StemCell Therapy

As a mystery illness started spreadingin China in late December, researchers at Inovio Pharmaceuticals were keeping aclose eye on what was happening, even before anyone knew the cause was acoronavirus.

The company, based in San Diego, is nostranger to the viruses. After MERS, which is caused by a different coronavirus, emergedin 2012, Inovio was one of the first to develop a still-experimental vaccinefor the disease. In the new outbreak, as soon as Chinese researchersposted the genetic makeup of the virus, dubbed SARS-CoV-2, the companysscientists sprang into action.

Wed all hoped that there would beenough overlap that our previously developed MERS vaccine would be helpful inthis case, says Kate Broderick, Inovios senior vice president for researchand development. Like MERS and SARS, the new virus is a coronavirus that usesRNA as its genetic material.

But in-depth analysis revealed that thetwo coronaviruses are too different for a vaccine against MERS, also known asMiddle East respiratory syndrome, to take down the new virus. So thecompanys researchers set about designing a new vaccine.

That design relies on a relatively newapproach to vaccine creation, one that the researchers used to develop the MERSvaccine. Traditional vaccines are composed of weakened or killed forms ofviruses or parts of viruses, including purified proteins. When injected into aperson, the immune system recognizes the virus as an invader and producesantibodies to stave off future invasions. But growing enough debilitated virusesor purifying enough proteins to make vaccine doses for millions of people can takemonths or even years.

So Inovio and other companies havedeveloped ways to make vaccines much more quickly. For their SARS-CoV-2 vaccine,Inovio scientists convert the viruss RNA into DNA and select pieces of thevirus that computer simulations have suggested will prod the immune system intomaking antibodies. Those selected bits of DNA are then inserted into bacteria,which produce large quantities of protein snippets to be used in the vaccine. Thisapproach drastically shortens the time it takes to make a vaccine. Atraditional vaccine takes two to three years to develop. For Inovios product,it took three hours to design and about a month to manufacture, Broderick says.

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Inovio started testing the vaccine inanimals at the beginning of February and hopes to begin safety tests in peopleby early summer.

Even so, Inovios vaccine is still atleast a year away from being widely used. As the number of cases of the novelcoronavirus disease, or COVID-19, continues to rise, several other groups are alsoracing to develop vaccines and therapeutics that take nontraditional approachesto fight the virus.

Researchers at the U.S. National Institute of Allergy and Infectious Diseases, working with the Cambridge, Mass.based biotechnology company Moderna, are developing a messenger RNA, or mRNA, vaccine that will stimulate the body to produce vaccine components. Messenger RNAs are copies of protein-making instructions encoded in the DNA of genes. Cellular machinery reads the mRNA instructions to build proteins.

Scientists have selected portions of SARS-CoV-2that may spark a vigorous immune reaction against the virus, says KizzmekiaCorbett, a viral immunologist at the NIAIDs Vaccine Research Center inBethesda, Md. The mRNA vaccine will tell human cells which viral proteins tomake, she says.

Were literally giving the cells agenetic code of our vaccine design, delivered as RNA that will tell cells, Hey,make this protein, says Corbett, who is the scientific lead on the centerseffort to develop the vaccine.

Those proteins Corbett wouldnt saywhich viral proteins will then prod the immune system to make antibodies toprotect against the virus. Since the body does all of the protein-productionwork with the mRNA vaccine, researchers can skip the time-consuming and costlystep of manufacturing vaccine proteins.

This strategy could be used to designvaccines against future coronaviruses or other emerging infectious diseases,Corbett says. What we feel we have developed is a universal strategy, beingable to quickly deploy a vaccine if another novel coronavirus should pop up,Corbett says. Other mRNA vaccines against MERS and other diseases are still inthe testing phase.

Corbett would not specify a timeline for her teams mRNA vaccine, but Anthony Fauci, director of NIAID, has said the mRNA vaccine could be ready for initial safety testing within months. But the researchers have yet to find a pharmaceutical company to manufacture the large quantities of mRNA doses that would be necessary for use by the general public, Fauci said February 11 in Washington, D. C., at a discussion of the new coronavirus at the Aspen Institute, a nonprofit organization.

Inovios experience with its MERSvaccine is one example of just how long it typically takes to make sure avaccine is safe and effective. Inovio conducted initial safety testing of theMERS vaccine in a PhaseI clinical trial from February 2016 to May2017. There were noserious side effects among the 75 healthy adult participants, theresearchers reported in 2019 in theLancet Infectious Diseases. The vaccine moved into a PhaseII trial in August 2018 to test safety in a larger number of people anddetermine whether the vaccine spurs the immune system to make protectiveantibodies. That trial is expected to wrap up later this year.

Even if everything goes swimmingly, theMERS vaccine must still pass Phase III safety and effectiveness testing beforebeing considered for approval by the U.S. Food and Drug Administration. Itsthe same gauntlet that all new vaccines and drugs must run.

Inovio and the NIAID/Moderna partnershiphave both received funding from the Oslo-based Coalition for EpidemicPreparedness Innovations. CEPI is also funding yet another type of novelvaccine development. CEPI and researchers from the University of Queensland inBrisbane, Australia, have found a way to clamp down on the coronavirus to keepit from infecting cells.

The Queensland group had already beenworking with CEPI on molecular clamp vaccines against other viruses for about ayear, says Trent Munro, a biotechnologist involved in the work. A molecularclamp is a protein stitched onto another protein, in this case the coronavirusspike protein. With SARS and MERS, spike proteins work a bit like malleablelock picks, changing shape to interact with a protein on the surface of humancells and gain entry into them. The 3-D structure of SARS-CoV-2s spike protein,reported online February 19 in Science,confirms the protein is also a shape-shifter.But the new coronavirus spike protein clings10 to 20 times as tightly to its target on human cells as the SARS versiondoes. Holding on tighter may help the new virus spread more easily from personto person, researchers say.

The molecular clamp the Queensland teamdevised keeps the spike protein from shape-shifting, locking it in a form that triggersantibody production and thus making it a potent vaccine, Munro says.

The team uses mammalian cells to producethe vaccine, and a specialized machine determines which cells are churning outclamped protein. With the machine, researchers can do things that would havetaken weeks before in just days, Munro says. Laboratory testing may start within weeks.Safety testing in people may begin in months, but it will take much longer for thevaccine to be ready for general use. When the Queensland group began workingwith CEPI to develop a molecular clamp vaccine, we thought it would take threeyears as a test case, Munro says. But the emergence of the new coronavirusforced the researchers to accelerate their efforts. Still, Munro estimates itwill be at least a year before the vaccine will be ready.

