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Covid robs tourism by the billion – TTR Weekly

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

LONDON, 25 August 2020: Visa service provider Official-esta.com has looked into which countries have suffered the biggest revenue loss, alongside the highest percentage of GDP lost to reveal the financial impact of Covid-19 on world tourism.

As the country with the most reportedCovid-19 cases, the USA (5.7 million cases) suffered the biggest drop inrevenue with a loss estimated at USD30,709 million.

With a reported drop of 98% ininternational tourist arrivals in June, Spain has the second-largest revenueloss of USD9,741 million.

France is the worlds most visited country,with over 89 million tourists each year, but the impact of Covid-19 hasresulted in a revenue loss of USD8,767 million.

The Caribbean islands make up 50% of thosewho have suffered the highest percentage loss in GDP, with the Turks and CaicosIslands, Aruba, Antigua and Barbuda, St. Lucia and Grenada all ranking in thelist of the top 10 worst affected.

Combining each countrys loss in revenue,the financial impact of Covid-19 on world tourism has resulted in a revenueloss of USD195 billion worldwide so far.

In 2019, global travel and tourismcontributed USD8.9 trillion to the worlds GDP, yet due to the currentpandemic, the financial impact of Covid-19 on world tourism has resulted in arevenue loss of USD195 billion worldwide in the first four months of 2020.

Official ESTA director of internationaldevelopment Jayne Forrester commented: Taking into account how travel andtourism contribute USD8.9 trillion to the worlds GDP alone, it is devastatingto see a total loss of USD195 billion worldwide in the first four months of2020 alone.

As travel bans have started to ease offfrom July, we only hope that we see no more significant losses to one of thelargest growing sectors in the world.

MethodologyData drawn from the World Travel and Tourism Council report on the impact Covid-19 has had on the travel industry. GDP data are taken from The World Bank. Data correct as of July 2020. Data available here

About Official ESTAOfficial ESTA is an online visa application and assistance processing firm, founded in 2011. It offers a simple step by step process for people to apply for their ESTA visa waiver that is required by anyone visiting the United States.

The countries with the biggest tourism revenue loss due to COVID-19:

The countries which have lost the highest % of GDP due to loss of tourism:

Fans crowd into an indoor concert in experiment on how to return to normality – CNN

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Leipzig, Germany (CNN) Ever since the coronavirus pandemic shuttered clubs, bars and concert halls around the world, music fans have been dreaming of the day they can once again visit a busy, sweaty venue to enjoy a gig with friends.

With infection rates rising in many European countries, this dream could be far off for now. But some music fans in Leipzig, Germany, have been given the chance to rock for a day in the name of science -- with the help of some glowing hand sanitizer and electronic trackers.

Researchers in the German city of Leipzig staged a 1,500-person experimental indoor concert on Saturday to better understand how Covid-19 spreads at big, busy events, and how to prevent it.

At the gig, which featured a live performance from musician Tim Bendzko, fans were given respiratory face masks, fluorescent hand gel and electronic "contact trackers" -- small transmitters that determine the contact rates and contact distances of the individual experiment participants.

Participants wearing FFP2 protective face masks took part in the Covid transmission risk assessment study in a concert setting in Leipzig, Germany.

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Using data from the contact trackers, scientists from The University of Halle will monitor the number "critical contacts" had by each participant during specific times and locations, while the residue left by fluorescent hand gel will identify frequently touched surfaces. Researchers hope to use the data to find ways to bring big events, including sports, back safely.

Professor Michael Gekle, the dean of the university's medical faculty and a professor of physiology, told CNN the experiment was being conducted to better prepare authorities on how to conduct events in the upcoming autumn and winter seasons.

Participants wore FFP2 protective face masks during the performance.

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

"We cannot afford another lockdown," he said. "We have to gather the data now in order to be able to make valid predictions," he said.

"There is no zero risk if you want to have life. We want to give the politicians a tool in order to decide rationally whether to allow such an event or not. That means they have to have the tool to predict how many additional infected people such an event will produce," he said.

Researchers directed volunteers to run three scenarios -- one that simulated a concert pre-coronavirus, a second simulating a concert during the pandemic, with improved hygiene measures in place, and a third, with reduced participants. Scientists will gather the data, apply a mathematical model, and evaluate the hygiene interventions, with conclusions ready by the end of the year.

Singer Tim Bendzko performed for volunteers during the study.

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

Researchers believe this is the first time an experiment of this scale has taken place in Europe, but say that different considerations would have to be applied depending on the type of event, the behavior of concert goers and whether patrons were allowed to consume alcohol.

"Of course, a concert with Rammstein would be different," he said.

Gekle told CNN that due to a low prevalence of the virus in the states of Saxony and Lower Saxony, participating in the study was low risk for volunteers, who underwent coronavirus testing 48 hours before participation, and were wearing masks during the show. "It's safer than flying to Majorca," he said.

The number of coronavirus infections in Germany has been climbing again since the end of July. On Saturday, the country saw its highest number of daily infections since April 26, with 2,034 new cases of Covid-19, according to Robert Koch institute, the country's center for disease and control.

The experiment may have been controlled, but for some in the crowd -- despite the lack of alcohol -- it felt like a return to normality.

Participants took a coronavirus test before being allowed to enter the study, and were temperature checked on arrival.

Sean Gallup/Getty Images

"This was our first real applause from the audience in months," Bendzko told CNN. "The atmosphere is surprisingly good -- it almost felt like a real concert.

"I wish that it will be possible to play at big concerts again someday soon," he said. "But we all understand that we now have to live with the virus and we have to take a certain risk."

Elli Blesz, 20, from Leipzig told CNN: "The atmosphere was really great, we all enjoyed the music -- it was nice to listen to live music after six months."

And Kira Stuetz, a 26-year-old student who attended the concert with her husband, said: "It was a little crazy." Recalling one of the pre-coronavirus simulations, where audience members sat together, she said that "at first it almost felt wrong all people came so close together. We thought this 'is a dream' because it's not allowed to be sitting together so close! But then it was really cool. I could not believe it that we were at a real concert again!"

Organizers around the world have been dipping their toes into the water to see when and how live events can be brought back in a world still suffering from the coronavirus pandemic -- in the UK, event organizers trialled concerts at an outdoor, purpose-made socially distant concert venue, where patrons sat in small groups on distant, raised platforms.

Correction: A previous version of this story misstated the number of people who participated in the experimental indoor concert. It was 1,500.

Nadine Schmidt reported from Leipzig, Germany. Amy Woodyatt wrote from London.

Fans crowd into an indoor concert in experiment on how to return to normality - CNN

Germany issues travel warning for Paris and Cote d’Azur as it happened – The Guardian

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Americans who regularly cross the border from Mexico reported long wait times to re-enter the US on Monday after US officials imposed new Covid-19-related restrictions on cross-border travel by US citizens and permanent residents.

The US government closed lanes at select ports of entry on the border and began conducting more secondary checks to limit non-essential travel and slow the spread of the coronavirus, the US Customs and Border Protection (CBP) said on Friday.

According to CBP data, wait times at some border crossings have since doubled or tripled. Many crossing points now have only one or two lanes of traffic open. On Monday, border-crossers reported up to 5-6 hour wait times.

Jess Herr, 30, a US citizen who lives in the Mexican border city of Tijuana and works at a restaurant in San Diego in southern California, said she usually wakes up at 4 am and crosses by car in about an hour to make her shift.

When she saw the long line of cars on Monday, she decided to cross by foot, although she still had to wait five hours to cross the border.

At the Cordoba bridge joining the Mexican city of Ciudad Juarez with El Paso in Texas, only two lanes were open to motorists. Border-crossers who usually waited about 45 minutes told Reuters they had waited more than three hours to cross, and some were late for work.

Melissa Reyes, general manager for a nonprofit organisation, said she had waited 4 and a half hours to cross the border back into the United States over the weekend after going to Puerto Palomas in Mexico to do some shopping. Normally the wait time would be 15-20 minutes.

The new restrictions announced last week would prove challenging for people who live lives that span both sides of the border, she said. Its gonna be pretty devastating, she added.

The US-Mexican border is the worlds busiest land border.

Before coronavirus restrictions at the border began in March, over 950,000 people entered the US from Mexico on foot or in cars on a typical day.

US president Donald Trump has implemented a series of sweeping policies to curb legal and illegal immigration in recent months, saying the moves are necessary to limit the spread of the coronavirus or preserve jobs for American workers.

In March, the US, Mexico and Canada agreed to bar non-essential travel across their shared borders, but the restrictions still allowed US citizens and permanent residents to return to the United States.

Germany issues travel warning for Paris and Cote d'Azur as it happened - The Guardian

WebBeds world’s top bed bank post-COVID? That’s the Webjet plan – Travel Trends

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Webjet aims to transform its WebBeds accommodation distribution/saler business into the #1 B2B player globally, overtaking the long-term bed bank market leader HotelBeds, when the world finally emerges from the COVID crisis.

But what are the metrics and how will Webjet make that happen?

Neither of these key points was addressed by Melbourne-based company in its announcement.

So lets look at the numbers as they currently stand.

At this point WebBeds is claiming 350,000 hotels and 44,000 customers (distribution network).

