff win," Charles said. "Now we have to build on that."

It was the Sun's first postseason victory since beating the Liberty in 2008, though New York won that series. Connecticut was swept in the opening round last year in Charles' first playoff appearance after failing to qualify for the previous two postseasons.

"This group has never won a playoff game so we'll take the win," coach Mike Thibault said. "It's exciting for them, but we're gonna have to play a whole lot better on Saturday to win there. ... Hopefully the first-game jitters are over."

Another win Saturday would send the Sun to their first East finals since 2006, though they would also have a chance to do so back home Monday night.

Pondexter advanced at least that far in three of her first five seasons with New York but now is at risk of falling in the opening round for a second consecutive year. The seven-year veteran, who placed seventh in this season's MVP voting, had 14 points Thursday but shot 3 for 16 as the Liberty hit 26.0 percent from the field.

"This may have been the worst playoff game I ever played," said Pondexter, who averaged 20.4 points during the regular season. "I didn't play smart basketball at all."

The only time she scored at least 20 in six matchups with Connecticut this season was in the Liberty's lone victory, 79-66 on Aug. 16 in the Sun's most recent visit to the Prudential Center. Charles was held to four and shot 1 of 7 in that game, but she scored no fewer than 17 in the other five meetings.

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Supreme Court has to face controversial topics in new term

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(CNN) -- A day after the Supreme Court upheld the health care law, Chief Justice John Roberts joked that he would spend some time at "an impregnable island fortress" to escape the torrent of vitriol and praise heaped on the bench.

The nation is now focused on the presidential election, but attention will likely shift back to the court after the November vote. A new term opens on Monday and the nine justices will address another potentially historic docket. Affirmative action, same-sex marriage, voting rights, and abortion could be taken up.

"The justices are moving from the frying pan right into the fire, having moved up with the big healthcare case," said Thomas Goldstein, a leading Washington lawyer and publisher of SCOTUSblog.com. "They are tackling some of the most difficult legal questions of today. Across the board, probably the biggest term in at least a decade."

A range of explosive issues will test Roberts' leadership of a shaky 5-4 conservative majority:

--Affirmative action and whether universities may continue to use race as one factor in student admissions to maintain a diverse campus.

--Same-sex marriage and the constitutional "equal protection" rights of gay and lesbian couples to wed.

--Voting rights challenges to rigorous federal oversight of state and local elections, and to voter identification laws.

--"Personhood" laws that say life begins at conception, a push by some states and anti-abortion opponents to perhaps revisit the Roe v. Wade ruling.

These issues and several other important criminal, business, and international cases could change the social political landscape in coming years.

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Supreme Court has to face controversial topics in new term

Report: Many Oklahomans would lose health care under Romney plan

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Read all the election coverage.

The results and methods of the report from Families USA are sharply disputed by Romney supporters.

The report shows that under plans advocated by Romney:

Avik Roy, a blogger for Forbes and an outside health policy adviser to the Romney campaign, said the Families USA report inaccurately portrays Romney's position and is "basically worthless" because of its high number of factual and analytical errors.

The report inaccurately portrays how Romney's tax deductions for health-care coverage would work, doesn't disclose that one of its authors' research shows that President Barack Obama's plan would lead to higher insurance premiums, doesn't consider how Romney's plan might impact premiums, dishonestly reports how the Obama plan would impact Medicare, and doesn't account for tax increases or Medicare cuts in the Obama plan, Roy wrote.

"Perhaps Families USA believes that Obamacare was paid for by magic unicorns in the state," he wrote.

Although the plan analyzed by Families USA doesn't accurately portray Romney's position, Roy wrote, it does somewhat correspond to a plan once offered by President George W. Bush.

A previous report from the nonpartisan Lewin Group shows that the Bush plan would not result in any new government spending but would reduce the number of uninsured Americans by 9.2 million - an unexplained discrepancy of 20 million people from the Families USA report, Roy said.

One of the authors of the Families USA report said it does not account for some policies discussed by Romney, such as freeing the sale of health-insurance policies across state lines and expanding state high-risk pools.

Jonathan Gruber, a co-author of the report, said those plans were not built into the calculations because Romney hasn't offered enough details for their impact to be estimated.

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Report: Many Oklahomans would lose health care under Romney plan

Will the Medicaid safety net be stretched?

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Like a stagehand suddenly caught in the spotlight, Medicaid unexpectedly took center stage in the health care reform debate this summer when the Supreme Court disallowed a forced expansion of the program under President Barack Obama's health insurance overhaul.

The star of that historic court showdown was expected to be the Affordable Care Act's "individual mandate" portion that requires most Americans to acquire insurance or pay a penalty beginning in 2014, not the 47-year-old federal-state health care safety net for the poor that already insures 60 million people.

But the justices upheld the individual mandate along with the bulk of the law, then surprised almost everyone by ruling that the Medicaid expansion, designed to help provide health coverage to more than 30 million low-income Americans, should be optional for each state.

