Select Page ::

Meet the new experts of non-surgical hair transplant – Alka Verma and her salon – Infiniti Hair C… – Hindustan Times

Posted on December 28, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Is your hair thinning shaking your confidence? Is the thought Why dont I have normal hair density like others? Why dont I have hair like the way I used to 10 years back? playing in your mind? Then you should consider getting a non-surgical hair transplant with Infiniti hair club. Infiniti Hair Club has been providing hair solutions for both men & women. Their expert team & state-of-the-art technology helps in achieving an undetectable look. A detailed one-on-one consultation will help and guide you to make a more informed decision. So, first things first, we need to understand what a non-surgical hair transplant is?

A hair replacement or a non-surgical hair transplant is a technique of attaching a hair replacement system to the scalp. This hair system is made of 100% natural human hair and is customized to precisely match the density and colour of your hair. This hair system is then attached on your head and blended into your existing hair after a haircut. The entire process takes about 3-4 hours and it will get you looking young and fabulous as ever.

What makes this technique the most unique & beneficial, is its ease and comfort. Besides that, the treatment is more preferable as it provides immediate results. It is tailor-made to match your hair density, so there is no question of poking needles onto your scalp. It also needs no medications, no blood-shed, its pocket friendly and has no side effects.

The Lifespan of the Hair Systems:

Since each system is made using only natural human hair, their lifespan is about 6-12 months. Although this could vary according to the kind of system and the way you maintain it. Timely servicing plays a crucial role in increasing its longevity. A well-maintained system tends to last for a longer duration. Maintenance interval depends on a lot of factors namely: the type of hair system, your skin type, and the climatic conditions. The average time to service them is once in every 15 to 30 days.

Even if youre not a local resident, or have any travel plans, or cannot come in for a service, we have still got you covered. The specially designed service kit kit includes all the necessary products that are required to service & maintain your hair system, that too at your own time and convenience. An experienced technician is assigned to train you when you avail the kit. We aim to make sure that our customers enjoy wearing their hair system no matter where they are. The best feature of this system is that it does not alter your lifestyle. You can continue to do every kind of activity and enjoy your hair without the slightest worry. You can run on a treadmill, play your favourite sports, or even go for a swim. You can even go paragliding, scuba diving, you name it! All with the utmost ease.

Is This Hair System Another Type of Wig?

Absolutely not! A wig is easily noticeable, while a hair system perfectly blends with your hair. It is also customized to match the texture of your hair and looks undeniably like your own hair.

What Would Something Like This Cost?

Our replacement system is the most cost-efficient option out there. They are relatively much more affordable than any kind of surgical treatment while also providing seamless, easy, and comfortable results.

What Does the CEO of Infiniti Hair Club Have to Say?

Alka Verma says, In todays fast-moving world, we have individuals as young as 15 years come to us for hair loss issues. While on one hand, I feel really sad that they have to face such trauma, sometimes at a really early age in life, but on the other hand, I look at the bright side and feel grateful that with our hair replacement systems I can replace their trauma with confidence and happiness. Hair loss happens for many reasons; the majority of the cases are related to stress, diet, hereditary, and a lot of other reasons. Whatever the reason may be, the solution is simple. Yes, you guessed it right. Its our hair replacement systems, she adds, Come in with no hair and walk out with a head full of hair, in a matter of a few hours. For more information and booking consultation, visit http://www.infinitihairclub.com

Disclaimer: This is a company press release. No HT journalist is involved in creation of this content.

Go here to see the original:
Meet the new experts of non-surgical hair transplant - Alka Verma and her salon - Infiniti Hair C... - Hindustan Times

Too Much of This Mineral May Shorten Your Life, Study Finds | Eat This Not That – Eat This, Not That

Posted on January 8, 2021 by Prof Baldwin

A recent study unveils a potential new connection between iron levels and longevity.

The study, which appeared in the journalNature Communications, pooled data from three large human genetic studies, "reaching an unprecedented sample of more than a million people," the lead study author and data analyst Paul Timmers, from the University of Edinburgh in the UK, tellsEat This, Not That!

"Using genetics, we found multiple lines of evidence indicating poor control of blood iron levels is causally linked to a shorter lifespan and fewer years lived in good health." (Related: The One Vitamin Doctors Are Urging Everyone to Take Right Now.)

After examining the DNA of individuals who lived long and healthy lives versus those who experienced age-related diseases and even death early in life, the researchers were able to pinpoint 10 regions of the genome that were related to three key measures of aging: lifespan, years lived free of disease (healthspan), and living to old age (longevity). Two such regions, LDLR and FOXO3, were explicitly found to influence the expression of genes that help the body metabolize iron, which is what led the researchers to hypothesize that iron levels could play a role in aging.

Senior study author Joris Deelen, PhD, who studies the biology of aging at the Max Planck Institute for Biology of Ageing in Germany explains that "genetic variation in these regions seems to be the most important for healthy iron metabolism. Genes influenced by genetic variation in the other eight regions are not directly linked to iron metabolism."

Essentially, those with high iron levels may have an increased risk of dying younger.

"It is well-known that a deficit in iron can cause poor health, but we showed, for the first time, that for most people a small reduction in blood ironfrom their current levelsis likely beneficial to their health," says Deelen. "Iron metabolism and healthy aging were not linked before."

The researchers discovered that genetic predisposition to higher iron levels is what's associated with a reduced lifespan, which is largely out of your control.

"We found that DNA variations, which elevate your iron levels in the blood (from birth), also increase your likelihood of getting age-related diseases and dying," says Timmers.

So, this doesn't mean you should never eat red meat or remove other iron-rich foods from your diet altogether, however, it may encourage you to become more conscious of what your iron levels are.

"People tend to lose their ability to regulate iron levels as they get older, so regularly checking your iron levels could be important to maintain optimal health into old age," says Timmers.

Of course, further research is needed because it isn't clear on what would be considered an optimal iron level in the blood. In fact, it could vary from person to person.

"Further clinical studies are needed to determine the precise mechanisms by which iron metabolism is linked to healthy aging," Deelen adds.

For more, be sure to sign up for our newsletter.

Life extension health, rejuvenation and longevity – The Business Times

Posted on January 22, 2021 by Prof Baldwin

THE relentless pursuit of the elixir of youth has spurred anti-ageing research in attempts to achieve the triple goals of life extension, namely, the triumvirate of healthy lifespan, rejuvenation and longevity.

Sirtuins are a family of cellular enzymes that are powered by a chemical compound called nicotinamide adenine dinucleotide (NAD). They play an important role in preventing diseases and even reversing some aspects of ageing.

Studies have shown that increased sirtuin activity in mammals has been associated with a delayed onset of age-related diseases and increased longevity.

Increased sirtuin activity appears to inhibit nerve degeneration and reduces the development of cardiovascular and metabolic diseases (such as diabetes mellitus and abnormal lipid levels).

Hence, if sirtuin activity can be increased using compounds that can boost its activity (STACs or Sirtuin Activating Compounds), the use of STACs can potentially help a person stay healthy longer, even if longevity is not affected.

Stay updated with BT newsletters

Resveratrol

Resveratrol is a natural plant phenol STAC found in the skin of red grapes and other fruits such as blueberries and cranberries. Contrary to common belief, red wine contains very little of it. Resveratrol has been shown to have life-extending properties in studies on lower-order species such as yeast and nematodes, but this effect has marginal reliability in higher-order species. Nevertheless, it has been shown to have potentially beneficial effects.

Before you start taking large doses of resveratrol, you may be surprised to know that it is a Janus-faced compound. Low dietary doses may suffice to elicit the biological responses required to optimise the body's defence mechanisms against incipient disease. But at high doses, it behaves in a contrarian manner.

At low doses, resveratrol induces responses that overlap with the female hormone oestradiol. Low-dose effects seen in animal and human studies include beneficial metabolic effects such as more efficient glucose reduction in diabetics, reducing the development of obesity and non-alcoholic fatty liver disease, protecting against arterial degeneration, delaying development of neurodegeneration, and improving motor and cognitive functions.

At high doses, resveratrol has an anti-oestrogen effect which suggests that it may reduce the risk of oestrogen-dependent cancers. This Janus-faced hormetic effects of resveratrol may partly explain the French paradox, where there is a reduced incidence of cardiovascular diseases and certain types of cancer in some populations despite their consumption of high-fat diets.

NAD

NAD is an important molecule that is essential for over 500 enzyme reactions in the body which impact metabolism, ageing, cell death, DNA repair, and gene expression. Hence, NAD plays a pivotal role in human health span and longevity and is a necessary substrate for sirtuin enzymatic activity.

In mammalian cells, NAD is mainly generated by the conversion of nicotinamide (a soluble form of Vitamin B3) into nicotinamide mononucleotide (NMN) followed by its combination with another molecule to form NAD. There is also another precursor, nicotinamide riboside (NR), that is converted by enzymes to NMN in the cells. As this pathway is safe and also the most efficient route for production of NAD, NMN or NR supplementation has been used to increase NAD levels.

Animal studies have shown that NMN supplementation can ameliorate the age-related reduction in NAD production in cells and improve the body's cardiovascular response to ageing. Age-related decrease in arterial elasticity means that the aorta is less able to expand and buffer the increased blood pressure generated each time the heart pumps. With ageing, the production of a pressure-bearing protein, type 1 collagen, in the arterial wall increases, whereas the main protein responsible for the structural integrity and elastic properties of the arterial wall, elastin, decreases. Studies in mice have shown that NMN supplementation was able to reduce stiffness in large arteries by reversing the accumulation of type 1 collagen in arterial walls and improving elastin content.

From the age of 40 years onwards, there is a gradual decline in perfusion of the body tissues resulting in gradual deterioration in body function towards the last decades of life. A consequence of this is cognitive decline.

Optimal brain function is dependent on adequate oxygen and nutrient delivery via minute brain blood vessels (cerebral microvascular circulation). This modulation of brain blood flow in response to increased brain activity is impaired with age, contributing to age-related cognitive impairment. Studies in aged mice given NMN have demonstrated an improvement in the modulation of cerebral microvascular circulation. Animal studies have also shown that NMN can prevent age-related cognitive decline by reducing cell death in areas of the brain that control short- and long-term memory.

Use of NMN was also associated with decrease in the neurodegenerative changes seen in Alzheimer's disease and age-related retinal changes. This age-related decrease in the production of new vessels and a gradual decrease of blood vessels in the microcirculation also result in reduction in muscle mass and diminishing exercise capacity with age. Mice given NMN were able to demonstrate an increase in the production of new vessels in the muscle and an increase in density of small vessels, thereby improving exercise capacity.

Caloric restriction

Caloric restriction (CR) which involves calorie reduction without causing malnutrition, has been associated with an increase in lifespan in some animal studies. In these studies, dietary CR was associated with increased lifespan and reduced disease incidence, especially cancers. However, some studies did not show benefit and, in some mouse strains, CR was associated with shortened lifespan.

Observational studies on humans who have practised extreme CR over many years showed low levels of risk factors for cardiovascular disease and diabetes.

Similarly, a human study on CR, the CALERIE study, found that CR participants had lower blood pressure and lower cholesterol.

The study was too short to examine the impact of CR on lifespan. The current conclusion from the National Institute of Aging in the United States is that there is not enough evidence to recommend CR as a therapeutic measure for life extension. Although CR was associated with lower risk factors for cardiovascular diseases and diabetes, caution is urged as in a study using mouse lemurs on prolonged CR, MRI studies showed that there was more widespread age-related grey matter atrophy in CR animals while only a few regions in the brain showed atrophy in those not on CR.

Life extension

Globally, heart disease and stroke are the two main causes of death in most high-middle and high-income countries. Hence, the first cardinal principle in life extension is to control the risk factors such as blood pressure elevation, cholesterol elevation, sugar elevation and smoking.