I know the timeline feels long, he says.I imagine it feels just unacceptable to those folks who are in areas ofserious outbreak, but at least we have a way of . . . pushing things forward asfast as possible.

CEPI has calls out for additionalvaccine development proposals. On January 31, the organization announced thatit would work with CureVac AG, based in Tbingen, Germany, to develop anothermRNA vaccine targeting the novel coronavirus.

Vaccines help keep people from gettinginfected with disease-causing organisms but may not help once someone isalready infected. But a shortcut to getting protection a shot of theprotective antibodies themselves may both prevent infections and treat them.

People who have recovered from infectionsretain antibodies in their blood against the virus or bacteria that caused theillness, often for years or decades. Such antibodies may give some protectionwhen the person encounters a similar infectious organism later on. But,crucially, these antibodies can also protect others. And quickly.

It can take weeks to months for vaccinesto prod the immune system into making protective levels of antibodies, says ChristosKyratsous, vice president of infectious disease research and viral vector technologiesat Regeneron Pharmaceuticals. Ebola vaccines, for example, take at least a weekto stimulate antibody production, but shots of antibodies offer immediateprotection, Kyratsous says. (Regeneron Pharmaceuticals,headquartered in Tarrytown, N.Y., is a major financial supporter of Society forScience & the Public, which publishesScience News.)

In studies conducted by other researchers,blood serum containing protective antibodies taken from people who hadrecovered from Ebola helped infected people recover from the disease. Doctorsand scientists in China have already begun using blood plasma from people whohave recovered from COVID-19 to treat people who are ill with the disease.

But giving people antibodies fromsurvivors doesnt always work. Regeneron and other companies have developedantibodies that can more reliably offer protection. Thecompany is already testing antibodies against Ebola and the MERS virus. Clinicalstudies and laboratory work with the companys MERS antibodies suggests thatthey can help protect against infection and treat established infections, Kyratsoussays.

The company isnow developing antibodies against the new coronavirus. We have learneda lot of things from the MERS project that we can now apply to the novelcoronavirus project, Kyratsous says.

For instance, the team has learned moreabout which viral proteins and parts of proteins make the best antibodytargets. Proteins on the surface of the virus that are needed for infection,such as the spike protein, are generally the best bets, he says.

Regeneron researchers have madeSARS-CoV-2 proteins in the lab and injected them into mice that have humanversions of antibody-producing genes. These humanized mice make fully humanantibodies, Kyratsous says, and could provide a ready supply. As soon as thoseantibodies are available, the company hopes to test their efficacy against thevirus in the lab. If that works, safety testing in animals and people may startsoon.

The team also hopes to work with peoplewho have recovered from COVID-19 to get antibody-producing cells from theirblood. But, Kyratsous says, harvesting antibodies from people isnt somethingthat can be easily scaled up.

Still, despite the rapid reaction ofthese and other scientists, vaccine and antibody protection for most people isstill far off.

In an acute situation, youre not justgoing to pull a vaccine out of your pocket, NIAID director Fauci said at theAspen Institute discussion. If the current outbreak proves to be really bad, theFDA may be able to authorize emergency use of promising vaccines that haventcompleted full safety and efficacy testing. But researchers wont know for atleast six months whether any of the vaccines in development help against SARS-CoV-2.

Other strategies to fight the new virus, including repurposing existing drugs used against other diseases, including HIV and hepatitis C, are also under way. But theres no clear winner yet among those candidates. For now, people exposed to the virus must rely on their own immune systems and supportive care from doctors and nurses to fight off the disease.

The reliable science journalism you count on is expensive. It takes professional reporters, editors, fact checkers, designers and digital producers to make sureScience Newsreflects the depth and breadth of science.We need your financial support to make it happen every contribution makes a difference.

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To tackle the new coronavirus, scientists are accelerating the vaccine process - Science News

All healthy families are alike, a DNA-conscious Leo Tolstoy might have written, and thereby entirely distinct from all thoseeach miserable in its own waywhose bodies or minds are threatened by their very bloodlines. But the Russian author would have been just as mistaken as he was in the famous opening lines of Anna Karenina, where he divided happy families from unhappy ones. As two remarkable books show, there is as much to link as there is to separate the cancer-stricken Gross family in Ami McKays recent memoir Daughter of Family G and the Galvins with their six schizophrenic sons, the subjects of Robert Kolkers forthcoming Hidden Valley Road. Over the course of decades, including times when medical orthodoxy was often intensely hostile to the idea of heritability in the diseases that devastated their families, the two American clans became significant factors in advancing genetic research into cancer and schizophrenia.

Together, their family stories touch on most of the burning issues in contemporary medicine, including the role of genes and their complex interplay with environmental factors in our fates, and the related issues of privacy, family ties and agencyespecially when it comes to the question of having children. There is something more, too, running through both books: the terror of choice. How many of us really want to know our likely futures or, even more forebodingly, those of our offspring?

READ:I am mine: This is what Alzheimers is like at 41

For Indiana-born McKay, now a well-known Nova Scotia-based novelist (The Birth House, The Virgin Cure), learning whether she carried the genetic mutation that had shortened her ancestors lives for more than a century was not an easy call. In 2000, after researchers finally detected the specific mutation that applied to our family through my moms DNA, I was one of the earliest to be asked if I wanted to be tested, she says in an interview. McKay, then 32, was slow to take up the offer because to know would be to have this thing that sits in the back of your head and doesnt go awayyou could never go back to being the way you were. Two factors finally sent her to the hospital lab in mid-September 2001, when she was acutely aware of headlines proclaiming Americas new normal in the aftermath of 9/11. One reason to accept her own new normal was my mom saying, Look, you know weve gone down this path for generationsthink about the benefits when doctors can no longer tell you that maybe you only have the flu or that you dont really need a colonoscopy at such a young age. That, and the fact McKay already had two sons. The mutation was known to never reappear once the genetic line of transmission was broken. If McKay was clear, so were her boys. If she was not, I had to know for their sake as well as mine.