Based on past Webjet ASX announcements, between 30,000 to 40,000 of these properties are directly contracted with WebBeds.

The remaining 300,000 plus would therefore be supplied by third-party providers, who own the hotel relationship and take a commission cut along the way.

Meanwhile, HotelBeds, which calls itself the worlds leading bed bank, says it has 180,000 hotels an estimated 75% or 135,000 of which are contracted, three times more than WebBeds and 66,000 customers.

HotelBeds, which is headquartered in Palma, Spain, also (currently) has a much bigger contracting team than WebBeds, giving it a key advantage.

The importance of having a direct relationship cannot be overstated higher commissions per transaction, greater flexibility in terms of partner pricing and distribution, better data and ownership of the client.

So the question remains and it has been put to Webjet today on what metric are they aiming to be #1?

No answer yet, but one thing is for sure, WebBeds is the now the major profit engine of Webjet, which announced its annual results late last week.

Webjet registered a net loss of $143.6 million for the year to June 30, 2020.

This included a $40 million debtors write-off, $14.6 million associated with the closure of Webjet Exclusives and $20 million in impairments arising from the closure of Online Republic Cruise.

The company has cut operating costs by around 50%; reduced staff numbers by 22% (515 jobs) and introduced four day weeks for most employees.

Meanwhile, Webjet raised more than $500 million in April and July to see it through the tough times.

Faced with a significant fall in bookings and nominal revenues in all our businesses, we focused on what we could control, said Webjet MD John Guscic.

We materially reduced our costs and fortified our balance sheet.

We are starting FY21 with a strong capital position offering significant financial and strategic flexibility.

As for WebBeds, 3.2 million bookings were made through the platform during the year and earnings before tax came in at $15.3 million despite a terrible second half in which it lost -$42 million.

Following the results announcement, Guscic told the Australian Financial Review he believes a COVID vaccine is the only antidote to travel woes.

As soon as a vaccine is either announced or goes into widespread implementation across a significant population, we would think that six to 12 months beyond that date we would see a significant improvement in the underlying travel industry sentiment, Guscic said.

I think very few travel businesses will thrive without a vaccine. Were no different. Our business is predicated on consumers having confidence getting on an aircraft and consumers having confidence arriving at a hotel.

Thats paramount and fundamental to our industry. There are other alternatives if there was a prolonged period without a vaccine that would ensure that we would survive.

ends

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WebBeds world's top bed bank post-COVID? That's the Webjet plan - Travel Trends

Outbound Travel Service Market is Projected to Expand at a Steady CAGR over the Forecast by 2025 – The News Brok

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Outbound Travel Service Market Report aims to provide an overview of the industry through detailed market segmentation. The report offers thorough information about the overview and scope of the market along with its drivers, restraints and trends. This report is designed to include both qualitative and quantitative aspects of the industry in each region and country participating in the study.

Key players in globalOutbound Travel Service market include:Expedia Group,Corporate Travel Management,Booking Holdings (Priceline Group),China CYTS Tours Holding,American Express Global Business Travel,China Travel,Fareportal,BCD Group,AAA Travel,Travel Leaders Group (ALTOUR),JTB Corporation,World Travel Holdings,Ovation Travel Group,Travel and Transport,Omega World Travel,World Travel,Abercrombie & Kent Group,FROSCH Travel,Direct Travel,TUI Group,Butterfield & Robinson,InnerAsia Travels and more.

Request sample copy of this report athttps://www.reportsintellect.com/sample-request/1291612?utm_source=market&utm_medium=24

This study specially analyses the impact of Covid-19 outbreak on the Outbound Travel Service, covering the supply chain analysis, impact assessment to the Outbound Travel Service market size growth rate in several scenarios, and the measures to be undertaken by Outbound Travel Service companies in response to the COVID-19 epidemic.

This report also splits the market by region: Breakdown data in Chapter 4, 5, 6, 7 and 8.

Americas, United States, Canada, Mexico, Brazil, APAC, China, Japan, Korea, Southeast Asia, India, Australia, Europe, Germany, France, UK, Italy, Russia, Middle East & Africa, Egypt, South Africa, Israel, Turkey and GCC Countries.

Inquire for a Discounthttps://www.reportsintellect.com/discount-request/1291612?utm_source=market&utm_medium=24

The scope of this research report extends from the basic outline of the Outbound Travel Service Market to tricky structures, classifications and applications. This research report also provides a clear picture of the global market by presenting data through effective information graphics. It also provides a detailed list of factors that affect market growth.

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Outbound Travel Service Market is Projected to Expand at a Steady CAGR over the Forecast by 2025 - The News Brok

We Should Call Traditional Medicine The Original Medicine: Dr Apurve Mehra – Outlook India

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

The clash between practitioners of traditional medicines and allopathy continues leaving the common man confused about the efficacy of remedies to boost immunity, treat common cold and other minor ailments to treatment for recovery after a fracture to even rehabilitation after a stroke. Dr Apurve Mehra, founder of Biogetica, which holds a patent for a faster and effective treatment of herpes, in an interview tells Outlook's Lola Nayar that the whole debate is pointless as each school of medicine has something to offer in developing more effective medicines.

There are many skeptics of alternate medicines particularly among allopathic doctors. How do you and your group of doctors tackle this? Is there any ongoing effort to authenticate the efficacy of your medications and treatment?

The term alternate medicine needs to be eradicated. We should instead call it the original medicine as history will vouch for the fact that for thousands of years, human beings have relied on nature for medicines. It is only in the last hundred years that pharmaceuticals have taken over medicines. Anyone who believes that pharmaceuticals are the only medicine is welcome to prove their point by living off pharmaceutical medicines and vitamins in place of natural food for a month.

While we use natural products, pharmaceuticals produce molecules to mimic natural products. For instance, marijuana, which is considered a medicine in the US, is not used in its original form but instead pharmaceuticals have created Marinol, a synthetic derivative approved by the FDA. Similarly, many malaria, blood pressure and anxiety medications are derived from nature. It's not that the natural molecule did not work, or is not supported by science. It is just that nature cannot be patented and, hence, no one wishes to prove it to the authorities.

At Biogetica, our experiments have proven that nature can support pharmaceuticals and even outperform them. The original live molecule in all the perfection of nature is better for you in the long run.

Can you cite any instances to support the claim that traditional medicines can support and even outperform allopathic medicines?

The last two studies we have published on herpes (a virus causing contagious sores, most often around the mouth or on the genitals) and trigeminal neuralgia (a nerve responsible for sensation in the face and motor functions such as biting and chewing). In the case of herpes, an episode normally lasts for about four weeks. A very popular anti-viral helps to reduce the episode to 10 days and sometimes to two weeks. We have produced a combination therapy which is 100 per cent natural that helps to reduce the herpes episode to just three days. We have a patent for our product both in India and in the US and our groundbreaking study on herpes has been published and peer reviewed.

In the case of trigeminal neuralgia, often called the suicide disease, an estimated one in five people who get this disease tend to commit suicide, being the most painful condition known to man, much worse than any headache, backpain or even a broken bone. While gamma knife surgery treatment for the disease was helping 44 per cent of the patients, our treatment protocol has been known to help 68 per cent of the patients to become pain free. There is a cost advantage too as a surgery can cost about R .5 lakh, our treatment using natural products costs around Rs 5000.

Though as in the case of herpes, the episode may get over within days, we advise ayurvedic treatment for 160 days to be able to eliminate the root cause of the disease. Unlike in allopathy, we dont just focus on symptoms. While pharmaceuticals make trillions every year, we dont make even a billion dollars every year. But what makes it worth it are the letters we get from different parts of the globe thanking us for the products that have made a difference in their lives.

We often hear criticism that many of the ayurvedic medicines contain harmful hormones and steroids and some also contain high levels of metals. How true is this charge?

The hormones and steroids dont come from Ayurveda, but is due to adulteration of these medicines. Hormones and steroids are native to allopathy and prescribed openly. We ensure our medicines are adulteration free. They are in fact organic in nature.

In terms of health and nutrition, how well do your medicines serve?

Our medicines work on three levels in the body. One is molecular level, which are like raw material required by the body to produce something. This concept comes from Western medicine. The second layer comes from what we have learnt from Ayurveda and Chinese and Tibetan medicines about how to balance the five elements of the body. The third layer comes from the Vedic saying amritasya putraha or children of immortality. So, our effort is to help you align your body to negentropic soul archetypes to heal the body. We have learnt from Western medicine what are the nutrients required to help a diabetic patients body produce insulin to metabolise sugar, while from Ayurveda we know the balance of five elements that has to be created in the body to make it conducive to produce insulin.

Similarly, homeopathy offers sarcodes of insulin, which serves like a mirror for the body. Where we differ from other practitioners of different medicines is that we strive to put together the best of various options to offer best treatment.

Are you coming out with any study to address fears of non-believers in traditional medicines?

We have already come out with many such studies but unfortunately people will believe what they want to believe in. The fact is that every system of medicine has strengths. But this strength becomes a weakness when the practitioner says my way or the highway.