The second principle is to have a healthy lifestyle such as keeping the weight within the healthy range and exercising regularly. Both physical exercise and dietary CR result in a significant increase in NAD production and increase sirtuin activity. CR may be an option as part of a weight-reduction regime to keep the weight optimal.

The third principle is to see your doctor regularly to control risk factors.

Finally, among the supplement options, scientific studies favour the use of low-dose resveratrol or NMN as they may potentially provide many health benefits via increased sirtuin activity, although more studies will be required to understand their efficacy in human life extension.

Top Wall Street analysts recommend these buys before 2020 comes to a close – CNBC

Posted on December 26, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Twitter CEO and co-founder Jack Dorsey gestures while interacting with students at the Indian Institute of Technology (IIT) in New Delhi on November 12, 2018.

Prakash Singh | AFP | Getty Images

As the year comes to a close, Wall Street is watching for a possible Santa Claus Rally. Historically, stocks tend to rise during the last five trading sessions of the calendar year, with this rally continuing until the second trading day of the new year.

Since 1969, the S&P 500 has gained 1.3% on average over this seven-day trading period, according to the Stock Trader's Almanac.

There are some stocks investors may want to pick up for 2021 before they close their books on the year. Finding compelling investment opportunities isn't easy. One strategy is to follow the moves of the analysts who consistently get it right. TipRanks analyst forecasting service attempts to find the best-performing analysts on Wall Street, or the analysts with the highest success rate and average return per rating.

Here are the best-performing analysts' five favorite stocks right now:

Top J.P. Morgan analyst Doug Anmuth just joined the Twitter bulls, upgrading the rating to Buy on December 16. Along with the call, the five-star analyst bumped up the price target from $52 to $65, with the new target suggesting 16% upside potential.

Anmuth explains that his price target is based on roughly 30x his 2022 EBITDA estimate, and also translates to approximately 9.5x his 2022 revenue estimate. Although this reflects a premium to advertising and social media peers like Google and Facebook, he believes it is "justified given a depressed EBITDA base and improving momentum in the business beyond 2020."

"We believe Twitter is uniquely positioned as the real-time broadcast and communications network, making it complementary to all other forms of media, including TV," Anmuth commented.

Additionally, Twitter is likely to benefit from the shift toward mobile and video given that the ad product and platform are continuing to improve, in Anmuth's opinion.

That being said, for the analyst to be even more optimistic about the company, he argues "better advertising execution, including diversification toward DR and performance-based, is critical."

Based on his 72% success rate and 32.1% average return per rating, Anmuth scores the #29 spot on TipRanks' ranking.

For RBC Capital's Scot Ciccarelli, Costco is a top pick in the retail space. On December 14, he maintained a Buy rating as well as a $439 price target (20% upside potential).

According to Ciccarelli, "Costco just keeps doing it what it does best," which is delivering strong sales growth and good margin performance. In its most recent quarter, the company posted comp growth of 17.1%, enabling it to generate strong leverage in fiscal Q1 2021, in the analyst's opinion. E-commerce sales surged 86% and now account for roughly 7% of total sales.

Even though U.S. comps moderated, Ciccarelli argues "this modest deceleration seemed to be driven by pull forward activity and more aggressive Black Friday promotions starting as early as late-October from some competitors." On top of this, gross margins reached 13.3% thanks to efficiency gains, labor productivity and significantly lower product spoilage in fresh foods.

What's more, Ciccarelli points out that Costco has the strongest buying power in the retail space because it concentrates all of its scale on a small group of SKUs, while its bigger competitors spread their buying power across millions of SKUs. Additionally, he thinks it has the lowest markup in the industry.

"We believe this combination creates extremely compelling value for their members. As a result, while Costco has indeed benefitted from accelerated shopping activity as more consumer dollars are directed towards goods rather than services/experiences (what we call the Retail Lift), we believe Costco is extremely well positioned regardless of broader economic trends in 2021," Ciccarelli opined.

Currently tracking a 76% success rate and a 20.6% average return per rating, Ciccarelli ranks among the top 52 analysts on TipRanks' list.

Following MKS Instruments' analyst day, Benchmark's Mark Miller is even more optimistic about its long-term growth prospects. To this end, he lifted his price target from $150 to $175 (17% upside potential), as well as reiterated a Buy rating on December 14.

According to Miller, management painted a very "upbeat picture," with the team expecting the semiconductor business growth to surpass wafer fab equipment spending by 200 basis points between 2020-2025 and its Advanced Products business to grow at GDP plus 300 basis points. Additionally, the company anticipates non-GAAP gross margins of 50%.

"We see upside coming next year in the Advanced Products group lead by improved laser demand due to a rebound in global manufacturing and growth from the E&S segment," Miller stated.

On top of this, the data storage segment is likely to benefit from the ramp of 5G phones as they require more memory content, in Miller's opinion. "Next gen devices require more transistors and higher bit densities. Higher aspect ratios, which require more rf power, have enabled MKS to gain share in the WFE market lead by rf etch applications such as hard mask removal," the analyst explained. In just the first nine months of 2020, MKSI's power solutions business has grown 110% year-over-year.

Miller argues that all of this puts MKSI on a path to achieve higher earnings in FY21. He bumped up his non-GAAP EPS estimate from $8.40 on sales of $2.47 billion to $8.82 on similar sales.

A 71% success rate and 25.8% average return per rating support Miller's #45 ranking.

NeoGenomics is a cancer diagnostics and pharmaceutical services company that works to better patient care by providing improved diagnoses and helping pharmaceutical companies launch cutting-edge therapies based on precision genetics.

The company, last week, received a nod of approval from BTIG, with analyst Mark Massaro initiating coverage with a Buy rating and the Street high price target of $60 (12% upside potential).

"We view NEO as the leading high-growth reference lab focused in oncology offering comprehensive cancer diagnostic tests and pharma services for pathologists, oncologists, academic medical centers, and pharma companies," Massaro noted.

To back this up, the five-star analyst points out that NEO has the broadest cancer diagnostic testing portfolio in the U.S., with it also boasting a "strong track record of acquiring and integrating market-leading lab companies over the years." This includes the acquisitions of Clarient, Genoptix and the oncology assets of Human Longevity, which were purchased at average revenue multiples of 2.5x revenue, compared to the average industry takeout multiples of 6.5x.

Massaro added, "We are positive on NEO's May 2020 partnership and ownership stake in liquid biopsy company Inivata, as NEO looks to expand its footprint in the high-value liquid biopsy and minimal residual disease (MRD) testing space. We think NEO will likely announce additional deals from here, and we regard NEO as a 'onestop oncology shop' as it leverages a leadership position in the pathology and oncology channel."

Massaro's stellar track record is evidenced by his 66% success rate and 28.2% average return per rating.

Wall Street's 6th best-performing analyst, Brian Fitzgerald, of Wells Fargo, believes the negative investor reaction following game developer Zynga's Q3 earnings results was "overdone," with the stock now appearing "inexpensive relative to growth." With this in mind, he upgraded the rating from Hold to Buy on December 15. In addition, he kept the price target at $12.50, implying 26% upside potential.

"We think shares of ZNGA present a favorable risk/reward in light of a new, more detailed strategic vision of organic growth, which CEO Gibeau recently articulated. This prompted us to reimagine what ZNGA will look like a few years down the road," Fitzgerald stated.

Putting it simply, the analyst likes what he's seeing. He envisions a vertically integrated ad network which, when combined with Rollic's games, could move the hyper-casual audience into the ZNGA network for monetization through ads and in-app purchases, while reducing UA costs. Additionally, its portfolio is now diverse enough to provide several options to allocate advertising spend on genres and regions with the best ROI, which could create a "less volatile recurring revenue stream," in Fitzgerald's opinion.

What's more, Fitzgerald sees "expansion of ZNGA's TAM beyond mobile by taking key franchises cross-platform in a cost-effective manner due to enhancements in game engine technology."

"We think FY21E FCF yield of over 5% limits the risk of underperformance as mgmt. has a successful track record of allocating capital into a TAM growing ~10%/year; moreover, management's commentary on December 9 suggests ZNGA's Q4 is still on track for double digit organic year-over-year growth," Fitzgerald added.

The Wells Fargo analyst boasts an impressive 83% success rate and 43% average return per rating.

View post:
Top Wall Street analysts recommend these buys before 2020 comes to a close - CNBC

These entertainers in their 90s offer suggestions for good health and a long life – East Bay Times

Posted on December 28, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

I am in my early 80s and have lived long enough to experience a lot and always have been able to manage difficult times. As we continue through this current climate, I need a lift. What can you offer? C.N.

Dear C.N

Thank you for your question. Heres one possible antidote: humor.

In 2017, HBO presented a documentary entitled If Youre Not in the Obit, Eat Breakfast that confronted stereotypes about life after age 90. In the film, Carl Reiner has a conversation with several of his friends from show business, challenging what it means to really live in your 90s.

Reiner, the legendary comedian, director and screenwriter, offers himself as Exhibit A at age 95. (Reiner passed away in June 2020 at age 98.) He spoke with other legendary comedians: Filmmaker and funnyman Mel Brooks, age 90; TV icon Norman Lear, age 95; and beloved performer Dick van Dyke age 91.

Comedy is part of these mens work. Humor can be used as a teaching tool, although it is unlikely that is the intention of these notables. Yet, here are some messages we can extract from these talented funny men. The quotes are from the HBO documentary.

Carl Reiner celebrates humor. Reiner had a running quip about being in his nineties. Every morning, I pick up my newspaper, get the obituary section and see if Im listed, he said. If Im not, I have my breakfast.

What we know: A sense of humor is related to longevity. Adults with an average sense of humor live longer than those who dont find humor in life, according to researchers. Benefits include decreased blood pressure while laughter boosts the immune system by decreasing the stress hormone cortisol and minimizing inflammation.

Norman Lear talks about culture and flexibility. I think the culture stereotypes everything, said Lear. Because Im 93, Im supposed to behave in a certain way. The fact I can touch my toes shouldnt be so amazing to people.

What we know: Society seems to have some unrealistic expectations about ones age and respective appearance, activities and capabilities. Not to be overlooked is Lears ability to touch his toes, demonstrating flexibility typically achieved with physical activity. Such activity improves our ability to perform daily physical activities, improves our range of motion and increases our sense of balance, helping us avoid falling and injuries.

Dick Van Dyke suggests dance and song. For a long and good life, Van Dyke suggests that you sing, dance and laugh everyday. Without knowing his daily routine, we do know in 2018 Van Dyke played the older cantankerous banker, Mr. Dawes in the movie Mary Poppins Returns. He not only danced and sang but jumped on a desk, did a tap dance number and jumped down with a spring and a bounce. Dancing has been found to have results comparable to formal exercise improving emotional, psychological and physical well-being. And its fun!

Mel Brooks promotes outrageous humor. During the HBO show, Brooks stood up and told the crowd, Ladies and gentlemen, the greatest cat sound in the world, as he broke out into the loudest yowl. As the audience howled, he said, What the hell do you want? Youre not paying a penny here.

Reiner refers to him as the funniest human being in the world. Age and outrageous are terms typically not paired together., but there is a book entitled, Be an Outrageous Older Woman by Ruth Harriet Jacobs. Sometimes outrage is needed to get attention.

At the time of this HBO program, all four men continued to work at a craft and art they loved. And herein lies a message. Having a sense of purpose is a lifesaver; humor is a healer helping us keep a perspective. And laughing is healthy. So, think about ways to do something you love to do, keep your sense of humor, have a good laugh and even do a little dance while taking a break from the news.

Thank you, C.N., for your good question. To watch the HBO documentary, see https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6zv_aRiiBmA.