"People assumed that the individual mandate was much more at risk than the Medicaid expansion," says John McDonough, director of Harvard University's Center for Public Health Leadership and an architect of the Massachusetts health reform, which inspired the federal law. "Nobody foresaw them making the Medicaid expansion voluntary as an option."

Republican Govs. Rick Scott of Florida and Rick Perry of Texas, whose states are among those with the largest populations of uninsured low-income residents, immediately vowed not to expand their Medicaid programs. Other governors blindsided by the court's decision unleashed their insurance commissioners to explore the choices for states under a ruling that generated more questions than answers.

"There are at least 300 questions that have legitimately been raised in the wake of the decision, and there is nothing in the actual language that can help you understand it one way or another," says McDonough.

What is certain is that there's a strong incentive in the law for states to extend Medicaid to everyone with incomes of up to 133 percent of the federal poverty level (approximately $15,000 for an individual or $30,000 for a family of four) and cover eligible childless adults for the first time.

States that do so will have their expansion completely funded by the federal government for three years, with the federal share later declining to 90 percent. But wait, there's more: The feds' offer of three "free" years only applies to the years 2014 through 2016, further prompting states to act now.

Regardless of how a state proceeds on Medicaid expansion, individuals and families earning between 133 percent and 400 percent of the poverty level will be eligible for insurance premium subsidies beginning in 2014 under the federal health care law.

McDonough says the Medicaid expansion was designed to standardize Medicaid eligibility levels, thereby eliminating the current state-by-state patchwork, cutting the cost of uncompensated care at hospitals and emergency rooms and leaving less room for lawmakers to manipulate Medicaid programs for their own purposes.

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Will the Medicaid safety net be stretched?

Freedom Autosport’s Whitis, Long Hope to clinch ST Championship at Lime Rock

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#25 Freedom Autosport Mazda MX-5: Tom Long, Derek Whitis Photo by: Luis Betancourt LAKEVILLE, Conn.—Last year, Freedom Autosport’s Derek Whitis and Tom Long won the ST race at Lime Rock Park. This year, they’ll be happy just to finish in the top six. That’s where the duo will have to place in order to clinch their first GRAND-AM Continental Tire Sports Car Challenge championship. Whitis and Long ...

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Freedom Autosport’s Whitis, Long Hope to clinch ST Championship at Lime Rock

Eco Smart Energy, LLC Installs New Eco-Friendly, Solar Heating System to Local YMCA!

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New eco-friendly, solar heating hot water system provides a 27% reduction in water usage and 43% reduction in gas consumption.Dallas, Texas (PRWEB) September 28, 2012 The team at Eco Smart Energy, LLC and Blackall Mechanical, Inc., worked together to perfect a solution to generate an eco-friendly hot water system called Sun Equinox for the YMCA Town North located at, 4332 Northhaven Road in ...

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Eco Smart Energy, LLC Installs New Eco-Friendly, Solar Heating System to Local YMCA!

City beaches reveal our careless habits

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NEWS RELEASE 28 September 2012

City beaches reveal our careless habits

In just one hour, over 500 volunteers from Porirua, Hutt Valley and Wellington worked on International Coastal Clean-up Day to collect more than 100,000 pieces of waste from the region's coastlines.

The rubbish - which weighed more than 5 tonnes - was collected from cleanups around Wellington and Porirua harbours, Makara and the South Coast. The dross from our daily lives is washing down city drains and streams, spilling overboard from boats, and blowing from city streets, says Ryley Webster, Community Education Manager from Sustainable Coastlines, a New Zealand environmental charity that is carrying out an audit of the rubbish collected at the cleanup.

About 20 percent of the rubbish collected has been audited to see what it is and where its coming from.

The mountain of waste includes plastics of all kinds twisted ropes, bags, drinking straws, bottles and tops, pens tangled fishing lines, parking tickets, cigarette butts and packaging. There is shotgun casing and wadding likely swept down from farms, shoes to fit all sizes, and industrial strength rubber gloves. It also includes larger items like tyres, furniture - even a kitchen sink. Medical waste like syringes and asthma inhalers were picked up at some locations.

Volunteers collected 55 bags of rubbish from Evans Bay beach alone on Sunday 16 September, the day of Coastal Clean-up. In the week following this another 35 bags were picked up by people working on periodic detention.

Unfortunately, it is a constant flow of rubbish out to sea and onto our beaches. Every time it rains, rubbish makes its way into drains and then out to sea, says Ryley.

A lot of what we are finding relates to individual behaviour. This event was a great example of communities coming together to look after their coastlines and tackle what is a global problem at a local level.

The type of rubbish found often reflected the use of the area and catchment where it was found. Oriental Bay was littered with broken glass and cigarette butts and the Makara coastline was covered in rope.

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City beaches reveal our careless habits