What McKay went to find out was whether she had any of the five genetic mutations associated with Lynch syndrome, specifically the one on the MSH2 gene that had ravaged her most direct ancestors and closest relatives. The mutation predisposes a person, early in life, to at least 13 kinds of cancer, from colon to ovarian to brainit brings an 85 per cent chance of colon cancer with an average onset at the age of 49. McKays uncle was diagnosed with cancer at 26, her grandmother at 50, her mother at 58. The syndrome is named after physician Henry Lynch, known as the father of cancer genetics, who picked up the barely flickering torch of cancer syndrome studies from a pioneering pathologist of the early 20th century, Aldred Warthin. But Warthins concept and supporting data came from his seamstress, Pauline GrossMcKays great-great auntwho mentioned to him in 1895 that she expected to die young, like so many in her family. (She did, at 46, from cancer.) Thanks to the detailed family chart Pauline Gross provided to Warthin, the list of known Gross victims dates back to 1856. We are, McKay writes, the longest and most detailed cancer genealogy in the world. For many years, that genealogy was possibly the greatest single factor in keeping alive the notion of heredity in cancer research.

The health records of the Galvins do not stretch as far back as the Grosses, but their family genetics played an even more pivotal research role in an era when mental health professionals were leaning hard into an understanding of schizophrenia as a psychological and not physical disease. The Galvin family, which eventually settled in Colorado Springs, Colo., began expanding in 1945, when U.S. Air Force officer Don Sr. and Mimi had their first child, Don Jr. It didnt stop until 1965, a year after the baby boom itself: 10 boys, followed by two girls.

READ:Why understanding the biology of our minds could cure autism and schizophrenia

Don Jr., a good athlete and average student, who was no trouble at all to his parentsthey ignored the severe beatings he imposed on his younger brothers while growing uphad his first psychotic break before his last sibling was born. His illness became worse at college, and he was soon back in the parental home, separated from his wife. Meanwhile, brother No. 2, James, who also married very young, began hearing voices and attacking his wife. After he had seemingly recovered, the youngest children were often sent to stay with him when Don Jr. made their lives too chaotic or frightening. James began to sexually abuse his sisters, who, as they later revealed, had been somewhat deadened to abuse because brother No. 4, Brian, had already molested them. In 1973, Brian, 22, prescribed antipsychotic drugs, killed his girlfriend and himself. Two years later, 15-year-old Peter, brother No. 10, had a psychotic break shortly after watching his father have a stroke before his eyes; in 1976, it was the turn of Matt, 17, brother No. 9. By late 1978, there were three Galvin boys in different wards of the same state mental hospital.

The last son to be diagnosed, Joe, brother No. 7, had troubled Peters doctors years before while visiting his hospitalized siblings, but he seemedif only relativelyfine to his family. But, after a series of personal losses, he too began being overwhelmed by hallucinations in 1982 at age 25. Joe later told his mother that a family friend, a Catholic priest to whom Don Sr. and Mimi had often entrusted their boys, had molested them, while Mimi revealed to her adult daughtersafter they had confronted her about sending them to Jamesthat she too had been sexually abused as a child, by her stepfather.

In short, the Galvin household offered a horrifically rich mine of potential evidence for any theory of schizophrenias causes. And it did so at a time when psychiatrys nature vs. nurture battle raged on, with many experts still holding to the schizophrenogenic mother explanation. That thesis, articulated by the influential German-American psychiatrist Frieda Fromm-Reichmann in 1948, tormented mid-century parents by blaming the disease on severe early warp and rejection in infancy and childhood, as a rule, mainly from a schizophrenogenic mother. It didnt help that Mimia perfectionist averse to praising her children and secretly troubled by her own traumafit the (false) mother-as-bogeyman profile to a T. But if Mimi herself and the vast set of triggers that might have influenced her sons individual psychoses interested some psychiatrists, the basic Galvin arithmeticsix boys in one familycaptured the attention of researchers seeking a physical cause. By the mid-1980s they had collected blood samples from the Galvins, which soonunbeknownst to the familybecame part of numerous studies.

It was 2016 before the right test offered a breakthrough. Researchers worked with the DNA of only nine families, all of which had to have at least three individuals with schizophrenia and three without. The goal was to find a common genetic mutation, even if it was common only to a particular family, because that abnormality could indicate an overall biochemical pathway to schizophrenia. The study found it in all seven Galvin brothers who had provided blood (two had refused), in the SHANK2 gene, which encodes the proteins that help brain synapses transmit signals. Its not a smoking-gun cause-of-schizophrenia gene, but it does offer the potential pathway the researchers sought, even as it raises this question: why, when its likely all the siblings have that mutation, did some develop serious mental illness and others did not?

READ:What do you do when your wife starts talking to the devil?

In November 2016, after researchers had told the Galvin daughterstheir main points of contact with the familyabout what they had been doing with the family blood for decades and the SHANK2 findings, Margaret Galvin organized what she called a blood-drawing party for non-afflicted family members. These would provide control samples for further research. Shouldve been on Halloween, she joked to author Kolker. Some invitees came, those ready to acknowledge their genetic heritage, and some did not.

The family gatherings, the absent relatives and the fortifying humour are all ties that link the Grosses and the Galvins. These are familiar notes to McKay, who describes her family reunions in terms of everyday organizing: I bring the potato salad, you bring the pecan pie, we talk about cancer. As for those who fear advance knowledge of the future, McKays empathy can be interspersed with anger if children are involved. Likewise, the Galvin daughters investigated the chances of passing their brothers health onto their own children before they became pregnant, and watched those kids like hawks for any indication that early intervention was needed.

McKay still feels the same about knowing the truth for the sake of her children even though her own news did not turn out well: she has the mutation, and so too do both her sons. What matters now, she says, is to draw the key lesson: Do things now, dont waitand dont let this thing define your life.

This article appears in print in the March 2020 issue of Macleans magazine with the headline, Betrayed by their genes. Subscribe to the monthly print magazine here.

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Families betrayed by their own genes - Maclean's

By Jonny Lupsha, News Writer

According to NPR, trained alert dogs for diabetic owners sell for up to tens of thousands of dollars, and business is booming. The diabetic alert dog industry is unstandardized and largely unregulated, and the science on a dogs ability to reliably sniff out blood sugar changes is, at best, inconclusive, the article said. Several [dog training companies] have faced lawsuits or complaints recently from consumers who bought diabetic alert dogs that they say dont work. In Texas, a group of more than a dozen dog buyers sued a trainer for fraud and won a judgment for $800,000.