Next week, well identify four women in their 90s, doing what they love to do with a message to all of us. Be safe, well and kind to yourself and others.

Note: A week before Reiner died, he said the following in an interview, Ive always got something Im doing and improving.

Helen Dennis is a nationally recognized leader on issues of aging, employment and the new retirement with academic, corporate and nonprofit experience. Contact Helen with your questions and comments at Helendenn@gmail.com. Visit Helen at HelenMdennis.com and follow her on facebook.com/SuccessfulagingCommunity

WISeCoin, the Innovative Tokenized Service of WISeKey, Authenticates People, Products and Machines Using Blockchain and AI – GlobeNewswire

Posted on December 22, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

WISeCoin, the Innovative Tokenized Service of WISeKey, Authenticates People, Products and Machines Using Blockchain and AI

WISeKey allows Connected Electric Cars to Pay with WISeCoin Cryptocurrencies at Autonomous Electric Charging Stations

ZUG, Switzerland December 21, 2020 WISeKey International Holding (WISeKey, SIX: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY), a leading cybersecurity IoT company, today announced that its WISeCoin IoT solution enables secure people-to-people, people-to-machines and machines-to-machines digital communications using blockchain and AI technologies.

WISeKey combines its blockchain technology, with extensive experience in digital identities and PKI, and expertise with secure microcontrollers, to create a tokenized service offering, the WISeCoin utility token. WISeCoin provides an innovative way to verify connected objects wanting to interact with one another. Through this unique service offering, WISeCoin AG, a Special Purpose vehicle created by WISeKey to build the infrastructure for secure intra-object interactions and transactions, aims at becoming the ubiquitous industry solution for facilitating secure IoT interactions.

The solutions provided by WISeCoin AG allows any person, object or machine to exchange information or value in a trusted manner while significantly reducing the risk of malicious cyber threats, frauds and hacks. WISeCoins are however not a means of payment, but a service offering. It is enabled through the token which is stored in a digital wallet and entitles the holder to the service offering of the WISeCoin. The token is indifferent to the wallet provider and can be incorporated into any ERC-20 compatible wallet.

The WISeCoin Validation Service uses AI provided by HIRO (via the certificates validation authority) to analyze the digital certificate of different actors and recognize and trust the identity of other parties they are interacting with. To do this, WISeCoin token gives its token holders (stored on digital wallets) access to the WISeKey Public Key Infrastructure (PKI), which provides the verification service in order to mitigate malicious actors and hackers from compromising interactions.

Objects send the validation authority the third partys public key and the digital certificate for validation. WISeKey checks that the corresponding public key holds a valid WISeCoin and if so, the identity is verified. In order to get the verification, the object making the request needs to hold at least 1 WISeCoin in its wallet, which is valid for 12 months or 100 requests. WISeCoin AG can, over time, adjust the number of tokens required to get verified, the longevity of the token and entitled verifications per token. The WISeCoin Validation Service is used for the verification of the validity of digital identity of the object in real time, thus ensuring secure use of digital identities for authentication of an object connected to the Internet and the activation of attributes such as digital signing, transactions, or sending WISeCoin Machine to Machine Cryptocurrency technology allows connected cars to pay with WISeCoin at the Electric Charging Stations, completing the transaction without using credit cards or any other traditional payment. Connected car owners can charge their cars and pay by transferring WISeCoins via NFC technology, from their car wallet to the electric charging station.

WISeKey is already providing the integration of WISeKey IoT and PKI in the manufacturers connected car solutions allowing them to authenticate legitimate car components and enabling owners to securely interact with the cars smart features. The fact that the electric car includes a WISeKey digital certificate stored on a WISeKey microchip acting as a secure hardware module it allows to send securely the WISeCoins required to execute the payment transaction between the electric car and the electric charger without any intermediaries or paying any transactional fees.

WISeCoin also includes an unforgeable digital identification for the ecar and echarger, securing both. Virtually all new cars on the market today include electronic technologies that could pose vulnerabilities to hacking or privacy intrusions if data security is not addressed. For example, smart cars without cybersecurity protection technology could allow hackers to gain remote access by exploiting vulnerabilities in their ecosystem of connected components and online services. As the number of cars connected to the Internet is growing quickly smart car manufactures are working to identify and reduce potential hacking vulnerabilities in their vehicles.

About WISeKey

WISeKey (NASDAQ: WKEY; SIX Swiss Exchange: WIHN, NASDAQ: WKEY) is a leading global cybersecurity company currently deploying large scale digital identity ecosystems for people and objects using Blockchain, AI and IoT respecting the Human as the Fulcrum of the Internet. WISeKey microprocessors secure the pervasive computing shaping todays Internet of Everything. WISeKey IoT has an install base of over 1.5 billion microchips in virtually all IoT sectors (connected cars, smart cities, drones, agricultural sensors, anti-counterfeiting, smart lighting, servers, computers, mobile phones, crypto tokens etc.). WISeKey is uniquely positioned to be at the edge of IoT as our semiconductors produce a huge amount of Big Data that, when analyzed with Artificial Intelligence (AI), can help industrial applications to predict the failure of their equipment before it happens.Our technology is Trusted by the OISTE/WISeKeys Swiss based cryptographic Root of Trust (RoT) provides secure authentication and identification, in both physical and virtual environments, for the Internet of Things, Blockchain and Artificial Intelligence. The WISeKey RoT serves as a common trust anchor to ensure the integrity of online transactions among objects and between objects and people. For more information, visitwww.wisekey.com.

Press and investor contacts:

Disclaimer:

This communication expressly or implicitly contains certain forward-looking statements concerning WISeKey International Holding Ltd and its business. Such statements involve certain known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors, which could cause the actual results, financial condition, performance or achievements of WISeKey International Holding Ltd to be materially different from any future results, performance or achievements expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. WISeKey International Holding Ltd is providing this communication as of this date and does not undertake to update any forward-looking statements contained herein as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

This press release does not constitute an offer to sell, or a solicitation of an offer to buy, any securities, and it does not constitute an offering prospectus within the meaning of the Swiss Financial Services Act (FinSA), the FinSAs predecessor legislation or advertising within the meaning of the FinSA, or within the meaning of any other securities regulation. Investors must rely on their own evaluation of WISeKey and its securities, including the merits and risks involved. Nothing contained herein is, or shall be relied on as, a promise or representation as to the future performance of WISeKey.

The securities offered will not be, and have not been, registered under the United States of America Securities Act of 1933, as amended, and may not be offered or sold in the United States of America, absent registration or an applicable exemption from the registration requirements of said Act.

See the original post here:
WISeCoin, the Innovative Tokenized Service of WISeKey, Authenticates People, Products and Machines Using Blockchain and AI - GlobeNewswire

Healthcare Organizations Are Polluting The Air And Harming Public Health, But That Can Change – Forbes

Posted on December 22, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

The healthcare industry accounts for 8.5% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and toxic air pollutants. ... [+]

Exposure to high levels of air pollution can cause a variety of health issues, ranging from mild irritation of the throat to heart problems, and can even lead topremature death. One major source of this health hazard is healthcare. Globally, the healthcare industry accounts for about 4.5% of greenhouse gas emissions and toxic air pollutants, a large enough emissions profile to rival most countries. "If it was on a list of nations, it would be the fifth country in the world," said Sonia Roschnik, international climate policy director for Health Care Without Harm.

In the U.S., healthcare accounts for an even great proportion of emissions. A recentanalysis inHealth Affairs shows that healthcare organizations and the medical supply chain are responsible for about 8.5% of U.S. greenhouse gas emissions and air pollutants. This figure rose by 6% between 2010 and 2018. The authors estimate that in 2018 alone, this pollution led to the loss of 388,000 disability-adjusted life-years, the cumulative number of years of life lost due to illness, disability or early death from the pollution.

The healthcare industry, while it's meant to promote longevity and wellbeing, threatens health by emitting harmful carbon-dioxide-trapping gases and air pollutants. "I feel conflicted as a health care provider because every time I'm providing care, I'm causing harm someplace else," said Jodi Sherman, associate professor of anesthesiology and epidemiology at Yale University and senior author of theHealth Affairsanalysis.

Sherman and her colleagues used health expenditure data from the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and emissions data from the Inventory of U.S. Greenhouse Gas Emissions and Sinks to estimate healthcare emissions both at the national and state level. The researchers input the data into an internationally standardized model that estimates the emissions associated with spending in different economic sectors. Using these results, the researchers determined the emissions released by the healthcare industry and which parts of the industry were the biggest polluters.

"We've shown that the health sector in the US is responsible for 8.5% of our nation's greenhouse gas emissions and similar fractions of toxic air pollutants," said Sherman. The medical supply chain accounted for about 82% of healthcare emissions, purchased energy accounted for 11% and healthcare operations accounted for 7%.

This pollution came at a high cost to human health. Using their emissions data and methods commonly used to calculate disability-adjusted life-years (DALYs) from greenhouse gases and air pollution, Sherman and her colleagues estimated that healthcare emissions resulted in the loss of between 244,000-531,000 DALYs, with a median of 388,000 DALYs. "We're similar in magnitude to deaths due to preventable medical errors," said Sherman.

But when a 1999 landmark report published by the Institute of Medicine revealed the magnitude of deaths from preventable medical errors, it sparked public outcry and led to the formation of the government Agency for Healthcare Research and Quality. Sherman said that the same hasn't happened for healthcare emissions. "Nobody [in power] is paying attention to this issue."

But the harms stemming from pollution can be prevented. In the U.S., some healthcare systems have taken it upon themselves to reduce their carbon footprint. Sherman's institution for example, Yale-New Haven Health, has stopped using a non-essential, environmentally harmful inhaled anesthetic, desflurane.

"Inhaled anesthetics are very potent greenhouse gases. They're released directly off of facility rooftops and vented to the outdoor atmosphere," said Sherman. "The [United Kingdom's] National Health Services estimated that [on average] 5% of an entire facility's footprint is coming from inhaled anesthetics."

Another target is the medical supply chain. "One of the three biggest categories contributing to the problem of healthcare pollution is medical devices and supplies," said Sherman. Not only does the manufacture and transportation of supplies emit pollutants, but single-use items like gloves and masks create waste, and could be used more efficiently.

"The PPE, the masks we've used in this pandemic, if they were designed to be reusable and low carbon, you could make a huge difference," said Roschnik.

Sherman also stressed that however successful individual facilities or even larger systems are at greening their operations, unified systemic change is needed. A step toward that is mandating that organizations report their emissions. Some U.S. healthcare systems voluntarily report their environmental impacts, but thats the exception rather than the rule. Mandated reporting could incentivize hospitals to track their impact, and the U.S. already has the framework for it.

"If we mandate reporting through the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid [Services] existing infrastructure, that may be the quickest way to leverage transition of the healthcare system in the U.S. to net zero," she said. "This is a call to the new administration to seriously look at the opportunity to help us help the health care sector reduce its emissions through this existing quality performance framework."

This kind of systemic change is already happening elsewhere. The U.K. has already done this and is the only place in the world with nationally mandated health system carbon accounting.

"We'd been working for a long time to look at the carbon footprint of the health sector and trying to identify what the hotspots are and what to do about it," said Roschnik. "We got to the point where we really felt [sustainability] needed to be integrated into everything you do, so that's why we launched the Greener NHS [initiative]." Roschnik helped launched the initiative which aims to bring the health system to net zero carbon emissions by 2040.

To get to net zero, the initiative outlines steps to reduce NHS emissions, like ensuring suppliers are committed to net zero emissions, developing the first zero-emission ambulances and constructing 'net zero hospitals.' "We've spent years working through what interventions will contribute how much," said Roschnik.

The benefits of cleaning up healthcare won't stop at clinics or medical suppliers. "The healthcare industry intersects with most other parts of the global economy. If we can transform this industry it's going to have ripple effects," said Sherman. "And it's part of our social mission."