Every medical practice has a time and place. It is important to make the right choice. For instance, in the case of a bone fracture it is important to go in for surgical care but after that one can choose from among traditional medicines and allopathy to strengthen the reset bone right from intake of calcium to other alternatives. Unfortunately, nobody is positioning themselves to serve patient needs, and instead opt to stick to what they have learnt in their medical studies and harbor skepticism for any other system of medicine. Over time and especially now during this pandemic, it is obvious that the time has come for doctors to come together and learn from each other.

Original post:

We Should Call Traditional Medicine The Original Medicine: Dr Apurve Mehra - Outlook India

Commitment to Education and Mentoring: How Memorial Sloan Kettering Continued Summer Internships During the Pandemic – On Cancer – Memorial Sloan…

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

While numerous summerinternships in the United States and abroad were cancelled this year due to the pandemic, Memorial Sloan Kettering (MSK) has kept many internship programs running both virtually and in-person. This summer, more than 300 interns from around the world were enrolled in MSK internship programs and many more students were involved in frequent online seminars and lectures provided by MSK.

Education is one of the core pillars of MSKs mission to lead in the prevention, diagnosis, treatment, and cure of cancer and associated diseases. MSK is dedicated to training the next generation of scientists and healthcare professionals, so when it became apparent in early March that hosting summer interns in-person was going to be uniquely challenging, MSK leaders quickly shifted to modify many of our student summer programs rather than cancel them outright.

At MSK, we are acting on our deep commitment to continue educating studentsduring the pandemic, said Laura Liberman, MD, FACR, Director of the Office of Faculty Development (OFD). Now, more than ever, we see why its vital to train the next generationof scientists and healthcare professionals and to teach them how to communicate clearly and accurately about science and health.

Some programs were modified to make them available to even more students. The Human Oncology and Pathogenesis Program (HOPP) Summer Student Program, designed for high school students who are interested in pursuing careers in the biomedical sciences, shifted to a virtual seminar series open to everyone by registering here. This series, which ends August 28, includes one-hour lectures held up to three times a week from leading doctors and scientists at MSK and other institutions.

A new program was created to focus on COVID-19 specifically. The MSK CARES (Coronavirus Academic Research Experience Summer) Program engaged past interns from the Summer Clinical Oncology Research Experience (SCORE) in literature review and analysis during the pandemic. These 14 SCORE alumni volunteered to join this brand new research program where they explored many aspects of COVID-19, including fatality rates, testing, vaccine development, telehealth, disparities among patient populations, and more. Check out their final presentations here and here.

Throughout the year, MSK hosts more than 25 different student programs that give high school students, college students and recent graduates the opportunity to work alongside our world-renowned staff in a variety of different areas. Some examples of student programs include the Clinical Assistance Program (CAP) for nursing students, Summer Support Internship/Employment Program for students interested in healthcare/hospital administration, Chemical Biology Summer Program (ChBSP) for chemistry, biochemistry, and chemical biology undergraduate students, Summer Exposure Program (SEP) designed to expose underserved high school students to clinical and research opportunities in oncology, and many more programs found here. There are internship opportunities in clinical research, molecular biology, chemical biology, computational biology and medicine, nursing, information technology, healthcare administration, office management, and more.

Get to know a few of our students who joined us this summer:

Anthony Martinez Benitez is a senior at Hunter College, majoring in human biology and minoring in chemistry. When he was seven years old, he and his family moved from El Salvador to Hempstead, NY, where they still reside. He first became interested in pre-med in high school after attending a summer pipeline program at the Zucker School of Medicine at Hofstra University. However, Anthonys specific passion for research started after he participated in our Clinical Oncology Open Learning (COOL) Scholars Program. After learning about the many types of physiological and psychological effects on cancer patients through this program, he was inspired to seek out research laboratories that focus on studying the advancement of cancer. This brought Anthony to apply to the SCORE Program this summer. He has been working virtually from home, and presented his final project on the STAG2 gene, which is found to be commonly mutated in bladder cancer (and several other types of cancer). In his free time, Anthony volunteers at a local hospital. After he graduates, he hopes to join one of MSKs research labs to continue to gain research experience and someday become a physician-scientist.

Rachelle Monteau is a pre-med student at CUNY in the highly competitive Sophie Davis Biomedical Education Program, a seven-year BS/MD program that specifically recruits students from underrepresented populations into medicine. Rachelles parents are originally from Haiti, but they now live in Queens, where she has been conducting her internship virtually this summer. Inspired by her father who is a physician assistant, she hopes to bring her medical training to underrepresented communities in the United States and abroad when she graduates. Rachelle was also accepted to our SCORE Program this summer, where she worked with her mentor, Fumiko Chino, MD, on her final project focused on racial trends in liver cancer mortality.

Kathleen Navasis a senior at UC Berkeley, double majoring in data science andMCB (Molecular and Cell Biology) with a focus on immunology. Shes spent her whole life living in the Bay Area, but in late June she travelled to New York City for the first time to work inThe Quaid Morris Lab. Out of a cohort of thirteen inourComputational Biology Summer Program (CBSP), she is one of three interns working on-site. Kathleen is focusing on multiple projects, including investigating how new onset autoimmunity can inform cancer outcome predictions. While she admits that its a strange time to live in New York City (but a great time to jog across town and sightsee unusually empty locations, including Times Square!), she will be staying through the fall to continue working on her research.

Amelia Tran lives in Vietnam and has been conducting herinternship from there this summer working opposite hours on East Coast time! She is a senior at Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts majoring in statistics. This summer, she was an intern in the Quantitative Sciences Undergraduate Research Experience (QSURE) program, where she learned about the role of statistics in biomedical settings. She is grateful that her internship was not cancelled, and found that the program was still well organized and professional, even though it was all virtual. She and her fellow QSURE interns still keep in touch over WhatsApp.

For more information about internships and student and new-grad careers at MSK, please visit: https://careers.mskcc.org/students-new-grads/.

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Commitment to Education and Mentoring: How Memorial Sloan Kettering Continued Summer Internships During the Pandemic - On Cancer - Memorial Sloan...

George Mason scientists help with saliva test that could be a game-changer for tracking COVID-19 in US – 13newsnow.com WVEC

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

"All the different parts of the Mason research ecosystem are bringing their expertise together for this worthy purpose."

FAIRFAX COUNTY, Va. George Mason scientists and researchers are on the front lines of creating a saliva test that will help detect antibodies to COVID-19 and could begin screening student, faculty and staff volunteers as early as this summer, according to the university.

"All the different parts of the Mason research ecosystem are bringing their expertise together for this worthy purpose, said Lance Liotta, the lead researcher and the co-director and co-founder of Masons Center for Applied Proteomics and Molecular Medicine (CAPMM). The goal is to evaluate if saliva can be used instead of blood for ease of screening for COVID-19 antibodies.

Researchers across the United States have found that one of the most versatile options for COVID-19 testing is the saliva-based paper-strip test, because it only requires a paper strip and a test tube. Studies have found that these types of tests could easily be used at home, reducing the risk of community spread.

Scientists have learned that even moderately accurate screening tests still reduce transmission.

Emanuel Petricoin, co-director of CAPMM, said Mason infectious disease, clinical care, clinical diagnostics and molecular microbiology researchers are working together to develop and assess the test for COVID-19 exposure.

This could have far-reaching impact for the local community, Virginia, the United States, and the entire world if an accurate method can be achieved and rigorously validated, Petricoin said.

The U.S. Food and Drug Administration issued the approval notice Saturday, for the test which was developed by Yale University, and has been partially funded by the National Basketball Association (NBA) and its player's association.

In mid-July as 3M partnered with MIT to develop a paper-based coronavirus test. The goal was to provide millions of their COVID-19 diagnostic tests after the summer.

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George Mason scientists help with saliva test that could be a game-changer for tracking COVID-19 in US - 13newsnow.com WVEC

Global Bioinformatics Market Explosive Growth And Key Trends Analysis | Eminent Players Are Agilent Technologies, Inc. (US), QIAGEN (Netherlands), BGI…

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Bioinformatics Marketis expected to reach USD 26.33 billion by 2026 from USD 7.76 billion in 2018, at a CAGR of 16.5% in the forecast period 2019 to 2026. The new market report contains data for historic years 2017, the base year of calculation is 2018 and the forecast period is 2019 to 2026.

Few of the major competitors currently working in the bioinformatics market are Thermo Fisher Scientific (US), Illumina Inc. (US), Agilent Technologies, Inc. (US), QIAGEN (Netherlands), BGI (China), Wuxi NextCODE (China), Eurofins Scientific (Luxembourg), Waters Corporation (US), Sophia Genetics (Switzerland), Partek (US), DNASTAR (US), Dassault Systmes (France), DNAnexus, Inc. (US), Genebio (Switzerland), ASEBIO (Spain), PerkinElmer Inc. (US), abm Inc.(Canada) a few among others.

Get Sample Copy Of This Report + All Related Graphs @https://www.databridgemarketresearch.com/request-a-sample/?dbmr=global-bioinformatics-market

Products of the report

New Bioinformatics Market Development

Key Developments in the Market:

Market Drivers

Market Restraints

To know more about the studyhttps://www.databridgemarketresearch.com/reports/global-bioinformatics-market

Segmentation: Global Bioinformatics Market

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Global Bioinformatics Market Explosive Growth And Key Trends Analysis | Eminent Players Are Agilent Technologies, Inc. (US), QIAGEN (Netherlands), BGI...