The article also cited a 2017 study that found that only three of 14 diabetic alert dogs tested better than random chance at detecting a change in a humans blood sugar levels. While diabetes affects more than 30 million Americans, many diabetics would benefit from learning more about the basic fundamentals of the disease, its treatment, and the serious consequences of not taking care of their health.

There are three types of diabetes mellitus: insulin-dependent type 1 diabetes can develop at any age, though it used to be considered juvenile diabetes presenting in children; non-insulin-dependent, or adult-onset, type 2 diabetes is the most common and usually presents in adults; and gestational diabetes occurs during pregnancy, and may or may not go away after childbirth. Professor Roberta H. Anding, Director of Sports Nutrition and a clinical dietitian at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Childrens Hospital, said that 80 percent to 90 percent of diabetics suffer from type 2 diabetes. But what is type 2 diabetes?

In this case, the body makes insulin, but its not being effectively used by the body, Professor Anding said. This is diagnosed by having a fasting blood sugar of greater than 126 milliliters per deciliter, or an oral glucose tolerance test of greater than 200.

Studies of identical twins overwhelmingly show that type 2 diabetes is genetic. If one twin gets diabetes, the chance that the other twin gets diabetes is three out of four, Professor Anding said. We have now identified multiple different genes, or loci on genes, that will suggest that yes, there are some higher risk individuals. The Human Genome Project has identified over 17 genetic loci strongly associated with type 2 diabetes.

Despite genetics playing a major part in contracting type 2 diabetes, our environment also comes into play. One prevention study called the Diabetes Prevention Program did research into how effective diabetes prevention could be when properly applied, and the results were stunning.

They assigned people with blood sugars that were just below the level of pre-diabetes to one of three groups: placebo, standard care; metformin, which is a medication that is used to control diabetes; or lifestyle intervention, Professor Anding said. The lifestyle intervention included two and a half hours per week of physical activity and a healthier, low-fat, low-calorie diet.

Lifestyle intervention reduced the incidence of diabetes by 58 percent, where traditional pharmacology that is used for the same kind of circumstance reduced it by 31 percent.

Cutting calories is a good start, Professor Anding said, but controlling which fats you eat helps as well. She cited a high intake of omega-3 and omega-6 polyunsaturated fats as leading to lower risks of diabetes, as do diets with a lot of whole grains and cereal fiber.

Following diabetes prevention steps through healthy living has plenty of scientific backing, unlike the trend in using diabetic alert dogs to detect low sugars in diabetics.

Professor Roberta H. Anding contributed to this article. Professor Anding is a registered dietitian and Director of Sports Nutrition and a clinical dietitian at Baylor College of Medicine and Texas Childrens Hospital. She received her bachelors degree in Dietetics and her masters degree in Nutrition from Louisiana State University.

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Lawsuits Mount as Alert Dogs for Diabetics Fail to Live Up to Expectations - The Great Courses Daily News

Scientists around the world are scrambling to develop a vaccine to stop the spread of the new coronavirus, but the best candidate might be an experimental one stored in a Houston freezer.

The vaccine, developed by researchers at Baylor College of Medicine and University of Texas Medical Branch at Galveston researchers, effectively protected mice against SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, the virus from the same family that spread in the early 2000s. The vaccine never progressed to human testing because manufacturing of it wasnt completed until 2016, long after SARS had burned out.

It generated zero interest from pharmaceutical companies, said Peter Hotez, a Baylor vaccine researcher and infectious disease specialist. Because the virus was no longer circulating, their response was essentially, thanks, but no thanks.

Hotez thinks the vaccine-in-storage can provide cross-protection against the new coronavirus, now officially named COVID-19, whose spread through China and, increasingly, to other countries has the world on edge. The virus, first detected in Wuhan, China, has now infected more than 75,000 people and killed more than 2,200, more than the 774 deaths from SARS. Although the bulk of the cases and deaths have occurred in China, COVID-19 now has been confirmed in 28 countries, the U.S. among them.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Coronavirus fears weigh on Houston economy as oil prices fall, businesses lose customers

The 34 cases in the United States 21 repatriated individuals and 13 travelers who fell ill after returning include three in Texas, an American citizen who was part of a group evacuated from China on a State Department-chartered flight, and two citizens on the Diamond Princess cruise ship. All three were taken to Lackland Air Force Base in San Antonio.

The Baylor-UTMB vaccine looks promising for COVID-19 because the virus so resembles SARS Hotez calls it SARS-2 which circulated between November 2002 and July 2003, mostly in mainland China and Hong Kong but also in Toronto, whose economy was so badly wrought by the outbreak that it needed a boost from a benefit concert featuring the Rolling Stones, Justin Timberlake and others to help shake the effects.

COVID-19 shares 82 percent of its genes with SARS and infects people through the same cell receptor, one of the spike-like proteins that stud the surface of coronaviruses and gives the family their name. The viruses originally jump from animals to people.

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The two viruses, which have mostly resulted in deaths in the elderly and people with serious underlying conditions, both can cause a severe form of viral pneumonia characterized by fever, cough and breathing difficulties. The early thinking is that COVID-19 is less lethal than SARS but more contagious.

There is no licensed treatment or vaccine for either, just supportive care focused on the symptoms.

The hope that the Baylor-UTMB vaccine should provide at least some, if not full, protection has had Hotez working the telephone the last few weeks, pleading with pharmaceutical companies and federal scientific agencies to pony up the funding needed to move the vaccine into clinical testing. The vaccine is still a candidate for such testing because the team has tested its continuing usefulness every six months, when it removes a sample from the freezer.

It may require some tweaking, but its stable, said Dr. James LeDuc, director of the Galveston National Laboratory on the UTMB Galveston campus. Every virus is different, features some adaptations.

The laboratory, a high-security biocontainment facility for the study of exotic disease, recently received the live COVID-19, which it will use to test the vaccine in mice, to see whether the SARS vaccine protects against it too. The labs researchers created mice engineered to replicate the human disease.

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Funding for clinical trials remains the big hurdle. Even with the new coronavirus circulating, Hotez has found few nibbles from pharmaceutical companies beyond the request to keep them informed and the suggestion their interest would pick up if the new coronavirus becomes a seasonal infection, like the flu.

Instead, Hotez is pinning his hopes for clinical trial funding on two grant proposals one to the British government; and another to the Coalition for Epidemic Preparedness Innovations, an Oslo-based coalition of charities (the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation is a sponsor) and governments that aims to derail epidemics by speeding up the development of vaccines.