Read this article:
Healthcare Organizations Are Polluting The Air And Harming Public Health, But That Can Change - Forbes

Is the great stagnation over? – The Week

Posted on December 5, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Shortly after the 1918 "Spanish Flu" departed, the Roaring Twenties arrived. History may not rhyme, but even an echo of that powerful economic boom would be most welcome.

Here's one reason why I'm cautiously hopeful that a kind of Roaring Twenties Redux might follow the coronavirus pandemic: Artificial intelligence researchers at Google's DeepMind unit announced Monday that an AI program had cracked the long-term problem of predicting how proteins in the human body fold into 3D shapes. "This long-sought breakthrough could accelerate the ability to understand diseases, develop new medicines and unlock mysteries of the human body," The New York Times reports.

Well, not just that as important as solving this 50-year riddle could turn out to be for human health and longevity. The possibly game-changing advance also suggests some legit reason for optimism that the apparent long-term slowdown in technological progress more broadly the "I was promised flying cars but got Twitter instead" syndrome might be ready to reverse. If that happens, get ready for faster economic growth and all the good things that go with it, such as higher wages. Or how about greater capacity to solve big problems that might not automatically show up in GDP numbers such as climate change and the threat of future pandemics?

To be sure, a long boom is not the current expectation from economists. Even the most bullish forecasts expect only a growth blip over the next couple of years as the economy rebounds from last spring's pandemic-induced shutdown. Maybe a boomy 2021 and 2022 before a deceleration back to the uninspiring 2 percent-ish pace we've been experiencing since the Global Financial Crisis of 2007-2009. The Congressional Budget Office recently predicted the economy's growth potential going forward will be almost a third slower than it has been over the past 50 years.

But AI could help change the gloomy forecast. Typically, the use case for AI is presented as automating operations such as customer service or improving decision-making through data analysis. And that stuff is important. Companies clearly think so, or they wouldn't be spending nearly $50 billion on AI systems this year. And the pandemic may be accelerating the trend. Moody's Analytics economist Mark Zandi said in a client note this week that many businesses "have taken advantage of the pandemic to more fully deploy technologies and process changes that they were investing in but reluctant to take full advantage of during the good times."

Maybe more important, however, is the role of AI as a super-researcher. In the paper "Are Ideas Getting Harder to Find?," economists Nicholas Bloom, Charles Jones, and John Van Reenen show how it's been getting harder to discover the big advances and breakthroughs that drive technological progress and economic growth. The low-hanging fruit have been picked. Their conclusion: "Just to sustain constant growth in GDP per person, the United States must double the amount of research effort every 13 years to offset the increased difficulty of finding new ideas."

But AI might go a long way toward solving this problem. Instead of thinking of AI as a general-purpose invention, some economists think of it as a general-purpose method of invention that can supercharge the research process. This protein-folding breakthrough is only the latest example. Back in February, MIT researchers announced they had discovered a new antibiotic using an AI approach similar to the one employed by DeepMind. "The computer model, which can screen more than a hundred million chemical compounds in a matter of days, is designed to pick out potential antibiotics that kill bacteria using different mechanisms than those of existing drugs," MIT's Anne Trafton reported. And in October, Wired magazine reported on InoBat, a Slovakia-based company using a U.S.-developed AI platform to analyze different lithium battery chemistries some 10 times faster than what was previously possible. This is only the beginning of the age of AI as the best-ever research assistant.

The 1918 influenza burned itself out. This time around, we are going to end a global pandemic ourselves through the application of technology specifically the light-speed development of vaccines. It probably won't be the last stunning innovation to transform our lives for the better this decade.

See the rest here:
Is the great stagnation over? - The Week

Stop the rain on human rights EURACTIV.com – EURACTIV

Posted on December 11, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

The current pandemic crisis serves as a magnifying glass of all existing inequalities in Europe racism, gender and sexual discrimination, treatment of migrants: there is still a long way to go to ensure full and real equality in Europe, write Helena Dalli and Dunja Mijatovi on the occasion of the Human Rights Day on 10 December.

Helena Dalli is the European Union Commissioner for Equality. Dunja Mijatovi is the Council of Europe Commissioner for Human Rights.

All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights. This very principle of equality enshrined in the Universal Declaration of Human Rights has inspired and transformed the lives of millions of Europeans and continues to give hope to countless more.

Regrettably, for all the progress of the past seven decades, there is still a long way to go to ensure full and real equality in Europe.

Our societies breed divisive levels of inequality, fear and polarisation. Structural discrimination keeps millions of Europeans on the margins of our societies, especially in employment, health, education, housing, and the criminal justice system.

The current pandemic crisis serves as a magnifying glass of all existing inequalities in Europe and exacerbates them. Those who were poor before it became poorer; those who were disadvantaged faced even greater disadvantages.

Inequalities affecting women, LGBTIQ people and ethnic minorities illustrate this problem well.

Although the situation varies from country to country, discriminatory treatment of women is ubiquitous. This is evident in the workplace, where deep-rooted societal attitudes contribute to maintaining the gender gap.

Violence against women and the obstacles faced by women in access to their sexual and reproductive health and rights also derive from ingrained patterns of inequalities between women and men.

Progress on ensuring equality for LGBTIQ people has been remarkable in some countries. However, in others the trend is worrying.

Restrictions to freedom of assembly and association, obstacles to legal gender recognition and lack of adequate protection at public events are evident failures of state authorities to uphold their commitments and legal human rights obligations to ensure equality for LGBTIQ people.

The situation is not much better for people from ethnic minority and immigrant backgrounds. If you are of African descent you are more likely than white people to face discrimination in the job market, in education and housing, and to be stopped by the police without reasonable suspicion.

Hate incidents also continue to scar the lives of Jews, Muslims and Roma, who are among the preferred scapegoats of those who still stigmatise some groups of people on the grounds of their ethnic origin or religion.

The unkept promise of equality betrays a long political, philosophical and judicial tradition which places equality at the centre of European democracies. Both the European Court of Justice and the European Court of Human Rights have upheld the principle of equality and non-discrimination since the 1970s.

Yet, more and more governments and parliaments seem to pay little attention to their legal obligations, and to the destabilising consequences that keeping millions of Europeans as second-class citizens is having on our societies.

Hard won progress longevity is not a given. We must protect and reinforce it every day.

The many challenges that our societies will have to face require that Europe strengthens the place equality occupies in our societies, starting by giving a more central focus to the principle of equality and non-discrimination in relations to all human rights, be they civil, political, economic social or cultural.

We must do better for the rights of the single mother living in poverty and for the disabled child prevented from attending a mainstream school. We must protect the rights of women and girls who have been sexually harassed, of young graduates who face discrimination in the labour market because of how their name sounds.

We also must remain vigilant in the face of worrying attempts to roll back progress towards equality for women and LGBTIQ people.

There is no easy fix, but already taking the decision to address these long-standing problems together is a good start. We firmly believe that the founding principles and values of the Universal Declaration are as relevant today as they were when they emerged from bloodshed, tyranny and war. They require that governments become stronger defenders of human rights.

We are helping them do so by addressing effectively the pervasive discriminations against women in Europe. Ratifying and implementing the Council of Europe Convention on preventing and combating violence against women and domestic violence is key to advance gender equality. This Convention has been ratified by 34 European countries, and signed by the EU.

However, the EU is not yet in a position to ratify because unanimity between member states has not been reached. We will join forces to make clear that the Convention protects from violence and nothing else; contrary to the misconceptions, fallacious and uninformed claims that have circulated and sown doubts.

Likewise, we are committed to fight racism and bring about an anti-racist culture. To this end, we believe that one of the priorities is to help member states stamp out ethnic profiling and end impunity for police misconduct.

We will also strengthen our work to counter discrimination against LGBTIQ people. We will continue to raise the visibility of LGBTIQ people in our dialogue with member states, support activists and use all means at our disposal to defend the right of LGBTIQ people to equality.

For this to happen, however, our voices alone will not suffice. There is the need for a renewed commitment by national authorities to uphold the founding values and legal obligations set out by the European Union and the Council of Europe. And here we get to the heart of the problem.

At best, many politicians in our member states remain indifferent about discrimination. At worst, they instigate violence and hostility. Politicians must be champions of equality, not obstacles to it. International organisations and the human rights community too have their bit to do.

We must become more inclusive in the way we defend human rights. We deliver a public service in the interest of society, but we do not own that service. We talk about, for and sometimes with people who have suffered human rights violations.

But we rarely empower them to speak for themselves. They should take part in decision-making processes as much as possible. We should learn to listen more and they must have the space to tell their stories and shape the policies and laws that concern them.

When states adopted the Universal Declaration on Human Rights on 10 December 1948, they pledged themselves to achieve equality. Giving practical effect to that vision is still possible but only if we choose to strengthen freedoms, promote participation and empower all people.

Originally posted here:
Stop the rain on human rights EURACTIV.com - EURACTIV

What is the secret to aging well? – MarketWatch

Posted on December 5, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Heres the million, or lets say, billion-dollarquestion: What is aging well and how do you do it? Whats the secret elixir?

There are expert presentations on a TedTalk playlist: How toMake You Feel Good About Getting Older.And there are droves of self-help books, exercise regimes, healthy diet gurusand lines of cosmetics that this query has spawned.

Thats where Marc Freedman, founder and chief executive ofEncore.org and the author of How to Live Forever: The Enduring Power of Connecting the Generations, comes in.

Freedman is one of those experts on thelongevity revolution who makes you stop and listen. Really listen. Trust me onthis. In his latest book, out in paperback this week, he explores longevity,youth, purpose and happiness, and the role older people can play in giving backto the next generation.

Hes not a disciple of retirement. As he told me in an interview: All too often, individuals are left to their own devices when it comes to finding a new sense of purpose in a postretirement period that could be as long as the middle years in duration. Many feel like they are all alone in navigating the new terrain, practically and emotionally.

Learning to age well requires anemotional shift. More yesterdays than tomorrows has a way of adding an urgencyto this stage of life. Time is more precious. Freedman says. Questions ofpurpose and legacy are more prominent. That can sound depressing, but for manypeople it is a powerful source of motivation for making the most of thisperiod.

I spoke with Freedman about hisbook, How to Live Forever, and his views of aging well. The highlights of ourconversation are below and have been edited and condensed.

We now have more people over 60 in this country than under18. How can we make an aging society work?

America is becoming a much more multigenerational society,with five generations alive at the same time. This is no temporary blip; its apermanent shift. Some see this transformation producing a zero-sum battlebetween old and young over scarce resources, but this dystopian scenario runscounter to much of human history.

Actually, theres good reason for optimism. Anthropologists now believe it was the role of grandmothers caring for young children (and allowing mothers to gather more food) that served as the turning point in our becoming human beings in the first place. And developmental psychologists studying both ends of the age spectrum today are discovering that the needs and assets of younger and older people fit together like pieces of a jigsaw puzzle. Just ask any grandparent.

Nows the time to build on these inherent and complementaryassets. Lets find new ways to bring the generations together to forge bonds,find joint purpose, and bridge divides. Intergenerational connection could be adefining feature of American resilience in the 21st century.

How has the pandemic affected the generational divide?

Lets face it, a powerful message to our generation I saythis as a 62-year-old has been stay home, stay safe and stay out of theway. That message has reinforced ageism and the age segregation that has grownso rampant in American society. Its driven a wedge between generations, withinfamilies and in communities.

At the same time, by separating us, the pandemic hasawakened a deeper appreciation for our essential interdependence across age andled to calls for the creativity that will be needed to bring young and oldtogether again when its over.

You call for dramatic innovation in the ways we bringgenerations together. What are you seeing in the past few years that excitesyou?