Dr. Stephen Robbins appointed Director of the Lady Davis Institute at the Jewish General Hospital – McGill Reporter

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

On August 20, Dr. Lawrence Rosenberg, President and CEO of CIUSSS West- Central Montreal, announced the appointment of Dr. Stephen Robbins as Director of the Lady Davis Institute for Medical Research (LDI) at the Jewish General Hospital (JGH) in January 2021. Dr. Robbins also becomes a Professor in McGill Universitys Gerald Bronfman Department of Oncology, as well as an Associate Member in McGills Department of Medicine. He will also hold the Glaxo Smith Kline Chair in Pharmacology at McGill.

Dr. Robbins is a proven strategic leader and a renowned scientist with an established national and international reputation, and we are confident that he will enhance the LDIs already strong position as a leading Canadian biomedical research centre, said Dr. Rosenberg, who chaired the search committee.

His career has spanned several interests, including immunology, genetics and cancer, which is particularly relevant, given that the LDI is home to more than 200 diverse scientists operating under four axes: cancer, epidemiology, molecular and regenerative medicine, and psychosocial aspects of disease.

Since 2013, Dr. Robbins has served as the Scientific Director of the Institute of Cancer Research at the Canadian Institutes of Health Research. He has been at the University of Calgary since 1996, where he is Professor in the Departments of Oncology and Biochemistry & Molecular Biology at the Cummings School of Medicine. He currently leads a research program that focuses on pre-clinical testing for brain tumours, inflammation and metastasis.

I look forward to joining the great research community at the Lady Davis Institute, said Dr. Robbins. I am very honoured and humbled by the opportunity to lead this internationally recognized research institute with its strong history of research accomplishments, accolades and contributions to improving the health and well-being of people across Canada and beyond.

Dr. Robbins earned his Bachelors degree in biology at York University in Toronto (1985) and his Ph.D. in microbiology and immunology from the University of British Columbia (1991). He pursued his post-doctoral work at the University of California at San Francisco (1991-1996) under Nobel laureate Dr. J. Michael Bishop. His previous leadership roles include Vice-Director (2007-2008) and Director (2009-2013) of the Southern Alberta Cancer Research Institute, and Associate Director, Research, of Alberta Health Services Cancer Care (2010-2013).

We are so pleased that Dr. Robbins is joining our faculty, said Dr. David Eidelman, Vice-Principal (Health Affairs) and Dean of the Faculty of Medicine at McGill. His research will flourish at McGill, and he is a welcome addition to our strong roster of oncology specialists.

Dr. Roderick McInnes, who has served with distinction as Director of the LDI since 2009, will continue in that role until the end of the year.

Dr. McInnes has done an exceptional job over the past decade in reinvigorating scientific output at the LDI, recruiting a corps of dynamic young investigators, and streamlining the focus of the Institutes intellectual interests, said Dr. Rosenberg. We are very grateful for his contributions, upon which we will continue to build for many years to come.

Since its founding in 1969, the LDI has been an integral part of the Jewish General Hospital, with strong academic links to McGill University. Its scientists are highly regarded for their cutting-edge work in basic, translational and clinical research, with a focus on bringing discoveries from the lab bench to the bedside for the benefit of patients.

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Dr. Stephen Robbins appointed Director of the Lady Davis Institute at the Jewish General Hospital - McGill Reporter

Students connect medical history to today’s practice The Daily Evergreen – The Daily Evergreen

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

History of Medicine Club president hopes to engage discussion about vaccines, increase membership

LAUREN PETTIT

Thinh Tran reached out to his roommates, friends and professors to create the History of Medicine Club, which he started in fall 2019.

Thinh Tran grew up in a family centered around business, but he decided to go a different route.

Tran, senior molecular biology major, saw his family practitioner when he was younger and realized that was the path he wanted to take. Now as a senior, Tran leads the History of Medicine Club, which he started in fall 2019.

Sian Ritchie, scholarly associate professor and club adviser, said a documentary about the purification of heroin from opium in the 1800s inspired her to teach an honors course about the history of medicine.

Ritchie previously advised the pre-optometry club, but the club has since been inactive. She also jumped around from being a researcher at a research lab to being a stay-at-home mom to teaching at WSU.

One of Trans friends took the class and told him about it, which sparked his interest in providing a club for others to learn more about the subject, Tran said.

[Tran] showed up at my door one day and said he wanted to start this club so Im like, Okay, cool, Ritchie said.

Tran noticed as an undergraduate on the pre-med track that professors usually do not teach about the history of medicine, but focus on the basics instead.

He then reached out to his roommate, friends and professors to get the club on its feet. He said one of the challenging parts was sparking interest for other students to join the group.

I feel like any students who are interested in any kind of healthcare would really benefit from learning the history behind certain medications and certain kinds of attitudes towards things like opium, Ritchie said.

Tran said as of now, the club hosts meetings to prompt discussions about the current medical field and how history has impacted medical society today. There are plans in the works to complete volunteer work.

Thats another really important box to check if youre interested in a health profession is getting those volunteer hours, Ritchie said.

She said with COVID-19 at the forefront of everything, it is important to learn how immunizations came to be. Ritchie said Edward Jenner was the first to find a vaccination against smallpox, which killed millions of people over centuries.

Jenner derived a vaccine for smallpox using a disease found in cows called cowpox. Ritchie said cartoons were published about the discovery claiming that the vaccination would turn them into a cow.

Its a classic kind of misunderstanding of science in the popular press. Its not new, Ritchie said. Its always been around.

After taking a gap year, Tran said he wants to attend medical school so he can practice family medicine. He has a passion for talking to people and finding solutions to improve their health.

Tran said with the semester being online, he anticipates all club meetings to be over Zoom, and students of all majors are welcome.

One of the things that Ive learned throughout this whole thing is Im going to need to be patient, Tran said.

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Students connect medical history to today's practice The Daily Evergreen - The Daily Evergreen

Treating COVID-19: Bipolar drug shows promise and other hopeful findings – Medical News Today

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

We continue our Hope Behind the Headlines series by exploring the most recent and most hopeful findings in the field of COVID-19 research.

Hopefully, the COVID-19 pandemic will not last forever. Every 2 weeks, we round up the recently published evidence that reminds us of this.

In our last installment, we reported on a vaccine candidate that showed promise in monkeys and a new trial that tested an existing drug, among other innovations.

In this feature, we discover another existing drug that could treat the infection. We also learn about T cells and how a new blood test could speed up vaccine development and mass screening.

Furthermore, we zoom in on a class of immune-modifying drugs that may be the most effective treatment for severe forms of the disease.

Stay informed with live updates on the current COVID-19 outbreak and visit our coronavirus hub for more advice on prevention and treatment.

Researchers have found that a drug that doctors currently use for treating conditions as varied as bipolar disorder and hearing loss also has antibacterial and anti-inflammatory properties. These properties make it a good candidate for treating COVID-19.

The drug is called Ebselen, and the fact that it is already in use indicates its safety. Furthermore, previous evidence has shown that Ebselen can block enzymes that the new coronavirus needs for replicating within healthy host cells.

This enzyme is called Mpro, and researchers have described this protease as indispensable for the replication of SARS-CoV-2. As a result, Mpro is an excellent drug candidate.

In the new study, Prof. Juan de Pablo, from the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering at the University of Chicago, IL, and his colleagues set out to test whether Ebselen can indeed inhibit the Mpro protease.

To find out, they created computer models of both the drug and Mpro to see how they interact. They found that the drugs action is two-pronged:

In addition to binding at the catalytic site of the enzyme, Ebselen also binds strongly to a distant site, which interferes with the enzymes catalytic function by relying on a mechanism in which information is carried from one region of a large molecule to another region far away from it through subtle structural reorganizations.

These findings highlight the promise of Ebselen as a repurposed drug against SARS-CoV-2.

The study authors

In an exclusive interview for Medical News Today, James Hindley, Ph.D., explained how he and his collaborator Martin Scurr, Ph.D. a research associate at Cardiff Universitys School of Medicine in the United Kingdom are working on a new test that measures a key component of the immune system: T cells.

Hindley, who is the Executive Director at Indoor Biotechnologies in Cardiff, told MNT that most of the existing tests focus on assessing antibodies to determine immunity to SARS-CoV-2.

However, another critical component of our immune response to viruses is the T cell. These also provide memory immune responses and may even be more sensitive than antibodies, said Hindley.

T cells are a type of lymphocyte, or white blood cell, that the bone marrow produces. Before neutralizing antibodies even come into play, different types of T cells have to collaborate to lead to antibody production.

The test we have developed can provide quantitative results measuring the magnitude of an individuals T-cell response to the SARS-CoV-2 virus. We can also run in parallel the same test for other human coronaviruses and viruses, such as influenza. This allows us to establish a persons immune status.

James Hindley, Ph.D.

The researcher went on to explain that the test will be useful for vaccine development; to determine whether a T-cell response to the vaccine has been generated and whether that is adequate to be protective from infection.

We also believe this test will enable public health bodies to perform much wider screenings of the population. [T]his would be carried out by laboratories in conjunction with antibody testing to determine what constitutes protective immunity.

Finally, the researcher also explained how this test is more effective than others.

