Tag: Health

Categories
GeekWire

Contest offers $101M for ways to boost healthy lifespan

Illustration: Graphic showing health stats for digital humans
The XPRIZE Healthspan competition focuses on reversing the effects of aging. (Illustration Courtesy of XPRIZE via YouTube)

Some of the biggest names in longevity research — and at least one Seattle biotech startup — say they’ll enter a $101 million, seven-year competition to turn back the clock on the effects of aging by at least 10 years.

XPRIZE Healthspan was unveiled today at a conference in Riyadh, Saudi Arabia. It’s the richest incentive-based technology competition ever created by the XPRIZE foundation, beating out a $100 million XPRIZE Carbon Removal contest that’s being funded by Elon Musk, the world’s richest (and most controversial) billionaire.

The top prize in the Healthspan contest will go to the team that does the best job of creating a therapy that can be administered in a year or less, leading to the restoration of at least 10 years’ worth of muscular function, cognition and immune function in people aged 65 to 80.

Peter Diamandis, the founder and executive chairman of XPRIZE, said the concept started out as a longevity prize, but the program’s planners “realized that the idea of waiting 20 years to see if someone won the prize was probably impractical.”

“We shifted from longevity to really looking at age reversal first, and then functional restoration second,” Diamandis explained. “You see, it doesn’t really matter what your epigenetic age is. Do you actually feel younger? Do you have the muscle, immune and cognition that you had 10 or 20 years ago? Because at the end of the game, that’s what really matters.”

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

Allen Frontiers Group awards $10M for neuroimmunology

Immune cells in spinal cord region
Immune cells (yellow and purple) fill a sinus (teal) in the outer layer of the meninges, the tissue that surrounds the brain and spinal cord. (Credit: Justin Rustenhoven / Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis)

The Paul G. Allen Frontiers Group, a division of the Seattle-based Allen Institute, is launching a research center in New York to focus on interactions between the nervous system and the immune system.

The Allen Discovery Center for Neuroimmune Interactions, headquartered at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai, will receive $10 million over the course of four years from the Paul G. Allen Family Foundation, with a total potential for $20 million over eight years.

The award is the result of an open call for research proposals exploring fundamental questions at the intersection of neuroscience and immunology. It’s the latest open-science initiative celebrating the legacy of Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen, who died five years ago at the age of 65 from complications of non-Hodgkin’s lymphoma.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

Brain-cell atlases point to paths for future research

Brain graphic with magnifying glass
Researchers analyzed the cellular and genetic makeup of the brain. (BRAIN Initiative / HiClipArt Graphic)

In a tour de force for neuroscience, teams of researchers have published a voluminous set of brain-cell atlases for humans and other primates.

The atlases are detailed in 21 research papers appearing in Science, Science Advances and Science Translational Medicine — and could point scientists toward new strategies for addressing mental conditions ranging from Alzheimer’s disease and schizophrenia to epilepsy and ADHD.

“We need to understand the specifics of the human brain if we hope to understand human diseases,” Ed Lein, a senior investigator at Seattle’s Allen Institute, said in comments provided via video.

“Most of disease research tries to create a replicate or a model of a human disease in a species that doesn’t get that disease,” Lein explained. “But if we want to understand why we get it, and what the consequences are, and how one should treat it, we need to have a deep understanding of the human brain itself.”

The studies in the package released today are part of the National Institutes of Health’s BRAIN Initiative Cell Census Network, or BICCN, a program that was launched in 2017. The Allen Institute for Brain Science has played a major role in sharing data produced by the program.

One study analyzed more than a million cells taken from 42 regions of the brain. Another study drew high-quality samples from more than 100 brain regions. Yet another study focused on samples from prenatal brain tissue. The collective efforts of the research teams characterized more than 3,000 human brain cell types.

The researchers didn’t just examine the brain cells themselves. They also ran them through DNA analysis to learn which genes appeared to be linked to the cells’ functions and dysfunctions.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

Allen Institute hits 20 years on the open science frontier

Allen Institute HQ
The Allen Institute’s HQ is in Seattle’s South Lake Union neighborhood. (GeekWire Photo / Kurt Schlosser)

Twenty years after Microsoft co-founder Paul Allen created the bioscience research center that bears his name, Seattle’s Allen Institute is still pushing out into new frontiers.

But this weekend, the nonprofit institute — and its hometown — are taking a little time to celebrate.

All this week, the Allen Institute has been highlighting Open Science Week, which touches upon one of the core values that Allen had in mind when he launched the institute with a $100 million donation on Sept. 16, 2003. And Seattle Mayor Bruce Harrell is giving the festivities an extra boost by issuing a proclamation designating Sept. 16 as “Open Science Day” in the Emerald City.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
Cosmic Tech

IBM marks medical milestone for quantum computers

An overhead view shows IBM's Quantum System One at Cleveland Clinic. (Photo by Ryan Lavine for IBM)
An overhead view shows IBM's Quantum System One at Cleveland Clinic. (Photo by Ryan Lavine for IBM)

IBM and Cleveland Clinic today unveiled the first quantum computer dedicated solely to research in health care and life sciences — a sleek cube of glass and metal that’s likely to generate sci-fi movie concepts for years to come.

Researchers hope IBM Quantum System One will eventually generate new biomedical discoveries as well.

“This includes quantum machine learning to design more efficient immunotherapies and designing quantum-accelerated models to predict drug combinations,” Jeanette Garcia, senior research manager of quantum computational science at IBM, said in an emailed statement.

The potential applications extend beyond medical research.