Were going to need to be as creative in bringing people together across age as weve been in splitting them apart, an imperative all the more urgent in the context of COVIDs toll. The good news is that innovation is already under way.

I recounted many examples of innovative practices in Howto Live Forever, but Im even more heartened by the wave of innovation Ivewitnessed since the book was first published two years ago. One of my favoriteexamples is Nuns and Nones,originated by a group of young changemakers, spiritually-inclined butreligiously unaffiliated (the nones), who sought out older Women Religiousall over the country (the nuns) for guidance about living a good life andleaving the world better than we found it.

Nuns and Nones also underscores how much of the push towardgenerational connection and collaboration is coming from young people. Youngsocial entrepreneurs are behind Nesterly, a homesharingplatform that brings homeowners with room to spare together with collegestudents who need affordable rents; Big & Mini, acommunity thats reducing isolation by helping to create intergenerationalfriendships; and Mon Ami, an app thats beingused by governments and nonprofits to mobilize large-scale volunteer efforts.

And there are so many more. I encourage folks to take a lookat our 15 new Gen2Gen Innovation Fellows.The work theyre doing gives me confidence about our future.

How can individuals age-integrate their own lives, even inthe pandemic?

It all comes down to a pair of priorities: proximity andpurpose. Hows that for alliteration!

By proximity, I mean finding ways to encounter individuals of different ages and generations, whether in the course of daily life or even via Zoom. To resist the scourge of age segregation.And by purpose, Im talking about the need to make these intergenerational connections in ways that reinforce common, shared interests that animate our lives.

We could go a long way to finding proximity and purpose inthis country, for example, by creating intergenerational service programs aimedat connecting youngers and olders to use their complementary skills to solvelocal problems like contact tracing, feeding the hungry, educating children,and rebuilding after disasters.

But theres one more way to age-integrate that anyone can doright now, no infrastructure needed. In a word, listen. One of my mentors, inhis 80s at the time, once told me its a lot more important to be interestedthan to be interesting. Its certainly one of the keys to bridgingdifference, across age as well as many other divides.

Does it matter that we now have the oldest president in thenations history?

Its a striking paradox: Just as were pushing more and moreolder people to the sidelines during this time of pandemic increasing notonly loneliness but its close cousin, purposelessness weve also witnessedthe leadership of so many older men and women.

The nearly 80-year-old Dr. Anthony Fauci has served as a voice of calm reason and deep knowledge throughout the battle with COVID. Elder icons like the late Congressman John Lewis and Justice Ruth Bader Ginsburg continued their lifes work to build an equitable society with deep passion to the very end. And now we have the oldest president-elect in American history.

Some express legitimate concerns about a gerontocracy holding on to power at the expense of younger people. All the more reason that our elder leaders, starting with the new president, should take this moment to call the generations to common purpose, to ask old and young alike to roll up their sleeves to create a stronger, more cohesive society together, and to make the most of the multigenerational moment already washing over us.

Thanks for your time, Marc. My personal favorite takeaway. Its a lot more important to be interested than to be interesting.

Kerry Hannonisa leading expert and strategist on work and jobs, entrepreneurship, personalfinance and retirement. Kerry is the author of more than a dozen books,includingGreat Pajama Jobs: Your Complete Guide to Working From Home,Never Too Old To Get Rich: The Entrepreneurs Guide To Startinga Business Mid-Life,Great Jobs for Everyone 50+,andMoney Confidence.Her on Twitter@kerryhannon

Original post:
What is the secret to aging well? - MarketWatch

Asymmetrex Publishes the First Report of Immortal DNA Strands in Human Stem Cells – PR Web

Posted on November 21, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Example of a tissue stem cell (left) holding on to its immortal DNA strands after dividing to produce a maturing tissue cell (right).

BOSTON (PRWEB) November 18, 2020

What does it mean for multiplying cells in the body to be immortal? The cell DNA is being replicated over and over again while being divided equally between new cells produced by cell divisions. All the new cell components produced by the DNA code are mixing with the old cell components and being divided between the new cells. So, every cell is a new cell. There is nothing really immortal about any of them. Right?

Not quite. Stem cells responsible for renewing other mature body cells are different. For a long time, tissue cell scientists had a somewhat nebulous idea that stem cells had a special longevity in organs and tissues that they were immortal cells, lasting for as long as the human lifespan. However, no one had a molecular concept for this idea of stem cell immortality until John Cairns, a pioneer of DNA replication, started thinking about DNA mutations and cancer in the 1970s.

Cairns predicted that stem cells did something unique with their DNA code. He said they held on to one strand of every one of their many chromosomes and never shared those DNA strands with the tissue cells they renewed. Cairns called these immortal DNA strands. Cairns argued that immortal DNA strands must exist to explain how immortal stem cells avoid higher cancer rates.

Asymmetrex director James Sherley calls the immortal strand hypothesis the Carpenters Rule for stem cells. Good carpenters avoid creeping measurement errors by using a ruler or the same piece of wood to measure duplicates. Too many DNA duplication errors in cells make them cancerous. Cairns proposed that stem cells were smart carpenters, keeping and using the same DNA strands for making their many replicate copies over the human lifespan.

Prior to Asymmetrexs new report, published in a special issue of the peer-reviewed journal Symmetry, there were many publications on the presence of immortal DNA strands in stem cells of other species, including molds, plants, insects, and mice. Low levels of immortal DNA strands were also reported for human cancer cells.

The new report from Asymmetrex describes the presence of immortal DNA strands in human liver stem cells. The SACK-Xs 12(3) stem cells used in the study were developed more than a decade earlier using Asymmetrexs patented SACK tissue stem cell expansion technology. SACK-Xs 12(3) human liver stem cells are distributed for research by Kerafast. They are the first and only commercial human tissue stem cell product supplied with their stem cell-specific dosage, certified by Asymmetrex.

The new report brings an important closure for an ingenious scientific deduction by a remarkable scientist, John Cairns, recently deceased. Now that normal human tissue stem cells are confirmed to have immortal DNA strands, scientists can get on with the business of leveraging this knowledge to a better understanding of tissue stem cells for improving human health.

About Asymmetrex

Asymmetrex, LLC is a Massachusetts life sciences company with a focus on developing technologies to advance stem cell medicine. The companys U.S. and U.K. patent portfolio contains biotechnologies that solve the two main technical problems production and quantification that have stood in the way of effective use of human adult tissue stem cells for regenerative medicine and drug development. Asymmetrex markets the first technology for determination of the dose and quality of tissue stem cell preparations for use in stem cell transplantation therapies and pre-clinical drug evaluations. Asymmetrex is a member company of the Advanced Regenerative Manufacturing Institute BioFabUSA and the Massachusetts Biotechnology Council.

Share article on social media or email:

Lifetime perspective on alcohol and brain health – The BMJ

Posted on December 5, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Harm prevention policies must take the long view

The maintenance of brain health is central to health and wellbeing across the lifespan.1 Evidence suggests three periods of dynamic brain changes that may be particularly sensitive to the neurotoxic effects of alcohol: gestation (from conception to birth), later adolescence (15-19 years), and older adulthood (over 65 years). Highly prevalent patterns of alcohol use may cause harm during these sensitive periods, including low level prenatal alcohol exposure, adolescent binge drinking, and low-to-moderate alcohol use in older adulthood.2 Although these patterns of alcohol exposure may be associated with less harm to individuals than sustained heavy drinking, the overall burden of harm in populations is likely to be large.

From fetal development to later life, the human brain goes through several periods of dynamic change. The prenatal period is characterised by extensive production, migration, and differentiation of neurons, accompanied by substantial apoptosis.3 Adolescence is characterised by synaptic pruning and increased axonal myelination.4 Older adulthood is associated with brain atrophy, which accelerates after the age of 65 years, largely driven by decreases in neuron size and reductions in the number of dendritic spines and synapses.5 Each of these changes in neurocircuitry could increase sensitivity to the effects of environmental exposures such as alcohol.6

Globally, around 10% of pregnant women consume alcohol, with the rates considerably higher in European countries than the global average.7 Heavy alcohol use during pregnancy can cause fetal alcohol spectrum disorder, associated with widespread reductions in brain volume and cognitive impairment. But recent evidence indicates that even low or moderate alcohol consumption during pregnancy is significantly associated with poorer psychological and behavioural outcomes in offspring, partially mediated by aberrant brain structure.8

More than 20% of 15-19 year olds in European and other high income countries report at least occasional binge drinking (defined as 60 g of ethanol in a single drinking occasion).9 Longitudinal studies indicate that the transition to binge drinking in adolescence is associated with reduced neocortical volume and functional connectivity, attenuated white matter development, and small to moderate deficits in a wide range of cognitive functions.410 In older people, alcohol use disorders were recently shown to be one of the strongest modifiable risk factors for all types of dementia (particularly early onset) compared with other established risk factors such as hypertension and smoking.11

Although alcohol use disorders are relatively rare in older adults, many older people frequently consume low to moderate amounts of alcohol.12 Recently, even moderate drinking was shown to be associated with small but significant loss of brain volume in midlife,13 supporting previous research indicating an association between low risk drinking and brain damage in older adults.2 However, it is currently unclear whether these structural changes translate into functional cognitive impairment.

The evidence for the adverse effects of alcohol on brain health is compelling, but it is limited by the observational nature of the analyses. These findings require further replication, with a focus on more rigorous causal modelling.

Demographic trends may compound the effect of alcohol use on brain health. Women are now just as likely as men to drink alcohol and experience alcohol related harms.14 In higher income countries, consumption has increased among older people15 while in low and middle income countries, consumption and related harms have increased across the population. Global consumption is forecast to rise further in the next decade.16 The effects of the covid-19 pandemic on alcohol use and related harms are unclear, but alcohol use increased in the long term after other major public health crises.16

A lifecourse perspective on brain health supports the formulation of policy and public health interventions to reduce alcohol use and misuse at all ages. This could increase longevity and quality of life by reducing the prevalence of fetal alcohol spectrum disorders, aberrant neurocognitive development in adolescence, and dementia in later life. An integrated approach to harm reduction across the lifespan is required in public health, mental health, primary care, social care, and voluntary sectors.17

Population based interventions such as guidelines on low risk drinking, alcohol pricing policies, and lower drink driving limits need to be accompanied by the development of training and care pathways that consider the human brain at risk throughout life. The effect of harm reduction strategies on maintaining brain health in both individuals and populations can then be more fully evaluated.

Competing interests: We have read and understood BMJ policy on declaration of interests and have no interests to declare.

Provenance and peer review: Not commissioned; externally peer reviewed.

Read this article:
Lifetime perspective on alcohol and brain health - The BMJ

Re-Inventing the Wheel: How CEOs Are Driving the Sustainable Tire of the Future – Triple Pundit

Posted on December 5, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

When the internal combustion engine is phased out and zero-emission electric vehicles rule the road, well still have tires. Lots of tires. After all, there is no substitute for the tire as we know it today and these everyday objects are more complex than you might think. Of course were all familiar with the outer tread made from synthetic and natural rubber, but tires also include other components made with a variety of materials, including steel, nylon, polyester and rayon.

The component-rich nature of tires serves to improve their longevity and performance. But their complexity makes it all the more important to understand the potential human health and environmental impacts associated with their lifecycle particularly as the number of vehicles on the road increases, topping the 1 billion mark for the first time in 2009. According to some estimates, this figure could hit 2 billion within 15 years.

With the potential for rising demand and corresponding impacts in mind, back in 2005 a group of leading tire company CEOs set out to study a range of tire lifecycle issues on an organized basis.

The idea gave birth to the Tire Industry Project. Organized as a voluntary collaboration under the umbrella of the World Business Council for Sustainable Development (WBCSD), the groups membership is currently comprised of 11 major tire companies and co-led by Bridgestone, Goodyear and Michelin.