Where we were innovative was looking at the minimum requirements to perform this test, to get the necessary data to answer the question of whether a person has specific T-cell responses.

By providing just these elements without the added complexity, we made this test much easier to perform in almost any lab.

New research spearheaded by Marcus Buggert, an immunologist at the Karolinska Institutet in Sweden, also has T cells at its heart.

Buggert and his team found that 30 out of 31 people who recovered from a mild SARS-CoV-2 infection had memory T-cell responses to the new virus.

Out of the same sample, 27 had antibodies against the coronavirus. Such findings add to the newly emerging direction in research that uses T cells as an alternative path to COVID-19 immunity.

In the new study, T cell responses were still visible months after a mild infection, sometimes even in the absence of antibodies.

In the absence of a protective vaccine, says Buggert, it is critical to determine if exposed or infected people, especially those with asymptomatic or very mild forms of the disease who likely act inadvertently as the major transmitters, develop robust adaptive immune responses against SARS-CoV-2.

Our findings suggest that the reliance on antibody responses may underestimate the extent of population-level immunity against SARS-CoV-2. The obvious next step is to determine whether robust memory T-cell responses in the absence of detectable antibodies can protect against COVID-19 in the long term.

Marcus Buggert

Finally, an observational study found a class of drugs called interleukin-6 (IL-6) receptor inhibitors to be the most effective for treating severe forms of COVID-19.

In fact, the new study found that these drugs are even more effective than remdesivir or dexamethasone the other two treatments widely heralded as beneficial, based on clinical trial results.

Healthcare professionals typically prescribe IL-6 receptor inhibitors for conditions with an autoimmune component, such as rheumatoid arthritis, to dampen the immune systems excessive response.

IL-6 receptor inhibitors as their name suggests block the receptors of IL-6, which is an immune signaling molecule, or cytokine.

In COVID-19, this action helps calm down the phenomenon known as the cytokine storm, which can lead to potentially fatal outcomes in people with the disease.

In the new paper, for which Dr. Pranay Sinha from the Section of Infectious Diseases at Boston University School of Medicine, MA, was the first author, the researchers explain that the participants who received the 1L-6 inhibitors had considerably higher supplementary oxygen requirements, indicating more advanced disease, than patients in the remdesivir and dexamethasone trials and would have been expected to have a higher mortality rate.

However, the IL-6 inhibitor recipients had a lower mortality rate than patients in the intervention and control groups of those trials.

Furthermore, the mortality rate for the participants who required ICU care was 22.9%. This rate was considerably lower than the published 4550% mortality in other ICU cohorts.

The majority of patients (85.5%) were also discharged alive, which is higher than the reported rate with standard of care (3666%) over a similar time of follow-up. Overall, the authors conclude:

[IL-6 inihitor] use was associated with decreased mortality, decreased rate of intubation, higher likelihood of being discharged alive, and shorter length of stay.

For live updates on the latest developments regarding the novel coronavirus and COVID-19, click here.

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Treating COVID-19: Bipolar drug shows promise and other hopeful findings - Medical News Today

Piezoceramics Bring Precision and Reliability to Medical Technologies – Novus Light Technologies Today

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

Piezoceramic materials are used in actuation and sensing applications across a variety of markets, and are key to some of the leading-edge technologies now used in the medical sector. From molecular diagnostics and microdosing to ultrasonic tartar removal from teeth, medical technologies require components that are fast and reliable, with low energy consumption. Piezoceramics combine all these characteristics, giving much higher accuracy and precision and requiring less power compared to traditional mechanical actuators and sensors. They are also friction free, so are less susceptible to wear and tear, keeping ongoing costs to a minimum.

The direct piezoelectric effect is based on the generation of charges through the application of force by a crystal, and this piezo technology is used in a range of everyday objects. The most widely recognised application of the piezoelectric effect is probably to provide the spark for electronic cigarette or gas grill lighters, but it is just as frequently used in reverse applying a voltage to a piezo crystal to cause it to change shape. This ability to convert electrical signal into motion is, if anything, even more commonly used in consumer goods particularly for the speakers often used in cell phones and other compact devices and the rise of advanced piezoceramic materials has further expanded their use. With no mechanical parts, piezoceramic actuators offer exceptional precision and speed combined with excellent reliability and low power consumption. They do not create, and are not affected by, magnetic fields, and work reliably under extreme conditions, for example at cryogenic temperatures and in vacuums, making them easily adaptable to different environments.

In vitro diagnostics (IVD) offer numerous possibilities to diagnose and detect diseases and other conditions at an early stage from samples of blood, saliva, urine or tissue. IVD is increasingly important in the fight against virus pandemics, such as COVID-19, where fast, easy and widely accessible testing methods open up the possibility to adapt therapeutic interventions for a personalised medicine approach to help cure, treat, and prevent diseases. Laboratory-based and portable point-of-care IVD testing devices require nano- and picolitre-level liquid handling, as well as high precision, shock-free dosing, fast mixing or separation of fluids and particles, and the generation of perfect droplets, taking into account the viscosity and surface tension of the media and the dosing speed. Often, contactless execution is also necessary to avoid sample contamination.

Piezoelectric components and actuators are ideal for several of these challenging IVD applications, and many clinical instruments take advantage of the incredible speed and accuracy that these technologies offer down to the nanometre level. In a lab setting, devices are getting more compact as we try to cram more capabilities into the same space, while the density of sampling is getting higher, creating a need for very small and fast drivers for the pipetting process. At the same time, these mechanisms must produce enough force to move the pipettes vertically, but with the accuracy to aspirate or dispense the right amounts of fluid. Small footprint piezomotors are perfect for this application, operating as a direct linear drive that can generate high forces. A ceramic that oscillates at ultrasonic frequencies generates a controllable forward motion with uniform speed and unparalleled accuracy.

Highly reliable PICMA stack multilayer piezo actuators are available in numerous designs with different displacement modes.

Piezo elements are also commonly used in micropumps to reliably and precisely move extremely small volumes of liquid or gas, ranging from a few hundred millilitres to a few nanolitres. Different types of pumps, such as membrane or peristaltic pumps, are actuated by different drive principles. The piezo elements can be adapted perfectly to each specific application and environment, from miniaturised lab-on-a-chip solutions for mobile analytical instruments, to microdiaphragm pumps that create continuous and variable flow rates down to the picolitre range. Essentially, any application that needs reliable metering of minute amounts of liquids and gases from medical uses and biotechnology to chemical analytics and process engineering can benefit from powerful and versatile piezo technology, and the more it is applied to this sector, the more device manufacturers will realise its potential.

Another use of piezo motors is in conventional chip-on-the-tip video endoscopes. These instruments typically use fixed focus optics to provide imaging for a certain depth of field, but integration of a miniature piezo motor enables variable focusing, ensuring that an object can always be displayed optimally in sharp focus. Selection of the most appropriate drive technology for the specific task and boundary conditions will enhance the image quality and depth of focus without compromising reliability.

Piezo drives also offer benefits compared to traditional mechanical drives for ultrasound applications. By avoiding the need for mechanical components such as clutches or gearheads they offer lower weight, reduced costs and greater reliability. Oscillations of a piezoceramic actuator at ultrasonic frequencies are converted into linear motion along a moving rod, giving a uniform motion of theoretically unlimited travel range.

Miniaturised piezo elements can be used for many minimally invasive treatment procedures, such as ablation, intravascular lithotripsy, or even the controlled release of medication. For example, a non-contact ablation procedure using piezoceramics has recently been developed for the treatment of atrial fibrillation. The transcatheter technology uses tiny piezo elements to generate ultrasonic waves, and the mechanical energy that the target tissue area absorbs leads to heating, causing coagulation. Treatment can be monitored in real-time, allowing lesions to be created as seamless lines, an important criterion that is the basis for the success of the therapy. This technology, generated by ultrasound only, reduces the risk of injury during treatment, and solves the greatest limitations of current catheter ablation technologies.

As stated above, piezo elements are also used in intravascular lithotripsy, for minimally invasive reduction of atherosclerotic plaques in blood vessels or heart valves, as well as life-threatening stenoses. Here, ultrasound waves increase the permeability of the blood vessel wall through sonoporation, enabling better penetration of the medication used to induce plaque dissolution.

As medical technology continues to develop at a rapid pace, the versatility of piezoceramics is becoming increasingly useful in providing solutions for more efficient instrumentation. The potential uses for piezoceramics is vast from minimally invasive treatment for atrial fibrillation to IVD testing platforms. The flexibility of piezoceramic materials mean that they can be adapted for multiple different applications, offering reliability and precision, and continuing to support instrumentation development as technology advances even further.

Written byAnnemarie Oesterle - Segment Marketing Manager Medical Technologies, PI Ceramic Marketing Manager.

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Piezoceramics Bring Precision and Reliability to Medical Technologies - Novus Light Technologies Today

Dr. Torry Tucker Receives Outstanding Teaching Award – East Texas Review

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

These awards demonstrate the Boards appreciation for exceptional educators at each of the 14 UT institutions, Board of Regents Chairman Kevin P. Eltife said. Their dedication to teaching excellence and student success is instrumental to achieving our education, research and healthcare missions.