The Baylor-UTMB venture is just one of the many ongoing efforts to halt the coronavirus epidemic. About 300 scientists dialed in remotely to a World Health Organization meeting last week to fast-track tests, drugs and vaccines to help slow the outbreak. UT-Austin scientists published a paper in Science on their creation of the first 3D atomic-scale map of the spike protein the part of the virus that attaches to and infects human cells that should provide a road map for better vaccine development.

At least eight initiatives to develop new vaccines have been announced, most of which use new technology, such as a type sometimes called genetic immunization, that is considered highly promising but has not yet led to licensure. One Houston firm, Greffex, said it has used genetic engineering to create a COVID-19 vaccine it will now take to animal testing.

Hotez said he thinks the Baylor-UTMB vaccine has an advantage because its already been successfully tested in animals and because its based on classic vaccine technology, the same technology used, for instance, in approved vaccines for Hepatitis B and the human papillomavirus. He said the less-than-perfect match should provide protection in the same way flu vaccines provide protection even though theyre not perfect matches.

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In addition to repurposing the SARS vaccine, the Baylor-UTMB team is working to develop a new vaccine targeting COVID-19. But Hotez acknowledged that work will take longer than the SARS vaccine. He said hes surprised Chinese officials havent reached out to him about testing the vaccine in China.

Baylors work is conducted through its Texas Childrens Hospital Center for Vaccine Development, whose mission involves fighting public health threats that affect people who live in poverty such as neglected tropical diseases and coronaviruses. It has made vaccines for neglected tropical diseases Chagas disease, schistosomiasis and hookworm, and the coronavirus MERS, or Middle East respiratory syndrome, the camel flu that originated in Saudi Arabia in 2012 and later was confirmed in South Korea. Unlike SARS, MERS does not resemble COVID-19.

On HoustonChronicle.com: Why Houston is uniquely situated to be better prepared for the coronavirus threat

But the question is, can any vaccine make it through clinical testing in time to make a difference in the fight against an emerging epidemic or pandemic?

LeDuc noted that there are no shortcuts to the testing required to prove vaccines are safe and effective in people, a process he acknowledges could take a year, during which time the disease may burn out.

Hotez said the only thing that might expedite testing is if the spread of the disease becomes dire, a sobering thought that some public health officials think is looking more and more likely as COVID-19 is diagnosed in more countries.

It is why Hotez laments the missed opportunities to develop and stockpile vaccines for SARS, MERS and even Zika, the mosquito-borne infection that emerged in 2014-2017 but then burned out.

Its like little kids soccer games where everyone just follows the ball, said Hotez. They all run to the ball when its one spot, then to the next spot where it goes and then the one after that. No one stays at the goal to play defense.

todd.ackerman@chron.com

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Is the vaccine to thwart the new coronavirus stored in a Houston freezer? - Houston Chronicle

Though common, these big phages would have been completely missed by traditional lab techniques. It used to be that scientists could only discover viruses by first growing themand they often filtered out anything above a certain size. In science, you tend to find what you look for. The huge phages dont fit the standard conception of what a virus should be, so no one went looking for them. But Banfield used a different method, which she pioneered in the 1990s: Her team took environmental samplesscoops of soil or drops of waterand simply analyzed all the DNA within to see what popped out. And once Banfield realized that the huge phages existed, it wasnt hard to find more.

Read: Beware the Medusavirus

Her team, including researchers Basem Al-Shayeb and Rohan Sachdeva, identified huge phages in French lakes, in Tibetan springs, and on the Japanese seafloor. They found the viruses in geysers in Utah, salt from Chiles Atacama Desert, stomach samples from Alaskan moose, a neonatal intensive-care unit in Pittsburgh, and spit samples from Californian women. All of these phages have at least 200,000 DNA letters in their genome, and the largest of them has 735,000.

The team included researchers from nine countries, and so named the new viruses using words for huge in their respective languages. Hence: Mahaphage (Sanskrit), Kaempephage (Danish), Kyodaiphage (Japanese), and Jabbarphage (Arabic), but also Whopperphage (American English).

These huge phages have other strange characteristics. With so much DNA, the viruses are probably physically bigger than typical phages, which means that they likely reproduce in unusual ways. When phages infect bacteria, they normally make hundreds of copies of themselves before exploding outwards. But Banfield says that an average bacterium doesnt have enough room to host hundreds of huge phages. The giant viruses can probably only make a few copies of themselves at a timea strategy more akin to that of humans or elephants, which only raise a few young at a time, than to the reproduction of rodents or most insects, which produce large numbers of offspring.

Giant phages also seem to exert more control over their bacterial hosts than a typical virus. All viruses co-opt their hosts resources to build more copies of themselves, but the huge phages seem to carry out a much more thorough and directed takeover, Banfield says. Their target is the ribosomea manufacturing plant found in all living cells, which reads the information encoded in genes and uses that to build proteins. The huge phages seem equipped to fully commandeer the ribosome so that it ignores the hosts genes, and instead devotes itself to building viral proteins.

This takeover involves an unorthodox use of CRISPR. Long before humans discovered CRISPR and used it to edit DNA, bacteria invented it as a way of defending themselves against viruses. The bacteria store genetic snippets of phages that have previously attacked them, and use these to send destructive scissorlike enzymes after new waves of assailants. But Banfields team found that some huge phages have their own versions of CRISPR, which they use in two ways. First, they direct their own scissors at bacterial genes, which partly explains why they can so thoroughly take over the ribosomes of their hosts. Second, they seem to redirect the bacterial scissors into attacking other phages. They actually boost their hosts immune system to take out the competition.

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A Huge Discovery in the World of Viruses - The Atlantic

Feb 21, 2020 03:56 PM EST

Parallel to the rapid spread of coronavirus from Wuhan China to 25 countries across the globe, spread of myths and even scientific studies with no peer reviews or 'preprints' on the novel virus has become viral and is contributing to fear and panic across the globe.

Even public health scientists have issued a statement condemning conspiracy theory claims on the origin of coronavirus. To combat confusions, World Health Organization stepped up and called for promotion the of scientific evidence and unity over misinformation and conjecture.

Preprints

Some scientific reports have linked coronavirus to AIDS, snakes, and even to pathogens from outer space. Reuters estimate that there are at least 153 studies ranging from genetic analyses, epidemiological papers, genetic analyses, and clinical reports from 675 researchers around the globe since the outbreak started. In contrast, during the SARS outbreak in 2003, such number of papers were published after more than a year from the outbreak.