Continue reading “IBM marks medical milestone for quantum computers”
Categories
GeekWire

Synthetic peptide molecules open the way for new drugs

Peptides slipping through cell membrane
An illustration shows how peptide molecules can slip through a cell membrane. (Image by Ian C. Haydon / UW IPD)

Researchers at the University of Washington have discovered how to create peptide molecules that can slip through membranes to enter cells — and they’ve also created a company to take advantage of the discovery for drug development.

The findings, which were published today in the journal Cell, could eventually lead to new types of oral medications for health disorders ranging from COVID-19 to cancer.

“This new ability to design membrane-permeable peptides with high structural accuracy opens the door to a new class of medicines that combine the advantages of traditional small-molecule drugs and larger protein therapeutics,” senior study author David Baker, a biochemist at the University of Washington School of Medicine, said in a news release.

Small-molecule drugs — for example, aspirin — are small enough to slip through cell membranes to do their work. Protein therapeutics — for example, monoclonal antibodies — can target more complex ailments, but the protein molecules are typically too big to wedge their way through lipid-based cell walls.

Peptide drugs are made from the same building blocks as protein, and offer many of the advantages of protein-based drugs. They can bind protein targets in the body more precisely than small-molecule drugs, promising fewer side effects.

“We know that peptides can be excellent medicines, but a big problem is that they don’t get into cells,” said study lead author Gaurav Bhardwaj, an assistant professor of medicinal chemistry at the UW School of Pharmacy. “There are a lot of great drug targets inside our cells, and if we can get in there, that space opens up.”

The newly reported experiments used a couple of molecular design techniques to create types of peptide molecules that can get into cells more easily.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

‘Kidney on a chip’ gets another ride to space

SpaceX Falcon 9 launch
SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket lifts off, carrying supplies and science experiments into space. (SpaceX via YouTube)

SpaceX launched a Dragon cargo capsule to the International Space Station today with more than 7,300 pounds of supplies and science, including an experiment from the University of Washington that takes advantage of zero gravity to study how our kidneys work.

The resupply mission began at 1:29 p.m. ET (10:29 a.m. PT) with liftoff for SpaceX’s Falcon 9 rocket from NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida. Minutes after launch, the Falcon’s first-stage booster flew itself back to an at-sea touchdown in the Atlantic Ocean, while the Dragon continued its rise to orbit.

Rendezvous with the space station took place on June 5.

SpaceX’s 22nd cargo resupply mission is carrying a wide range of science experiments. One will use glow-in-the dark bobtail squid to study the impact of spaceflight on interactions between microbes and their hosts. Another will study how tardigrades are able to weather the rigors of space. And then there’s UW’s “kidney on a chip.”

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

Human genome sequencing rises to the next level

Human genome diversity
New reference genomes were based on an analysis of 32 samples from diverse populations. (UW Graphic / David Porubsky)

Twenty years after the first human genome sequence was published, an international research team has kicked the sequencing game to the next level with a set of 64 reference genomes that reflect much higher resolution and more genetic diversity.

Since the Human Genome Project completed the first draft of its reference genome in 2001, decoding the human genetic code has been transformed from a multibillion-dollar endeavor into a relatively inexpensive commercial service. However, commercial whole-genome sequencing, or WGS, often misses out on crucial variations that can make all the difference when it comes to an individual’s health.

“As a metric, 75% of structural variants that are present in that person’s genome are missed by WGS, but are captured by our long-read phased genome assembly,” University of Washington genome scientist Evan Eichler told me in an email. “Such variants are about three times more likely to cause disease.”

Eichler, who was a member of the original Human Genome Project, is one of the senior authors of a study laying out the new set of reference genomes, published today by the journal Science.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

Bad weather slows COVID-19 vaccination drive

A double vaccination for COVID-19 deserves double stickers. (Photo by Alan Boyle)

They say that the second vaccine shot for COVID-19 is rougher than the first one — and we’re not just talking about the side effects.

As a newly double-vaccinated member of the 65-and-older set, I can vouch for the claim that the side effects can be felt more acutely the second time around: Back in late January, my first Pfizer-BioNTech shot gave me nothing more than a sore arm. This week’s second shot gave me body aches the day after, as if I had been shoveling snow for hours. (Which, come to think of it, I was … a couple of days earlier.)

But that’s nothing compared to the headaches I would have given myself if I had tried to schedule a vaccination this week. I would have been hard-pressed to find an appointment, even with the benefit of websites like WA COVID Vaccine Finder, the Washington State Department of Health’s Vaccine Locator and the Washington State COVID-19 Vaccination Sign Up System.

Jeffrey Duchin, health officer for Public Health – Seattle & King County, acknowledged that it’s been a tough slog for some folks. “I wish we had more vaccine, and had vaccine for everyone,” he said today during a news briefing.

Get the full story on GeekWire
Categories
GeekWire

One man’s quest for the COVID-19 vaccine

COVID-19 vaccination
Patient care technician Myo Thant gets the COVID-19 vaccine at UW Medical Center – Montlake. (UW Photo)

Trying to get an appointment for a COVID-19 vaccine on the day that eligibility was expanded to new age groups in Washington state would be a familiar experience to anyone who’s tried to get a hot movie ticket, a cheap airfare or season tickets to Kraken hockey games.

I’ve been through all of those trials, and my efforts to work through the online hiccups and fast-disappearing slots are likely to be replicated in the months ahead as efforts to quell the coronavirus pandemic continue to ramp up.

Bottom line? Sharpen your searching skills, don’t wait for an invitation, and pursue multiple options.

Your mileage may vary, of course. I was just one of thousands of regular folks aged 65 and older who joined the search for the vaccine this week.

Get the full story on GeekWire