The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler(UTHSCT) Associate Professor Dr. Torry A. Tucker has been selected to receivethe 2020 Regents Outstanding Teaching Award from The University of TexasSystem Board of Regents to recognize extraordinary classroom performance andinnovation.

The honor reflects the great respect students, peers andpresidents have for a recipients teaching abilities and contributions.

This award is so well deserved, and we are so proud of Dr.Tucker, said UTHSCT President Dr. Kirk A. Calhoun. Great faculty, like him,will lead and educate a new generation of scientists and healthcareprofessionals. We appreciate what Dr. Tucker does for our university every day,and I look forward to when we can have an in-person and safe celebration of hisaward.

Dr. Tucker is an associate professor of cellular andmolecular biology. He also serves as the associate dean for faculty andeducation initiatives. Dr. Tucker was trained as a cell biologist at theUniversity of Alabama at Birmingham with a focus on diseases of the lung,specifically cystic fibrosis. He came to The University of Texas Health ScienceCenter at Tyler as a postdoctoral fellow in 2007 and joined the faculty in2009. His current research investigates the causes of pleural scarring andsubsequent fibrosis. He also studies pathways involved in the development and progressionof idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis.

Dr. Tucker receives a certificate, medallion and $25,000 inrecognition of his impact on students and the institution. Tucker was one of 27faculty members representing 14 UT academic and health institutions to receivethe 2020 Regents Outstanding Teaching Award.

These awards demonstrate the Boards appreciation forexceptional educators at each of the 14 UT institutions, Board of RegentsChairman Kevin P. Eltife said. Their dedication to teaching excellence andstudent success is instrumental to achieving our education, research andhealthcare missions.

Great teachers inspire, motivate and challenge theirstudents, UT System Chancellor James B. Milliken said. We honor theseoutstanding educators for their service to Texas and Texans.

The University of Texas System Board of Regents establishedthe annual awards program in 2008 to honor exemplary classroom performance andinnovation. Since then, the Board has presented more than $20 million to over750 outstanding UT educators.

Nominees undergo a series of rigorous evaluations bystudents, peer faculty and external reviewers. The review panels consider arange of activities and criteria in their evaluations of a candidates teachingperformance, including classroom expertise, curricula quality, innovativecourse development and student learning outcomes.

As part of the world-renowned University of Texas System,The University of Texas Health Science Center at Tyler (UTHSCT) is a graduateschool providing programs for those seeking careers in the medical field.UTHSCT offers Master of Science in Biotechnology, Master of Public Health andMaster of Health Administration degrees, as well as residency programs formedical school graduates in family medicine, general surgery, internalmedicine, occupational medicine, rural family medicine, general psychiatry andrural psychiatry. Psychology internships and fellowships are also available.

Graduate students, medical residents and other medicalprofessionals-in-training develop marketable skills and qualifications to excelin the medical field as they learn alongside innovative scientists, physiciansand other healthcare experts at UTHSCT and UT Health East Texas, a 10-hospitalhealth system throughout East Texas. Led by Kirk A. Calhoun, MD, FACP, theuniversity will soon become the home to the first medical school in East Texas,pending regulatory and accreditation approval. For more information visitwww.uthct.edu.

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Dr. Torry Tucker Receives Outstanding Teaching Award - East Texas Review

Companion Diagnostic, Targeted Therapy Approvals Rise in Tandem – OncLive

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

In 2020, the rate of companion diagnostic approvals is keeping pace with that of targeted therapies, rapidly expanding the arsenal of novel tools available to identify actionable molecular markers across histologies.

Since January 2020, the FDA has approved 10 new single-agent and combination regimens for use with a specific companion diagnostic (Table).1,2

The agency also has given the go-ahead for the Ventana HER2 Dual ISH DNA Probe Cocktail assay, a new, faster method for detecting HER2 gene amplification status for trastuzumab (Herceptin) therapy.2

Additionally, on August 7, 2020, the agency approved Guardant360 CDx assay, a next-generation sequencing (NGS) test that utilizes circulating cell-free DNA from peripheral whole blood plasma, as a companion diagnostic to detect EGFR mutations in patients with non-small cell lung cancer who are candidates for osimertinib (Tagrisso) therapy. The test is the first liquid biopsy assay that also uses NGS technology, the FDA said.3

As precision medicine evolves in oncology, companion diagnostics are broadly and increasingly being adopted to guide treatment decisions, enabling clinicians to better and more precisely direct patients to therapies that best suit their unique genomic profiles. Specifically, companion diagnostics can be used to select the patients who are likely to respond to a given therapeutic intervention, as well as those who should not receive a specific treatment because of a high risk of adverse events. This latter insight is critical, considering that many oncology drugs are toxic and have a positive effect in only a fraction of patients with a particular malignancy.4

The profusion of targeted therapies approved with associated companion diagnostics in 2020 duly reflects oncologys growing emphasis on personalized methodologies of treatment selection and the fields continuous investigative efforts to advance precision medicine, according to Shridar Ganesan, MD, PhD, associate director for Translational Science and section chief of Molecular Oncology at the Rutgers Cancer Institute of New Jersey in New Brunswick. What we are seeing is the result of a lot of investment in targeted therapeutics and approaches over the past decade now coming to fruition, Ganesan said.

CROSS-THERAPY INDICATIONS

The FDA has approved 43 in vitro and imaging-based diagnostic devices, including the Guardant360 CDx assay.2,3

This record of FDA-accepted companion diagnostics dates back to 1998, when Dako Denmarks immunohistochemical assay, HercepTest, developed to detect the HER2 protein in breast cancer tissue, was concurrently approved with trastuzumab (Herceptin).

The simultaneous approval represented the first step toward oncologys current practice of codeveloping drugs and corresponding diagnostics.5

In contrast to 1998, this model of companion diagnostic-guided therapeutics is now dominant in oncology, with several devices holding indications for multiple therapies across tumor types. For example, Foundation Medicines NGSbased in vitro diagnostic device, FoundationOne CDx, which detects substitutions, insertion and deletion alterations, and copy number alterations in 324 genes, is approved as a companion diagnostic test for 23 therapies. The assay uses DNA isolated from formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tumor tissue specimens.

On April 17, 2020, Foundation Medicine announced that the comprehensive genomic profiling test received FDA clearance to aid the identification of candidates for pemigatinib (Pemazyre) monotherapy, which received an accelerated approval for adults with treatment-nave, unresectable, locally advanced, or metastatic cholangiocarcinoma with an FGFR2 fusion or rearrangement.6

FoundationOne CDxs indication further expanded on May 6, 2020, when the FDA granted capmatinib (Tabrecta) an accelerated approval for adults with metastatic MET exon14 skippingmutated nonsmall cell lung cancer and designated the device as the agents corresponding companion diagnostic.7

The approval of FoundationOne CDx for multiple tumor types exemplifies Ganesans observation that companion diagnostic development does not always entail new technology and will not necessarily require frequent innovation as the usage and utility of these devices expands in oncology. Often, we are building on a platform diagnostic that is already FDA approved. In some cases, new diagnostic tools are not being invented; rather, existing assays are being validated for a new purpose, Ganesan said.

On May 19, 2020, FoundationOne CDx was approved to support the identification of patients with deleterious or suspected deleterious germline or somatic homologous recombination repair gene-mutated metastatic castration-resistant prostate cancer. Patients with the biomarker who progress after prior treatment with enzalutamide (Xtandi) or abiraterone acetate (Zytiga) are eligible to receive olaparib (Lynparza).8

This decision expanded FoundationOne CDxs olaparib-specific indication: the diagnostic was previously approved to select patients with BRCA-mutant advanced ovarian cancer who would benefit from frontline maintenance olaparib monotherapy, on July 1, 2019.9

FoundationOne CDxs 2019 approval followed a 2016 announcement issued by AstraZeneca, olaparibs developer, and Foundation Medicine indicating that the companies had entered into a definitive agreement to develop a novel companion diagnostic assay for olaparib to support the global development of the PARP inhibitor.10

The cross-therapy companion diagnostic approvals that FoundationOne CDx received in the 4 years that followed AstraZeneca and FoundationOnes forging of this strategic partnership evidence the multiyear nature of the research efforts required to advance diagnostic-guided precision care. Ganesan emphasized that moving the needle in personalized medicine can be a slow process fraught with questions, even if the recent succession of 2020 companion diagnostic approvals makes it appear otherwise.

For example, it took us over 20 years to go from identifying HER2 amplification in a subset of breast cancer, to developing and validating HER2targeted theraputics, and f inally, development of combination treatment strategies that have changed the natural history of early and late-stage HER2amplified breast cancers, Ganesan said.

Nevertheless, the series of 2020 companion diagnostic indications that the FDA has issued in synchronization with targeted therapy approvals represents a very important series of developments that points to the importance of upfront molecular profiling for many cancers, both as part of their biologic classification and to guide optimal therapy, Ganesan added.