With the assistance and work of independent consultants and advisors, TIP conducts original research and deploys analytic tools of its own invention. In addition to disseminating results to members, TIP shares information with government agencies, other research institutions and the general public.

TIP member companies account for more than 60 percent of the global tire industry. Through scheduled biennial meetings, participating CEOs select research topics based on potential human health and environmental impacts within the tire lifecycle. They also consider how TIP can fill existing knowledge gaps with original, scientific research.

The main role of TIP is to generate knowledge and science related to human health and environmental impacts, Director Anne Ccile Rmont told TriplePundit. TIP came from CEOs who realized that if they mutualized their efforts, it would be more efficient, and they would achieve a much greater impact.

TIP research bears that out. One of the initial projects involved identifying the most commonly used chemicals in tire manufacturing and assessing their current and potential regulatory status. The work resulted in a short list of chemicals that needed additional analysis.

In another early project, TIP discovered a void of science-based knowledge around the topic of particles generated by tires on the road. When TIP started its research, there was not even a science-based consensus on what the particles look like, how to collect samples, and how to evaluate them. The dearth of information on what are now known as tire and road wear particles (TRWP) led TIP to multiple research projects that continue to have significant impact on the research community, as attention turns to microplastics in the ocean and other emerging issues.

TIP started looking into understanding TRWP, how they are formed, what they look like, and what they are made of, in order to be able to recognize them and understand any potential impacts on human health and the environment, Rmont explained.

So far, the groups research indicates that TRWP are unlikely to negatively impact human health and the environment, and that few TRWP are likely to reach the ocean. But the project created a greater understanding of where the particles do settle before degradation namely, along roadsides and, to a lesser extent, in freshwater sediment, which could lead to a holistic approach to prevent TRWP from entering the environment.

From the initial focus on topics including the chemicals used in tire manufacturing, and tire wear, TIP has recently widened its scope to engage in broader sustainability issues tied to the tire industrys increasing use of natural rubber.

Natural rubber is, of course, biodegradable and renewable, but it comes with its own set of challenges. Natural rubber mainly comes from Southeast Asia, and 85 percent comes from smallholder farmers. Its production has been associated with a range of issues, including deforestation and [poor] working conditions, Rmont told TriplePundit.

In 2017, the CEOs of TIP agreed to support the formation of the Global Platform for Sustainable Natural Rubber (GPSNR), a multi-stakeholder organization focused on socioeconomic and environmental factors across the natural rubber value chain. We have been proactive in terms of looking for solutions, establishing an organization, creating benchmarks and performing a full lifecycle assessment, Rmont said.

In an update earlier this year, GPSNR outlined the scope of its mission, noting that the organization recognizes the need to work toward economic sustainability within the natural rubber industry, ensuring that the earnings of millions of smallholders and farmworkers are enough for them to enjoy a decent standard of living.

Further research into tire manufacturing chemicals and TRWP will continue this year and next. The coalition will also move stakeholder engagement around end-of-life tire management forward, having recently published an updated global state of knowledge report on the management of tires at end-of-life. And it will develop a World Business Council for Sustainable Development SDG Sector Roadmap, with the aim of articulating how the tire industry can work to support the U.N. Sustainable Development Goals.

In the coming months, in partnership with TIP, well take a closer look at each of these stages of the tire lifecycle, what the industry is doing to understand potential impacts, and how the sustainable tires of the future are taking shape. You can follow the series here.

This article series is sponsored by the Tire Industry Projectand produced by the TriplePundit editorial team.Members of the Tire Industry Project (in alphabetical order) are Bridgestone, Continental, Cooper Tire, Goodyear, Hankook, Kumho Tire, Michelin, Pirelli, Sumitomo Rubber, Toyo Tires, and Yokohama Rubber.

Image:Manuel Mena/Unsplash

View original post here:
Re-Inventing the Wheel: How CEOs Are Driving the Sustainable Tire of the Future - Triple Pundit

US listing set to support and accelerate ongoing development of 4D Pharma’s live biotherapeutics – BioPharma-Reporter.com

Posted on November 7, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

The move follows the merger it announced late last month with the NASDAQ listed, Longevity, a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC). 4D Pharma will become dual-listed and ordinary shares will continue to be traded on AIM.

Live biotherapeutics, a novel class of drug derived from the microbiome,are defined by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) as being biological products that contain a live organism, such as a bacterium, that is applicable to the prevention, treatment or cure of a disease.

The merger is set to be completed and effective in early 2021, said the UK firm. But it is subject to approval by 4D Pharma and Longevity shareholders and it is also bound by the SEC review process.

The US listing is set to support and accelerate ongoing development of its live biotherapeutics, said the CEO, Duncan Peyton.

It is a big step for 4D Pharma, it is a big step for any European biotech business to step across the Atlantic and become a US listed business. It is something we have worked on for a while, he told BioPharma-Reporter.

The benefits are evident, he said. We get access to strong healthcare funds that understand innovative technologies like live biotherapeutics, we get access to more capital."

4D Pharma, which was officially founded in 2014, is at a pivotal time in its growth and development, said the CEO.

4D Pharma's live biotherapeutic products (LBPs) are orally delivered single strains of bacteria that are naturally found in the healthy human gut, and it has developed a proprietary platform, MicroRx (R), that identifies live biotherapeutics based on a deep understanding of function and mechanism.

Its clinical programs target cancer, including a clinical collaboration with Merck, respiratory diseases such as COVID-19 and asthma, gastrointestinal diseases, and pre-clinical programs targeting neurological diseases like Parkinsons disease and auto-immune diseases. It is also engaging in a vaccine research collaborative alliance with Merck.

Peyton said that despite the operational and economic challenges in 2020 created by the global pandemic, the biotech has made significant strides on several fronts.

This includes 4D Pharma presenting clinical data for live biotherapeutics for the treatment of cancer in combination with Mercks Keytruda, as well as positive Phase II results for the first drug candidate able to treat both IBS-C and IBS-D. In addition, earlier in 2020, 4D Pharma was able to quickly instigate a Phase II clinical trial in COVID-19 based on our detailed understanding of our asthma program.

What are the big next steps, and what is the regulatory approval timeline looking like for 4D Pharmas live biotherapeutics?

That really depends on the pathway we take, in the coming weeks and months, in relation to our oncology program, in particular.

We want to expand on the data we have seen recently in relation to oncology and IBS and take that through to approval trials.

The IBS trial will probably take longer, as there is need to address a large patient population. The oncology space is slightly different, and there is [an option] to get an accelerated approval.

Product registration is within reach then. I would say we are just a couple of years, not a decade, away from approval.

4D Pharma is a leader in the field, he said. From a research point of view, we are streets ahead.

The company understands the mechanisms of action of its strains and can demonstrate that preclinically and in patients, he said.

Those capabilities are supported by nearly 1,000 granted patents. I think we have a similar number of patents in development, and all of our IP is generated in-house, our team is pushing forward mechanistic understanding.

And Mercks engagement is a validation of 4Ds clinical pipeline and research capabilities, he added.

The companys platform, he said, goes beyond just addressing diseases of the gut, to explore oncology and immune system related areas. We are also starting to understand and unpick how our bacteria actually act on the gut-brain axis, continued Peyton.

Such insights could potentially lead to innovation in the neurodegenerative disease field, he said.

And the CEO sees Big Pharma's attitudes to the live biotherapeutics field changing.

We have been working with Merck, who I believe to be one of the most innovative of Big Pharma companies, for the past two and half years. We have been working with them on Keytruda, which is probably the biggest selling drug in the world right now, we are looking at how we can expand the patient groups into which Keytruda is active or regenerate a response for the drug, as it does not work in all patients. That is a signal of Mercks belief in the microbiome.

On top of that, Merck asked us to explore what we could do for it in relation to its vaccine business. We have that vaccine program [set up] now, we are doing all the research, and Merck will take it on from the preclinical stage.

As we publish more data on oncology and IBS, we are getting more incoming calls.

The landscape continues to change, some Big Pharma companies want to wait and see, others want to get involved and Merck is one of those.

4D Pharma has six clinical programs, namely a Phase I/II study of MRx0518 in combination with Keytruda (pembrolizumab) in solid tumors, a Phase I study of MRx0518 in a neoadjuvant setting for patients with solid tumors, a Phase I study of MRx0518 in patients with pancreatic cancer, a Phase I/II study of MRx-4DP0004 in asthma, a Phase II study of MRx-4DP0004 in patients hospitalized with COVID-19, and Blautix (R) in Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) which has completed a successful Phase II trial.

Preclinical stage program include candidates for CNS disease such as Parkinson's disease and other neurodegenerative conditions.

Read the original here:
US listing set to support and accelerate ongoing development of 4D Pharma's live biotherapeutics - BioPharma-Reporter.com

How to pay for long-term care like nursing homes, home health aides – CNBC

Posted on October 18, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Morsa Images | DigitalVision | Getty Images

Chances are, you aren't seriously thinking about how to pay for long-term care when you are older.

Most people only think about it at two points in their lives: when their parents need it or when they start to get much older and realize they need to have a plan, said Carolyn McClanahan, a physician and certified financial planner at Life Planning Partners in Jacksonville, Florida.

Yet someone turning 65 years old today has almost a 70% chance of needing some type of long-term care services in their remaining years, according to the U.S. Department of Health and Human Services. Women need 3.7 years of care, while men need 2.2 years.

The average lifetime cost of formal long-term care is $172,000, according to PWC.

"The big thing that you at least need to think about is your aging, periodically, and how you are going to plan for it," said McClanahan, a member of the CNBC Financial Advisor Council.

"Not just the cost, but the whole logistics for how you're doing to thrive as you get older."

More from Invest in You:The big lesson Suze Orman learned from her recent health scareHow to take the mystery out of picking a retirement savings plan7 financial steps to take after the death of a spouse or loved one

That means before you go down the road of how to pay for it, think about the optimal situation for your older years. Will you want to stay at home no matter what or are you willing to move into a facility that will care for you? Do you have family members willing to help out to keep costs down? Do you live in an area where it is cost-effective or do you need to move? What is your health like?

"If you have significant health issues you are not going to have longevity," McClanahan said. That means you have to have a conversation with your family about what your desires are about medical intervention or moving into hospice care.

You have to spend down to a very low level of assets in order to qualify for Medicaid.

Then, think about how to pay for your plan. You can save for it yourself, known as self-insuring, or buying some type of long-term care insurance policy. Government benefits, such as Medicaid and Medicare, have specific qualifications.

Medicare will only pay for long-term care if you need skilled services or rehabilitative care for up to 100 days in a nursing home or a short period of time with skilled home health or other skilled in-home services.

Medicaid is reserved for those who qualify under their state's program. Financial eligibility is based on your modified adjusted gross income and is tied to the federal poverty level.

"You, in effect, have to be impoverished," said Aaron Ball, head of insurance solutions, service and marketing at insurance company New York Life.

"You have to spend down to a very low level of assets in order to qualify for Medicaid."

The government looks back five years into your finances and would determine if any assets transferred during that time make you ineligible to receive benefits.

Check your state's Medicaid website to see if you qualify, which you can access through Medicaid.gov. You can also go to MedicalPlanningAssistance.org to check eligibility.

The big issue with putting aside money for the possibility of long-term care is that you need to have enough money to be able to do it.

Elder care isn't cheap. The annual national median cost for a private room in a nursing home was $102,200 in 2019, according to Genworth Financial.

For an assisted living facility, it costs a median yearly $48,612. The median national annual cost of a home health aide was $52,624, the insurance provider found. The cost varies by state, so research the state you plan live in during retirement

Peathegee Inc | Tetra images | Getty Images

You should have at least two years worth of care covered, McClanahan advised. If you are really healthy, though, it means you may live longer and have a higher risk of dementia, she said. In that case, plan on having enough money saved to cover five years of care.