The outbreak, according to Tom Sheldon, a science communications specialist at Britain's non-profit Science Media Centre led to the rise of "preprints" - or a practice in which a researcher immediately posts their findings online without external checks, scrutiny or validation. This, according to Sheldon leads to misinformation, fake-news leading to fear, panic, and confusion of the public.

Scientists Condemn Bogus Coronavirus Conspiracy Theory

Public health scientists yesterday issued a statement published in Lancelet condemning multiple social media posts and even a scientific paper speculating the possibility that COVID-19 has no natural origin, and that the virus was bioengineered in the laboratory.

The statement declared that based on studies, scientists from multiple countries overwhelmingly conclude that the 2019 new coronavirus originated from wildlife. "Conspiracy theories do nothing but create fear, rumors, and prejudice that jeopardize our global collaboration in the fight against this virus," the statement adds. It also issued support to Chinese public health workers and scientists who are in the front line of fighting the disease.

Earlier, multiple media posts also claimed that coronavirus has been patented and that a vaccine is already available was debunked by Factcheck.Org, clarifying that there is no available vaccine for the 2019 novel coronavirus, and there is no patent available yet.

It turned out that the patent being referred to is genetic sequence of the virus that causes SARS, or severe acute respiratory syndrome, a disease that spread to dozensof countries in 2003, and of avian infectious bronchitis virus, or IBV, which infects poultry, and was developed to prevent and control viral diseases of livestocks.

WHO Steps Up to Bust Myths

As fears and misconceptions rapidly spread online, World Health Organization (WHO) Director General called for promotion of scientific evidence and unity over misinformation and conjecture. Graphics featuring myths busted by the WHO were created for easy downloading and dissemination.

Important and life-saving advisory such as the pneumococcal vaccine and the Haemophilus influenza type B do not provide protection against the new virus, or that there is no evidence that companion pets such as cats or dogs can be infected by coronavirus are among the those highlighted in the WHO advisory.

2018 NatureWorldNews.com All rights reserved. Do not reproduce without permission.

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The Viral Spread of Coronavirus Research and Myths - Nature World News

Indiana University trustees have approved the appointment of 15 faculty members as distinguished professors, IU's highest academic title for its most outstanding and renowned scholars and researchers. This is the largest number of new distinguished professors to be appointed in the university's history.

The record number is being recognized in honor of IU's Bicentennial Year and to highlight the remarkable research, scholarship and creative accomplishments of IU's past and present faculty as well as their public impact over the past 200 years.

"Faculty honored with the title of distinguished professor -- a title reserved for only the most highly acclaimed and accomplished IU faculty -- truly are among the finest scholars and researchers in the world," IU President Michael A. McRobbie said. "This prestigious appointment celebrates those who have earned national and international recognition and who have strengthened and transformed their fields of study through their research, scholarship, innovation and creative contributions to the world. They were chosen from the largest and best pool of candidates in IU's history.

"Our students and our campuses benefit enormously from the superb academic achievements, engagement and academic integrity of the faculty who have earned appointment as IU distinguished professor and who have been central to the reputation for excellence that IU enjoys as it begins its third century."

Distinguished Professor Symposia in Bloomington and Indianapolis to honor the 15 new distinguished professors will be announced in the coming weeks. Below are brief biographies of the appointees:

Lisa Blomgren Amsler is the Keller-Runden Professor of Public Service in the O'Neill School of Public and Environmental Affairs. Her research examines dispute systems design and the legal infrastructure for collaboration, dispute resolution and public participation in governance. She has co-edited three books and authored more than 120 articles, monographs and book chapters. She joined the IU faculty in 1989 after practicing labor and employment law.

Lynda Bonewald is a professor of anatomy and cell biology and of orthopedic surgery in the School of Medicine. She is the founding director of the Indiana Center for Musculoskeletal Health, which has more than 100 members from 36 departments on four campuses. She has been continually funded by National Institutes of Health for more than 30 years and is responsible for tools used by researchers globally to determine osteocyte biology and function.

Ann Elsner is a professor in the School of Optometry. Her research led to the discovery that infrared light can image the retina, and she has studied a range of retinal pathologies with a focus on diabetic retinopathy, age-related macular degeneration and normal aging of the eye.

Loren Field is a professor of medicine, of physiology and biophysics, and of pediatrics in the School of Medicine. Field and his IU colleagues were the first to show that relatively simple genetic modifications can induce mammalian heart cells to regenerate. His current research is focused on identifying genes and molecules that promote heart muscle regeneration by coaxing healthy cells to proliferate. The success of this research would offer the potential for seriously ill patients whose tissue has been damaged by heart attack to "re-grow" their own hearts.

Charles Geyh is the John F. Kimberling Chair and professor in the Maurer School of Law. His scholarship focuses on the operation of state and federal courts in relation to the political branches of government and the legal profession. His work on judicial independence, accountability, administration and ethics has appeared in more than 80 books, articles, book chapters, reports and other publications.

David Giedroc is a Lilly Chemistry Alumni Professor and director of the Graduate Training Program in Quantitative and Chemical Biology in the College of Arts and Sciences' Department of Biology. His research interests include the biophysical chemistry of infectious disease. Giedroc is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science and the Royal Society of Chemistry.

Jeffrey Gould is a Rudy Professor of History in the College of Arts and Sciences' Department of History. He is a groundbreaking historian, writer and filmmaker whose work has transformed scholarship on social movements in Nicaragua and El Salvador. He helped build the Center for Latin American and Caribbean Studies into one of the leading research centers of its kind. He's authored several books and articles, and several have been published in Spanish.

Roger Innes is a Class of 1954 Professor of Biology in the College of Arts and Sciences' Department of Biology. His lab work primarily focuses on understanding the genetic and biochemical basis of disease resistance in plants. He's investigating how plants are able to recognize pathogens and actively respond. The research is funded by two grants from the NIH and has recently been featured in the European journal International Innovation.

Filippo Menczer is a professor of informatics and computer science in the Luddy School of Informatics, Computing and Engineering. His research, supported by the National Science Foundation, Department of Defense, McDonnell Foundation and Democracy Fund, focuses on web and data science, social network analysis, social computation, web mining and modeling of complex information networks. His work on the spread of information and misinformation on social media has been covered by many national and international news outlets.