References

1. Hematology/oncology (cancer) approvals & safety notifications. FDA. Updated August 6, 2020. Accessed August 10, 2020. bit.ly/3a9NHuO

2. List of cleared or approved companion diagnostic devices (in vitro and imaging tools). FDA. Updated August 3, 2020. Accessed August 10, 2020. bit.ly/2PbJj4M

3. FDA approves first liquid biopsy next-generation sequencing companion diagnostic test. FDA. August 7, 2020. Accessed August 10, 2020. https://bit.ly/31AAEi0

4. Becker Jr R, Mansfield E. Companion diagnostics. Clin Adv Hematol Oncol. 2010;8(7):478-479.

5. Jan Trst Jrgensen, ed. Companion and Complementary Diagnostics: From Biomarker Discovery to Clinical Implementation. Academic Press; 2019.

6. Foundation Medicine receives FDA approval for FoundationOne CDx as the companion diagnostic for Pemazyre (pemigatinib), the first FDA-approved targeted therapy for adults with previously treated locally advanced or metastatic cholangiocarcinoma. News release. Foundation Medicine, Inc; April 17, 2020. Accessed July 13, 2020. bit.ly/3jXzpSk

7. Foundation Medicine receives FDA approval for FoundationOne CDx as the companion diagnostic for Tabrecta (capmatinib), the only FDA-approved MET inhibitor for patients with metastatic nonsmall cell lung cancer with METex14. News release. Foundation Medicine, Inc; May 6, 2020. Accessed July 13, 2020. bit.ly/30dFyC3

8. Foundation Medicine receives FDA approval for FoundationOne CDx as the companion diagnostic for Lynparza to identify patients with HRR-mutated metastatic castrationresistant prostate cancer. News release. Foundation Medicine, Inc; May 20, 2020. Accessed July 13, 2020. bit.ly/3hPy4ez

9. Foundation Medicine expands indication for FoundationOne CDx as a companion diagnostic for Lynparza (Olaparib). News release. Foundation Medicine, Inc; July 1, 2019. Accessed July 13, 2020. bit.ly/338uyb6

10. AstraZeneca and Foundation Medicine enter strategic collaboration for Lynparza companion diagnostic assay. News release. AstraZeneca; June 4, 2016. Accessed July 13, 2020. bit.ly/3165Oh5

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Companion Diagnostic, Targeted Therapy Approvals Rise in Tandem - OncLive

NeuBase Therapeutic’s CEO, Dietrich A. Stephan, Ph.D., to Present at Tribe Public’s Presentation and Q&A Webinar Event on August 26, 2020 – BioSpace

Posted on August 24, 2020 by Danzig

SAN FRANCISCO, CA / ACCESSWIRE / August 24, 2020 / Tribe Public announced today that Dietrich Stephan, Chief Executive Officer of NeuBase Therapeutics, Inc. (NASDAQ:NBSE), a biotechnology company developing next-generation antisense oligonucleotide (ASO) therapies using its scalable PATrOL platform to address genetic diseases, will present at Tribe Public's Presentation and Q&A Webinar Event at 8 am pacific/11 am eastern on Wednesday, August 26th, 2020. During this complimentary, 30-minute event, Dr. Stephan will introduce the NeuBase's next-generation gene silencing technology and discuss the company's progress with treatment candidates in Huntington's Disease (HD) and Myotonic Dystrophy (DM1). A question and answer session will follow the presentation. To register to join the complimentary event, please visit the Tribe Public LLC website: http://www.tribepublic.com, or send a message to Tribe's management at research@tribepublic.com to request your seat for this limited capacity Zoom-based event.

Dietrich A. Stephan, Ph.D. is an industry veteran who is considered one of the fathers of the field of precision medicine, having trained with the leadership of the Human Genome Project at the NIH and then going on to lead discovery research at the Translational Genomics Research Institute and serve as professor and chairman of the Department of Human Genetics at the University of Pittsburgh. Dr. Stephan has identified the molecular basis of dozens of genetic diseases and published extensively in journals such as Science, the New England Journal of Medicine, Nature Genetics, PNAS, and Cell. In parallel, Dr. Stephan has founded or co-founded more than ten biotechnology companies and has advised numerous other companies. These companies are backed by top-tier investors such as Sequoia Capital, KPCB, Thiel Capital, and Khosla Ventures as well as corporate partners such as Life Technologies, Pfizer, and Mayo Clinic. Notably, Dr. Stephan founded NeuBase Therapeutics in August 2018, took it public in 2019, and has since grown the company to market capitalization to the tune of hundreds of millions of dollars. Dr. Stephan received his Ph.D. from the University of Pittsburgh and his B.S. from Carnegie Mellon University.

ABOUT TRIBE PUBLIC LLCTribe Public LLC is a San Francisco, CA-based organization that hosts complimentary worldwide webinar & meeting events in the U.S. Tribe's events focus on issues that the Tribe members care about with an emphasis on hosting management teams from publicly traded companies from all sectors & financial organizations that are seeking to increase awareness of their products, progress, and plans. Tribe members primarily include Institutions, Family Offices, Portfolio Managers, Registered Investment Advisors, & Accredited Investors. Website: http://www.tribepublic.com.

ABOUT NEUBASE THERAPEUTICSNeuBase Therapeutics, Inc. is developing the next generation of gene silencing therapies with its flexible, highly specific synthetic antisense oligonucleotides. The proprietary NeuBase peptide-nucleic acid (PNA) antisense oligonucleotide (PATrOL) platform allows for the rapid development of targeted drugs, increasing the treatment opportunities for the hundreds of millions of people affected by rare genetic diseases, including those that can only be treated through accessing of secondary RNA structures. Using PATrOL technology, NeuBase aims to first tackle rare, genetic neurological disorders. NeuBase is continuing its progress towards developing treatment candidates in Huntington's Disease (HD) and Myotonic Dystrophy (DM1.)

CONTACT:

Tribe Public, LLC.John F. Heerdink, Jr.Managing Partnerjohn@tribepublic.com

SOURCE: NeuBase Therapeutics, Inc.

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NeuBase Therapeutic's CEO, Dietrich A. Stephan, Ph.D., to Present at Tribe Public's Presentation and Q&A Webinar Event on August 26, 2020 - BioSpace

Rogue planets could outnumber the stars – The Ohio State University News

Posted on August 22, 2020 by Danzig

An upcoming NASA mission could find that there are more rogue planets planets that float in space without orbiting a sun than there are stars in the Milky Way, a new study theorizes.

This gives us a window into these worlds that we would otherwise not have, said Samson Johnson, an astronomy graduate student at The Ohio State University and lead author of the study. Imagine our little rocky planet just floating freely in space thats what this mission will help us find.

The study was published today, Friday, Aug. 21, in The Astronomical Journal.

The study calculated that NASAs upcoming Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope could find hundreds of rogue planets in the Milky Way. Identifying those planets, Johnson said, will help scientists infer the total number of rogue planets in our galaxy. Rogue, or free-floating, planets are isolated objects that have masses similar to that of planets. The origin of such objects is unknown, but one possibility is they were previously bound to a host star.

The universe could be teeming with rogue planets and we wouldnt even know it, said Scott Gaudi, a professor of astronomy and distinguished university scholar at Ohio State and a co-author of the paper. We would never find out without undertaking a thorough, space-based microlensing survey like Roman is going to do.

The Roman telescope, named for NASAs first chief astronomer who was also known as the mother of the Hubble telescope, will attempt to build the first census of rogue planets, which could, Johnson said, help scientists understand how those planets form. Roman will also have other objectives, including searching for planets that do orbit stars in our galaxy.

That process is not well-understood, though astronomers know that it is messy. Rogue planets could form in the gaseous disks around young stars, similar to those planets still bound to their host stars. After formation, they could later be ejected through interactions with other planets in the system, or even fly-by events by other stars.

Or they could form when dust and gas swirl together, similar to the way stars form.

The Roman telescope, Johnson said, is designed not only to locate free-floating planets in the Milky Way, but to test the theories and models that predict how these planets formed.

Johnsons study found that this mission is likely to be 10 times more sensitive to these objects than existing efforts, which for now are based on telescopes tethered to the Earths surface. It will focus on planets in the Milky Way, between our sun and the center of our galaxy, covering some 24,000 light years.

There have been several rogue planets discovered, but to actually get a complete picture, our best bet is something like Roman, he said. This is a totally new frontier.

Rogue planets have historically been difficult to detect. Astronomers discovered planets outside Earths solar system in the 1990s. Those planets, called exoplanets, range from extremely hot balls of gas to rocky, dusty worlds. Many of them circle their own stars, the way Earth circles the sun.

But it is likely that a number of them do not. And though astronomers have theories about how rogue planets form, no mission has studied those worlds in the detail that Roman will.

The mission, which is scheduled to launch in the next five years, will search for rogue planets using a technique called gravitational microlensing. That technique relies on the gravity of stars and planets to bend and magnify the light coming from stars that pass behind them from the telescopes viewpoint.

But because microlensing works only when the gravity of a planet or star bends and magnifies the light from another star, the effect from any given planet or star is only visible for a short time once every few million years. And because rogue planets are situated in space on their own, without a nearby star, the telescope must be highly sensitive in order to detect that magnification.

The study published today estimates that this mission will be able to identify rogue planets that are the mass of Mars or larger. Mars is the second-smallest planet in our solar system and is just a little bigger than half the size of Earth.

Johnson said these planets are not likely to support life. They would probably be extremely cold, because they have no star, he said. (Other research missions involving Ohio State astronomers will search for exoplanets that could host life.)

But studying them will help scientists understand more about how all planets form, he said.