"The problem is now you have segregated this money you are not using for your life, so you have to understand the risk and benefit of that," she said.

Also, if you are going to need care, make sure to actually use the money.

"Some people, when they actually get there, they are so afraid of spending the money, they don't get the care they need, or the family doesn't want you to spend the money because of their inheritance," McClanahan said.

When calculating how much to put aside, don't forget about other streams of income you'll be receiving, like Social Security, pension or an annuity.

About 7.5 million Americans have some form of long-term care insurance, according to the American Association for Long-Term Care Insurance.

The average annual premium for a 55-year old couple is $3,050, according to the association's 2020 price index. For a single man, age 55, the average cost is $1,700, while a 55-year-old single female is looking at an average annual premium of $2,650. The initial pool of benefits is $164,000 each and reaches $386,500 by age 85.

However, costs vary depending on your age, health and the policy, among other factors.

Typically, people start to think about buying insurance between the ages of 45 and 55, New York Life's Ball said.

Luis Alvarez | DigitalVision | Getty Images

It's especially a good option if you haven't started putting money aside in your younger years, said Tom Henske, CFP and partner at New York-based Lenox Advisors. It will be hard to accumulate the money you need if you only start saving at age 60, he said.

"A long-term care event would devastate your financial plan," Henske warned.

There are different types of long-term care insurance products available.

Traditional long-term care insurance is strictly for paying for long-term care. Costs have risen over the years, in part as insurers realized they initially underpriced their products.

"The problem is it is expensive and you don't know whether you are going to end up needing it," McClanahan said.

Hybrid plans include both life insurance and long-term care insurance. If you die without using it, at least the family receives a death benefit. The downside is it doesn't pay as nice of a benefit as traditional insurance does, McClanahan said. She suggests buying the policy in a lump sum. The younger you are, the less you'll have to pay.

A new product is also making its way into the marketplace, aimed at those who don't have enough saved for long-term care but don't want to lay out large premiums, said New York Life's Ball.

It has coinsurance and deductibles more akin to health insurance, which helps reduce the premiums, he said. In the case of New York Life's product, the average premium is $1,600 a year.

More:
How to pay for long-term care like nursing homes, home health aides - CNBC

4D Pharma to host virtual KOL event reviewing new data presented at the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer annual meeting 2020 from Live Biotherapeut…

Posted on November 7, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

4D Pharma to host virtual KOL event reviewing new data presented at the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer annual meeting 2020 from Live Biotherapeutic MRx0518 clinical programs

Leeds, UK, November 5, 2020, 4D pharma plc(AIM: DDDD), a pharmaceutical company leading the development of Live Biotherapeutic products (LBPs) - a novel class of drug derived from the microbiome, today announces that it will host a virtual Key Opinion Leader (KOL) event to review data presented from two ongoing clinical trials of MRx0518, the Companys lead immuno-oncology single strain Live Biotherapeutic, as both a neoadjuvant monotherapy and combination therapy in patients refractory to checkpoint inhibitors at the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer (SITC) Annual Meeting 2020. The event will take place on Wednesday, November 11, 2020 at 1:00pm GMT (8:00am ET).

The event will feature presentations from 4D pharma management and KOLs, Dr Mark P Lythgoe, Academic Clinical Fellow in Medical Oncology and Pharmacist at Imperial College London, and Dr Shubham Pant, Associate Professor Department of Investigational Cancer Therapeutics and Department of Gastrointestinal Medical Oncology at the University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

A live webcast of the event will be available on the Reports and Presentations section of the 4D Pharma website atwww.4dpharmaplc.com. To access the call, please dial 1-877-270-2148 (United States) or 1-412-902-6510 (international) and reference the 4D pharma conference call to join. A replay of the webcast and accompanying slides will be available on the 4D pharma website following the event.

About 4D pharma

Founded in February 2014, 4D pharma is a world leader in the development of Live Biotherapeutics, a novel and emerging class of drugs, defined by the FDA as biological products that contain a live organism, such as a bacterium, that is applicable to the prevention, treatment or cure of a disease. 4D has developed a proprietary platform, MicroRx(R), that rationally identifies Live Biotherapeutics based on a deep understanding of function and mechanism.

4D pharma's Live Biotherapeutic products (LBPs) are orally delivered single strains of bacteria that are naturally found in the healthy human gut.The Company has six clinical programmes, namely a Phase I/II study of MRx0518 in combination with KEYTRUDA (pembrolizumab) in solid tumours, a Phase I study of MRx0518 in a neoadjuvant setting for patients with solid tumours, a Phase I study of MRx0518 in patients with pancreatic cancer, a Phase I/II study of MRx-4DP0004 in asthma, a Phase II study of MRx-4DP0004 in patients hospitalised with COVID-19, and Blautix(R) in Irritable Bowel Syndrome (IBS) which has completed a successful Phase II trial. Preclinical-stage programmes include candidates for CNS disease such as Parkinson's disease and other neurodegenerative conditions. The Company has a research collaboration with MSD, a tradename of Merck & Co., Inc., Kenilworth, NJ, USA, to discover and develop Live Biotherapeutics for vaccines.

In October 2020 4D pharma announced its intention to merge with Longevity Acquisition Corporation (NASDAQ: LOAC), a special purpose acquisition company (SPAC), and seek a NASDAQ listing.The merger is expected to be completed and the NASDAQ listing of 4D pharma American Depositary Shares (ADSs) under the ticker symbol LBPS is currently expected to become effective in early 2021, subject to approval of 4D Shareholders and Longevity Shareholders, and the SEC review process.

For more information, refer tohttps://www.4dpharmaplc.com

Here is the original post:
4D Pharma to host virtual KOL event reviewing new data presented at the Society for Immunotherapy of Cancer annual meeting 2020 from Live Biotherapeut...

The Adrenomyeloneuropathy Treatment Market to grow on an emphatic note from 2019 to 2029 – PharmiWeb.com

Posted on December 22, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Adrenomyeloneuropathy is a rare genetic neuro-degenerative disease. Adrenomyeloneuropathy is the adult onset of adrenoleukodystrophy caused by the mutation in ABCD1 gene occurs usually in young boys. Adrenomyeloneuropathy disease affect the nerve cells in the spine and brain and the adrenal glands. Adrenomyeloneuropathy symptoms includes stiffness, weakness and pain in the legs. Adrenomyeloneuropathy is also known as progressive spastic paraparesis. Damage to the nerves of the legs which causes unsteadiness and fall, also the bladder, bowel and sexual organs are affected by the adrenomyeloneuropathy. Rare diseases affect vast numbers of people, with current data representing 30 million sufferers in the EU alone and 30 million affected in the US. There is no cure to Adrenomyeloneuropathy. However some treatment might stop the progression of Adrenomyeloneuropathy such as stem cell transplants. Blood testing, MRI test, vision screening and Skin biopsy and fibroblast cell culture are done for the diagnosis for the adrenomyeloneuropathy. Continued advances in the treatment of adrenomyeloneuropathy will further propel the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market.

Growing cases of rare disease and development of new and advanced treatment for rare disease is expected to boost the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market. Growing preference for healthy lifestyle and favorable government regulation spur the Adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market in the forecast period. Development of new technology and devices for the diagnosis of genetic disorders will propel the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market. Rising focus on the research and development of new therapeutic and drug treatment and growing government funding for the orphan drug is expected to drive the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market.

To remain ahead of your competitors, request for a sample here@

https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/samples/28645

However, stringent regulations for the drug development and high cost of associated with the treatment is expected to hinder the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market.

The global adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market is segmented on basis of disease type, drug type and end user and geography.

Development of novel drugs and undergoing clinical trial for the rare disease is expected to boost adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market. More than 3,000 drugs are in active development for one of the rare disease. Progress in genomics and biomedical science for the development of rare disease drug is expected to spur the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market. Various pharmaceutical companies are focusing on developing drug for the low prevalence disease types and rising funding and collaboration among the key players and government is expected to spur the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market.

To receive extensive list of important regions, Request Methodology here @

https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/methodology/28645

The North America market for adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment is expected to retain its dominance, owing to increasing patient pool for rare disease, increasing government funding to accelerate the research and development for rare disease. According to Genetic and Rare Diseases Information Center, more than 25 million Americans are suffering from rare disease in United States.Europe is expected to account for the second largest share in the global adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market owing to growing clinical trial funding programs for orphan drug development and high prevalence of adrenomyeloneuropathy and high treatment seeking rate. Asia Pacific is expected to show significant growth, owing to increasing diagnosis rate and improvement in healthcare infrastructure. China is expected to show significant growth in the adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market, due to rising population improving R&D capability, increasing per capita heath spending. Latin America and Middle East & Africa is expected to show growth owing to lack of diagnosis and inadequate healthcare facilities and lack of skilled physicians for Adrenomyeloneuropathy Treatment market.

Examples of some of the key manufacturer present in the global adrenomyeloneuropathy treatment market are Ascend Biopharmaceuticals, Novadip Biosciences, Eureka Therapeutics, Human Longevity, Regeneus, Allogene Therapeutics, BioRestorative Therapies, Immatics Biotechnologies, NewLink Genetics, Cytori Therapeutics, Talaris Therapeutics among others.

You Can Request for TOC Here @

https://www.persistencemarketresearch.com/toc/28645

Explore Extensive Coverage of PMR`sLife Sciences & Transformational HealthLandscape

Persistence Market Research (PMR) is a third-platform research firm. Our research model is a unique collaboration of data analytics andmarket research methodologyto help businesses achieve optimal performance.

To support companies in overcoming complex business challenges, we follow a multi-disciplinary approach. At PMR, we unite various data streams from multi-dimensional sources. By deploying real-time data collection, big data, and customer experience analytics, we deliver business intelligence for organizations of all sizes.

Our client success stories feature a range of clients from Fortune 500 companies to fast-growing startups. PMRs collaborative environment is committed to building industry-specific solutions by transforming data from multiple streams into a strategic asset.

Naved BegPersistence Market ResearchAddress 305 Broadway, 7th Floor New York City,NY 10007 United StatesU.S. Ph. +1-646-568-7751USA-Canada Toll-free +1 800-961-0353Salessales@persistencemarketresearch.comWebsitehttps://www.persistencemarketresearch.com

Source MARKITWIRED

Originally posted here:
The Adrenomyeloneuropathy Treatment Market to grow on an emphatic note from 2019 to 2029 - PharmiWeb.com

Global Precision Medicine Software Market 2020 Recovering From Covid-19 Outbreak|Know More About Brand Players – The Think Curiouser

Posted on October 25, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

The research report entitled GlobalPrecision Medicine SoftwareMarket 2020 added by Syndicate Market Researchprovides professional information to evaluate the most recent Precision Medicine Software market measurements and industry situation. The report offers the research methodology and approaches followed to clear up the Precision Medicine Software industry conditions. This report studies the all-important aspects of the Precision Medicine Software market based on current market conditions and focuses on future possibilities of Precision Medicine Software market during 2020-2026.

This report research enormously examines each and every specific deciding factor of the Precision Medicine Software industry on the basis of present financial condition, Demand, Trends, Limit, Capacity, procedures encapsulated by Precision Medicine Software market competitor and their advancement framework.

Get FREE Sample Copy of Report:https://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/sample/precision-medicine-software-market

(We Provide Free Sample copy as per your Research Requirement, also including COVID 19 impact analysis)

The research highly targets on the current industry size of the Global Precision Medicine Software market and its improvement capacity on the basis of the last 5 years data with company profile of leading players and manufacturers. The major key regions which add to the progression of Precision Medicine Software market mostly cover such as Precision Medicine Software market in North America, South America, Europe, Africa, the Middle East, and the Asian countries.