Mark Messier is a Rudy Professor of Physics in the College of Arts and Sciences' Department of Physics. His research focuses on the experimental study of neutrinos, which are among the most abundant particles in the universe. He is a member of the Deep Underground Neutrino Experiment, which is made up of more than 1,000 collaborators from 190 institutions in over 30 countries. DUNE advances work in each of the key areas of physics research.

Osamu James Nakagawa is the Ruth N. Halls Professor and professor of photography and studio art in the Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture + Design. His photography has been published, reviewed and exhibited internationally. He has permanent collections on display at several museums, including the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, the International Museum of Photography at the George Eastman House, the Tokyo Metropolitan Museum of Photography and the Museum of Contemporary Photography in Chicago.

G. David Roodman is the Kenneth Wiseman Professor of Medicine in the School of Medicine. His research focuses on osteoclasts and osteoblast activity in both normal and pathological states, including Paget's disease and multiple myeloma. Roodman's lab pioneered the development of long-term marrow culture techniques to study osteoclast differentiation and activity.

Chandan Sen is the J. Stanley Battersby Chair and professor of surgery at the School of Medicine. He and a team of more than 30 scientists study how to tap into the power of regenerative medicine and engineering to heal burns, develop new therapies for diabetic complications, treat injured soldiers and even regrow damaged and diseased tissue. Sen has published more than 300 articles and is cited more than 900 times a year in literature.

Marietta Simpson is a Rudy Professor of Music in the Jacobs School of Music. She is one of the most sought-after mezzo-sopranos and is greatly admired for the rich beauty of her deeply expressive voice. Simpson has performed with many of the world's great conductors and has performed with all the major orchestras in the U.S. and most of those in Europe.

David Williams is the Harry G. Day Chair and Professor of Chemistry in the College of Arts and Sciences' Department of Chemistry. He is an internationally recognized scientist in the field of organic chemistry. His research is focused on the synthesis of biologically active natural products and the development of new reaction methods. He serves on a number of advisory boards, including for the NI H. Williams is a fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Excerpt from:
Record number of faculty appointed as distinguished professors in honor of IU's Bicentennial Year - IU Newsroom

According to a recent study, increased levels of stress hormone cortisol in young children who are separated from their parents, especially mothers, could have a long-term genetic impact on future generations.

In an analysis published by the Journal of the Royal Society of Medicine, experts in the emotional needs of small children say that several studies show that small children cared for outside the home, especially in poor quality care and for 30 or more hours per week, have higher levels of cortisol than children at home.

Professor Sir Denis Pereira Gray, who wrote the paper with two colleagues, said: Cortisol release is a normal response to stress in mammals facing an emergency and is usually useful. However, sustained cortisol release over hours or days can be harmful.

The authors said that raised cortisol levels are a sign of stress and that the time children spend with their parents is biologically more important than is often realised.

Raised cortisol levels are associated with reduced antibody levels and changes in those parts of the brain which are associated with emotional stability.

Environmental factors interact with genes so that genes can be altered, and once altered by adverse childhood experiences, can pass to future generations. Such epigenetic effects need urgent study, said the authors.

Sir Denis added: Future research should explore the links between the care of small children in different settings, their cortisol levels, DNA, and behaviour.

(This story has been published from a wire agency feed without modifications to the text.)

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Stress in kids separated from parents may leave long-term genetic impact - Hindustan Times

Are you genetically predisposed to some diseases? Do you carry genetic mutations that can impact the health of your child? A debit card-sized IndiGenome card, recently unveiled by the government, will help you find the answers if your genetic information is captured in a database that India's umbrella research organisation - the Council of Scientific and Industrial Research (CSIR) - is building. Once your genome is sequenced from your blood sample and added to this database, the card can be used to read the information embedded in your genes, just as your debit card is used to generate a financial transaction statement from your bank's database.

Well, the card is not the key. Genome sequencing - or mapping the pattern of the basic building block of every living cell - is. A genome contains all of a living being's genetic material (simply put, the genome is divided into chromosomes, chromosomes contain genes, and genes are made of DNA). Each genome has approximately 3.2 billion DNA base pairs, and the way they are arranged, or variations and mutations in their pattern, can provide clues about the individual's health or ill health, inherited or acquired. Already, 1,008 individuals, chosen to represent India's social, ethnic and geographic diversity, have been issued such cards. Over 280 doctors in 70 institutions have been trained to make sense of such data. A CSIR institute, the Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB) - which is spearheading the Genomics for Public Health in India, also called IndiGen project - is planning to enrol 20,000 Indians for whole genome sequencing in the next couple of years to build a larger database. The data will be important for building the knowhow, baseline data and indigenous capacity in the emerging

area of precision medicine. IndiGen will have applications in a number of areas, including faster and more efficient diagnosis of rare diseases. The other benefits are cost-effective genetic tests, carrier screening applications for expectant couples, enabling efficient diagnosis of heritable cancers and pharmacogenetic tests to prevent adverse drug reactions.

In fact, IGIB leads two other programmes - Genomics for Understanding Rare Diseases India Alliance (GUaRDIAN) Network and Genomics and other Omics tools for Enabling Medical Decision (GOMED), led by Dr Mohammed Faruq, to see that the genome database and genetic screening leads to development of cost effective diagnostic tools and tests that are licensed out to private and public medical institutions.

The world over, fall in cost for genome sequencing (a reason for which is increase in computing power) is leading to path-breaking applications spanning the entire spectrum of healthcare - diagnosis to treatment and drug development to prevention and wellness - and unrelated fields such as agriculture, animal productivity, environment, sports and many more. Consider this: CSIR took six months to sequence the genomes of 1,008 Indians. Seventeen years ago, a global initiative led by the US National Academy of Sciences, had taken 12 years, and spent $3 billion, to complete the sequencing of the first human genome. Today, sequencing a person's genome does not cost more than $1,000. In fact, Sam Santosh, Chairman of MedGenome Labs, a private venture, says he can sequence a complete human genome in his Bengaluru lab for $500-600.

The Industry

The catalyst for the IndiGen project was advent of Next Generation Sequencing (NGS) in the last decade or so. (NGS helps an entire human genome to be sequenced in a day. The previous Sanger sequencing technology used to take over a decade.) The technology is being used by both IGIB and MedGenome for high-throughput sequencing, i.e. sequencing hundreds of thousands of genes in one go.