If we find a lot of low-mass rogue planets, well know that as stars form planets, theyre probably ejecting a bunch of other stuff out into the galaxy, he said. This helps us get a handle on the formation pathway of planets in general.

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Rogue planets could outnumber the stars - The Ohio State University News

Island WorldsA Totally New Frontier of Exoplanets – The Daily Galaxy –Great Discoveries Channel

Posted on August 22, 2020 by Danzig

Posted on Aug 22, 2020 in Astronomy, Science

Imagination will often carry us to worlds that never were. But without it we go nowhere, said Carl Sagan. So, imagine a galaxy filled with tens of millions of black holes and dark, lifeless island worlds rogue, free-floating planets unmoored from the gravity and the life-giving light of an alien star. It is now is becoming increasingly apparent that the Milky Way may be just such a galaxy. An upcoming NASA mission could find that there are more rogue planetsplanets that float in space without orbiting a sunthan there are stars in the Milky Way, a new study theorizes.

This gives us a window into these worlds that we would otherwise not have, said Samson Johnson, at The Ohio State University and lead author of the study. Imagine our little rocky planet just floating freely in spacethats what this mission will help us find.

The Roman Telescope

The Invisible Galaxy 100 Million Black Holes Lurking in the Milky Way

The Roman telescope, Johnson said, is designed not only to locate free-floating planets in the Milky Way, but to test the theories and models that predict how these planets formed.

Search Will Span 24,000 Light Years of the Milky Way

There have been several rogue planets discovered, but to actually get a complete picture, our best bet is something like Roman, he said. This is a totally new frontier.

This illustration shows a rogue planet drifting through the galaxy alone. Credit: NASA/JPL-Caltech/R. Hurt (Caltech-IPAC)

Gravitational Microlensing Einsteins General Relativity

This microlensing effect is connected to Albert Einsteins Theory of General Relativity and allows a telescope to find planets thousands of light-years away from Earthmuch farther than other planet-detecting techniques. Because microlensing works only when the gravity of a planet or star bends and magnifies the light from another star, the effect from any given planet or star is only visible for a short time once every few million years. And because rogue planets are situated in space on their own, without a nearby star, the telescope must be highly sensitive in order to detect that magnification.

The study estimates that this mission will be able to identify rogue planets that are the mass of Mars or larger. Mars is the second-smallest planet in our solar system and is just a little bigger than half the size of Earth.

Source: Samson A. Johnson et al. Predictions of the Nancy Grace Roman Space Telescope Galactic Exoplanet Survey. II. Free-floating Planet Detection Rates, The Astronomical Journal (2020). DOI: 10.3847/1538-3881/aba75b , iopscience.iop.org/article/10. 847/1538-3881/aba75b

The Daily Galaxy, Sam Cabot, via The Ohio State University

Image credits: NASA

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Island WorldsA Totally New Frontier of Exoplanets - The Daily Galaxy --Great Discoveries Channel

The truth about the migrant crisis isn’t what you think – Spectator.co.uk

Posted on August 22, 2020 by Danzig

Home Secretary Priti Patel visited the port of Dover last weekto gee up the beleaguered Border Force and offer words of encouragement to the British people. 'It is our mission and objective to break this route up,' she told her personal cameraman and tightly-controlled media team. Priti hot footed it out of the docks as soon as the PR stunt was over. Job done for another day. More fake promises of stronger borders by a Conservative party who seem unable to control anything, let alone a porous expanse of water separating England from France.

The reality is we all know whats going on. Not from the mainstream media who eagerly line the dock side waiting for exhausted looking women and children being brought off the boats. We all know the reality from alternative media and independent reporters that have filled the void.

Ive covered the migrant crisis for more than five years and worked on the ground in more than eight countries. Ive visited dozens of refugee camps and illegal migrant encampments. Ive spent hundreds of hours with refugees and migrants listening to their stories and trying to make sense of this crisis. The picture I see in the news does not reflect my experience and that of many others.

Over my time on the refugee trail, Ive noticed that the majority of people making the journey to Europe are males between the age of 18-35. In fact Id estimate up to 85 per cent of the migrant influx is comprised of young men. I always found it difficult to turn on the TV and see women clutching their infants and fathers weeping as they landed on the shores of Greece. Difficult because of the humanitarian empathy that wells up within us all, but also difficult because its not a reality Im seeing on the ground.

What I found over five years across the Balkans and Europe is not whats written about in the papers, its not the stuff that wins journalism awards. Its the painful reality that the refugee crisis is more complex than we are led to believe. 'Everyone who needs asylum should be given a safe place,' a leftist volunteer once told me. Thats true and its a nice notion to live life by, however the reality is starkly different.

What Ive witnessed over the years is people, who by their own admission are not refugees, taking advantage of European gullibility and generosity. In 2015, when Merkel declared anyone who came will be welcomed in Germany, the door was truly opened. A green light lit up across the Middle East, Africa and other more far-flung parts of the world. With the aid of Google and volunteer organisations people knew exactly what type of persecution, sexual persuasion, religious or ethnic identity would secure them a ticket into Europe.

I dont mean to be flippant on the subject of fraudulent asylum claims but it seems all too common. In warehouse refugee camps Ive witnessed men from Egypt studying maps of Damascus to fabricate their identity. Ive seen North Africans all claim to be Syrians and coincidently all from Damascus.

Around a fire on the Serbian-Croatian border Ive shared cigarettes and fruit with middle class, metropolitan Iranians who are taking their chances on reaching Europe. 'We will say we are Christians and suffer problems because of that. I have had friends who say theyre gay and it worked. The funny thing was when he arrived in Berlin they housed him with other gay refugees.'

Countless stories that dont fit the narrative pushed on the evening telly fall by the way side. Violence, drugs, alcohol, disease and criminality are the bleak reality I saw on Europes borders. I shared the hardship to an extent to understand what truly drives people to pack up everything and come to Europe.

Thousands and thousands of genuine refugees suffer in the Balkan barbed wire. More lie restless in stifling, overcrowded camps waiting for their turn to continue onwards to Europe. In the West, we know all of this yet we neglect to have the difficult conversations that are vital moving forwards.

How do we protect public health with an influx of uncontrolled migration? How do we address the elephant in the room: integration? What about family reunification? The numbers are vast! If Germany has six million new arrivals then how many more will come if their families are allowed to join them? How will Europe cope with all these people?

The British public are alarmed by what they see in Dover. Not out of a knee jerk, racist reaction but out of a genuine sense of concern. People have the right to ask questions: Where are these people going to live? What about the school placements? The doctors surgeries? The opportunities to work in an already crumbling economy?

The reality is we all know what we are hearing about the refugee crisis is not the full picture. Its not as clear cut as the London bubble would have us believe.Across the world, there are hundreds of millions who would qualify for EU asylum. The question we are all going to have to ask is how much is enough? How many people can the West really take?

Edward Crawford is afreelance photojournalist and videographer

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The truth about the migrant crisis isn't what you think - Spectator.co.uk

Teenager who died in the Channel is a reminder that the migrant crisis is a human emergency, not just a – The Sun

Posted on August 22, 2020 by Danzig

THE horrors that the Sudanese teenager who died in the Channel must have suffered hardly bear thinking about.

The toy dinghy and makeshift paddles he used tell a heartbreaking story of just how desperate he must have been when he set off on his final journey.

He wanted a new life in Britain and lost everything pursuing it.

The tragedy serves as a painful reminder the migrant crisis is a human emergency, not just a political one.

Which is why we urge Labour to stop playing politics and throw its weight behind Home Secretary Priti Patel as she cracks down on the real villains of this piece: the evil people-traffickers exploiting human misery by aiding and abetting these perilous crossings.

Its easy for Shadow Home Secretary Nick Thomas-Symonds to claim that the Government lacks competence and compassion.

And predictably, the comment is raking in supportive responses from Labour backbenchers on social media.

But deep down, Mr Thomas-Symonds knows as well as we do that this humanitarian crisis can only be solved with teamwork.

Its time for him and his party to give it a go.

We know the Treasury is desperate to recoup some of its enormous Covid bailout outlay.

But hiking train fares in January would be a bonkers way to go about it.

To boost productivity and get the economy moving, the Government is urging commuters to go back to their offices.

But getting them there will be an uphill battle if the price of train travel soars once again.

When the country is back on its feet and the train lines have sorted themselves out and by that we mean no more delayed services and crippling strikes Brits might accept a modest rise in fare prices.

But until that day comes, these automatic yearly hikes have got to stop.

If you thought your lockdown was boring, spare a thought for the Tower of London ravens.

Since the time of Charles II, theyve enjoyed almost constant human company but for months now theyve been almost entirely friendless.

And it seems the quiet life doesnt suit them: Beefeaters report that two of the birds were caught trying to sneak out.

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Legend has it that if the ravens fly away, the Crown and Britain will fall.

So if youre wondering what to do with the kids this long summer holiday, why not consider a trip to the Tower?

You never know, you might just save the country while youre there.

GOT a story? RING The Sun on 0207 782 4104 or WHATSAPP on 07423720250 or EMAILexclusive@the-sun.co.uk

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Teenager who died in the Channel is a reminder that the migrant crisis is a human emergency, not just a - The Sun

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