Top Players and Manufacturers Analysis in Precision Medicine Software Market:Syapse, Allscripts, Qiagen, Roper Technologies, Fabric Genomics, Foundation Medicine, Sophia Genetics, PierianDx, Human Longevity, Translational Software, Gene42 Inc, Lifeomic Health

Do Inquiry for Purchasing Report Here:https://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/inquiry/precision-medicine-software-market

This Precision Medicine Software Market report separated into the;1. Top manufacturers2. Product Type (Cloud-based, On-premises)3. Application/ end users (Healthcare Providers, Pharmaceutical and Biotechnology Companies, Research Centers and Government Institutes, Other)4. Key Regions

Key regions covered in the world Precision Medicine Software market report include:

The five regions are in turned segment into major countries and geographies. The key countries included in the global Precision Medicine Software market report includeU.S., Canada, Germany, UK, Italy, France, Spain, China, India, Southeast Asia countries, South Korea, Japan, Australia, GCC countries, Turkey, Brazil, Egypt, Mexico, and South Africa among others.

(Our Analystcan add Regional analysis as per your Research need also)

In the first part, The Precision Medicine Software market report provides company profiling, product picture, contact information and requirements of key producers of the global market. This report comparatively delivers the past, present, and futurist Precision Medicine Software industry strategies, organization capacity, size, share, growth, and forecast analysis be featured the predicted circumstances. Moreover, the possible results and the hazard to the improvement of Precision Medicine Software market comprehensively described in this report.

In next part, the Precision Medicine Software report delivering investigation of the most essential industry players based on their organization profiles, sales volume, Precision Medicine Software market value, yearly income, gross margin, demand and supply is considered in this report, which can drive opportunity Precision Medicine Software market competitors in dynamic business parts of learning.

Browse Complete Report with [emailprotected]https://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/market-analysis/precision-medicine-software-market.html

Key Highlights of the Precision Medicine Software Market:

Detailed research of the standard Precision Medicine Software market makers can ask the entire market to review the modernize plans and propelling examinations. Centered review of Precision Medicine Software market depends upon expansion, drive confining components and point of speculation can presume the market progress. The investigation of developing Precision Medicine Software market fragment and the dominating business sector will deal with the readers to plan the business strategies. The essential appraisal identified with Precision Medicine Software industry like the cost, sort of uses, the meaning of product, demand, and supply elements are acknowledged in this study report.

In the final part, the Global Precision Medicine Software Market report 2020 portrays business improvement designs, the Precision Medicine Software sales channel, wholesalers, buyers, merchants, studies findings, reference area, measurements sources and more.

Thanks for reading this Report; you can also get specific chapter wise, section wise or region wise reports.

Read another Report:-https://www.openpr.com/news/2160425/global-blockchain-technology-in-healthcare-covid-19

About Syndicate Market Research:

At Syndicate Market Research, we provide reports about a range of industries such as healthcare & pharma, automotive, IT, insurance, security, packaging, electronics & semiconductors, medical devices, food & beverage, software & services, manufacturing & construction, defense aerospace, agriculture, consumer goods & retailing, and so on. Every aspect of the market is covered in the report along with its regional data. Syndicate Market Research committed to the requirements of our clients, offering tailored solutions best suitable for strategy development and execution to get substantial results. Above this, we will be available for our clients 247.

Syndicate Market Research244 Fifth Avenue, Suite N202New York, 10001, United StatesEmail ID:[emailprotected]Website:https://www.syndicatemarketresearch.com/Blog:Syndicate Market Research Blo

View post:
Global Precision Medicine Software Market 2020 Recovering From Covid-19 Outbreak|Know More About Brand Players - The Think Curiouser

What must we teach The Next Generation? – The Business Times

Posted on November 21, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Fri, Nov 20, 2020 - 5:50 AM

HOW can we prepare the next generation to handle the mind-bending changes that are taking place every day and every hour? Indeed, when is the next generation?

Much faster than you think. Best to view it as "now". So much technology involved in the way we live and work from today onwards. Bill Gates's magic all-electric house will be looking old already, I expect.

There is a lesson in that. Be thoughtful for your techie advances. Today's new connection wizard will often be tomorrow's has-been. You cannot judge all of the stayers and goers correctly, but you can be prudent about your investment in every new toy.

My advice is to shun the processes that make what is already being done adequately well simply faster with what appear to be more bells and whistles.

There are a thousand ways to have a diary. I find most of them excessively interrupting and admonishing. I prefer a simple word document to which I can add whatever I want whenever I want. I've been using one for years and it works very well.

Stay updated with BT newsletters

Of course, it doesn't send irritating messages to all those involved with me to remind them to jump to my commands. I think they quite like that. But each to his or her own.

Back to the basics

We obviously don't need to drill the next generation in the techie things they are already enthusiastically learning. It will be second nature to them to adopt a technologically advanced lifestyle. Chances are, however, that they will need some more fundamental disciplines. I rate the first of these the understanding that fundamental is itself important.

Certain basic rules of life get lost in the rush to adopt the next gizmo or philosophy that comes along. As an example of this I quote digitisation, which Wikipedia defines as "the process of converting information into a digital format, in which the information is organised into bits. The result is the representation of an object, image, sound, document or signal by generating a series of numbers that describe a discrete set of points or samples."

The use to which digitisation is put is another helpful way of looking at it. Digitisation is how we turn everything into numbers. Okay, but why do we want to do that? So that it is much easier to handle than words. What do we do once we have turned the imprecise words, senses, feelings into numbers? We then produce a process for handling them. And that process is fast and final, by which I mean definitive.

Absolutely fine for the hard data of life - how many bottles on the wall. But try to apply that numeracy to love, to pain, to a sunset, to beautiful music, to an unspoken relationship between two people. Of course, it can be done, we do it all the time. "Measure your degree of satisfaction with our service - one star or five stars or something in between."

I may have loved the person who dealt with me, hated the answer I got and longed for a wider range of prices from which to choose. The weary five stars don't give me much scope, so we resort to words - but only for those willing to take the trouble. Now we have biased any feedback in favour of the literate.

Measuring the unmeasurable

The quality of life is not easily digitised so we must be careful that we don't ruin top class music, for example, by digitising it, at least until we can do so with the fineness of the human ear and the feelings of the human heart.

How would you measure the characteristics of a potentially top leader? A lot of hard facts go into doing so. But so does a lot of judgment. Maybe one day we will be able to do it with a measure of success. For now, don't be fooled by the very arbitrary attributes we can specify. Teaching people to "read" others is one of the most difficult coaching jobs we are called on to do.

Understanding personality

I have spent some time on digitisation because measurement is one of the great achievements of the human species. But to allow it to overtake our sensitivities would be a major mistake. I have examples of where this has been done in our own business.

Measurement of personality needs to be carefully handled if it is not to have the opposite effect for which doing it is intended. When it is achieved exclusively by numbers it has the effect of putting people into strict, and very limiting, definitions.

This is not what we want personality measurement for. Our objective is not to "imprison" people but to "free" them. You don't do that by putting them into a box.

There are other fundamentals of life that are equally important and difficult to measure. Personal discipline is a good example. We can measure exercise, diet, sleep and time devoted to several useful life-supporting-and-lengthening activities.

It is much more difficult to measure a well-balanced person - and yet, that is the sort of person we want determining the basic rules of how we live our lives.

And when it comes to sustainability, in the interests of revitalising the planet, our measurements will likely suggest short-term solutions to our problems rather than long-term solutions, which are generally the only way to undo the damage we have done.

Sustainability - the long-term solution

Sustainability becomes particularly difficult in times of economic disaster like the current pandemic. Desperate to get the planet's economy back on line we will inevitably be searching for quick fixes.

This will apply especially to SMEs who don't have the cash reserves to sustain them through prolonged absence of business.

It is vital therefore that their mentors and coaches - probably the parents and family - teach them a company's responsibility towards the planet and their fellow human beings. Longevity of a business today means adaptability to the changing scene.

It also means sensitivity to the market and to all the changes taking place in an overcrowded and vulnerable living space. The next generation is already with us. It needs to be.

Here is the original post:
What must we teach The Next Generation? - The Business Times

How curing loneliness can increase longevity and health J. – The Jewish News of Northern California

Posted on October 16, 2020 by Prof Baldwin

Zara Jaffe, president of the Senior Friendship Club of Peninsula Temple Beth El (which meets at the Peninsula JCC), does not mince words: Loneliness is lethal. Zara should know. She is 95 years old, and boasts that two of the 20 to 25 members of her group are centenarians. She is proud that her friendship club fights loneliness head-on.

Dr. Vivek Murthy, former U.S. surgeon general in the Obama administration, discusses the impact of loneliness on mental and physical health in his book Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection in a Sometimes Lonely World. Those who battle loneliness are affected mentally and physically, resulting in increased risk of depression, anxiety, addiction, self-harm, weakened immune system, diabetes, dementia, heart disease, sleep disturbance and premature death. He explains that the reduction of lifespan due to loneliness is similar to smoking 15 cigarettes per day.

Loneliness is not about being alone. Its an internal feeling of isolation, the sense that if you disappeared tomorrow, no one would notice. In 2018, Cigna surveyed over 20,000 adults and found that 46 percent of respondents felt lonely or left out. Contrary to what we might predict about loneliness affecting mainly an older population, it was young adults in Generation Z (ages 18 to 23) who were the loneliest, followed by millennials (ages 24 to 39). After the pandemic hit, a survey by the company SocialPro revealed that 31 percent of Americans feel lonelier because of the coronavirus situation.

Being around people does not mean one cannot feel lonely. As a freshman in college I lived in a 1,000-person dormitory, played violin in my college symphony and went to classes with hundreds of others. I dared not admit to myself that I was lonely, probably because of the stigma associated with it. The following year I joined a Jewish fraternity, and I closely observed others to learn how to be more social. As a result, my feeling of loneliness decreased.

Dr. Carla Perissinotto, a geriatrician at UCSF, remarks that even before the pandemic, loneliness has been a serious public health problem. In her research, those who are more likely to be lonely include women, those of lower socioeconomic status, and minority populations. In contrast to the Cigna poll, she has found that there is a greater risk of loneliness with aging due to a combination of life transitions, such as retirement or losing a spouse, and having hearing and visual impairments.

If this pandemic teaches us anything it is that, in addition to our physical health, social health matters, too. However, once this pandemic ends (and I am optimistic it will), we may not immediately bounce back from our isolation. New York Times journalist Kate Murphy recently wrote about this, asserting that deprivation has sent our brains into survival mode and that we have become hypervigilant and oversensitive: People start to withdraw, rationalizing they are too tired, didnt like the person much to begin with, or theres something theyd rather watch on Netflix. She warns, As we all gradually re-emerge from our confinement and widen our social circles, dont expect anyone or anything to be the same.

So what can we do to improve our social health? Dr. Murthy advises service as a powerful antidote to loneliness. Call a friend, do small acts of kindness or volunteer. How often do you hear volunteers state, I get more out of this than I give?

Post-pandemic you might pursue connections and service through your synagogue, your local Jewish community center, Bay Area Jewish Healing Center, or Jewish Family and Childrens Services, or by volunteering with your favorite symphony, art museum, library, or community theater. We should do the things that we find most meaningful. As a result, we will become less isolated and more resilient against loneliness.

At the end of my phone call with Zara Jaffe, she demonstrated what she preached. She invited me to join her Senior Friendship Club. This is what the club is about creating friendships and community, celebrating birthdays and holidays, and simply being together. Whether in person or on Zoom, the Friendship Club has been meeting weekly for 40 years, and there is no excuse even a pandemic to stop them now. Loneliness is too big a threat.

Read the original:
How curing loneliness can increase longevity and health J. - The Jewish News of Northern California

Select Page ::