IndiGen is a good start but there are countries that are much ahead. Genomics England, a public-private partnership between the UK government and world's biggest NGS sequencing machine maker, Illumina, has completed sequencing of 1,00,000 genomes of British citizens comprising a mix of cancer patients, rare disorder patients and healthy people. A new agreement for sequencing of 3,00,000 genomes, with an option to increase it to 5,00,000 over the next five years, was signed by the two partners on January 13. "Countries such as Estonia and Iceland are attempting to sequence every single citizen and link the data with their health schemes. The US has decided to do it for every single rare disorder patient," says Praveen Gupta, Managing Director & Founder, Premas Life Sciences - the authorised partner of US-based Illumina in India.

"The global high-throughput genomics industry will be in the range of $10-12 billion. With an estimated 25-30 per cent annual growth, it is expected to become a $25-30 billion market in the next three-four years," he says. Premas sells tools (reagents, platforms, software, training) to labs that do genetic testing in India. With 90 per cent market share, it drives NGS technology in India, too. "The high-throughput genomics market in India, including reagents, instruments and services, will be about Rs 500 crore. Approximately 50,000 samples must be reaching India's clinical (service) market on an annual basis," says Gupta.

Dr Sridhar Sivasubbu and Dr Vinod Scaria, IGIB scientists at the forefront of the IndiGen programme, say genome sequencing is just one piece of the initiative. IGIB has two other programmes - Genomics for Understanding Rare Diseases India Alliance (GUaRDIAN) Network and Genomics and Other Omics Tools for Enabling Medical Decision (GOMED) - to ensure their genome database and genetic screening lead to development of cost-effective diagnostic tools and tests that can be licensed out to private and public healthcare institutions. "GUaRDIAN focuses on rare diseases. Given that we are a billion-plus people, even the rarest of the rare diseases is found in a few lakh people. So, this programme caters to 70 million people living with some genetic disease. We find technological solutions for these 7,000-odd diseases and partner with a network of 280 clinicians across 70-odd institutions to offer our solutions," says Sivasubbu.

"Patients and their families connect with us through the GUaRDIAN network. We sequence their genes to find the mutation, and once we find it, we go back to their communities with a cost-effective test to identify that mutation. You just have to look for that single mutation in others, and that's cost-effective," says Scaria. Instead of whole genome sequencing, which costs between Rs 50,000 and Rs 1,00,000, a single assay developed by IGIB through these programmes costs Rs 2,000. The team led by Sivasubbu and Scaria has developed 180 tests for 180 genes and transferred the technology to private diagnostic labs. The institute itself has catered to about 10,000 patients and carried about 25,000 tests in the last two years. "We have entered into partnerships with about a dozen companies. The format of the collaboration depends on the business models they follow," says Sivasubbu.

Premas Life Sciences

The authorised partner of US-based Illumina in India provides tools (reagents, platforms, software, training and troubleshooting) to labs engaged in genetic testing in India. With 90 per cent market share, it drives the New Generation Sequencing technology in India

It works in areas other than healthcare, too. For example, Tagtaste, an online platform for food professionals, uses the company's services to understand the genomics of taste. It has customers and partners such as Pepsico, Coca Cola, Nestle and ITC

Dr Lal PathLabs

The company has licensed diagnostic tests for 27 conditions from Institute of Genomics and Integrative Biology (IGIB)

Has a portfolio of more than 200 different types of tests

It is active in fields like rep- roductive health, cancer di- agnosis, pharmacogenomics

Medgenome Labs

The Bengaluru-based player considers itself as the private sector avatar of IGIB. It offers not just genetic tests but also carries out research. It has collaborated with Singapore's Nanyang Technological University to sequence 1,00,000 whole genomes from Asia. The Genome Asia project has already completed sequencing 10,000 whole genomes, of which about 8,000 are from India

MedGenomes research associates recently sequenced and analysed the genome of the Cobra snake. The findings, published in Nature, suggest the possibility of developing a new method of producing anti-venom completely in the lab.

Lifecell International

The company is in the genetic testing space. It has tied up with IGIB and offers tests ranging from basic screening (prenatal screening, newborn screening, etc) to high-end ones based on NGS. It tests more than 50,000 patient samples every month

Mahajan Imaging

The company has set up a new R&D wing to focus on cutting-edge scientific and clinical research and help radiology and genomics companies develop world-class clinically relevant products. The idea is to integrate imaging and genomic data

Trivitron Healthcare

The Chennai-based chain wants to develop tools using genomic data that can work on conventional platforms. It is talking to IGIB and trying to get its knowhow for manufacture of products for sale to pathology labs

The Private Hand

Dr Lal PathLabs, a pathology lab chain with big plans in the genetic testing space, has an entire department for such tests. "We offer tests of all levels - Karyotyping, which looks at the macro level, Microarrays, which offer intermediate resolution, and NGS, used to elucidate the DNA sequence at the micro level. The fields we are active in include prenatal reproductive health, cancer diagnosis and pharmacogenomics (study of how genes affect a person's response to drugs). We have more than 200 tests and conduct around 300 tests per day," says Dr Vandana Lal, Executive Director, Dr Lal PathLabs. The company has licensed tests for 27 conditions from IGIB. "The imported technology is expensive. The idea to partner with CSIR labs is to bring these cutting-edge technologies to Indian masses at a reasonable cost," says Dr Lal.

Lifecell International is another player in the genetic testing space that has tied up IGIB. "We offer tests ranging from basic screening (prenatal screening, newborn screening, etc.) to high-end ones based on NGS. We test more than 50,000 samples a month. PCR-based tests range from Rs 2,000-5,000 whereas tests based on NGS and those involving sequencing of large parts of the genome can cost upwards of Rs 20,000," says Ishaan Khanna, CEO, Biobank & Diagnostics, Lifecell. He believes the IndiGen database will help in development of better analysis and interpretation tools. "Our focus is on developing rapid genome testing for children in NICU (Neonatal ICU) and similar other scenarios where doctors need clear actionable results in the shortest possible time. IndiGen provides the right mix of Indian genome database," he says.

But not every partnership is for access to cost-effective tests. Mahajan Imaging, a medical imaging chain, has set up a Centre for Advanced Research in Imaging, Neuroscience and Genomics to focus on research and helping radiology and genomics companies develop clinically relevant products. The idea is to integrate imaging and genomic data. "We started the project six months ago and are among the first imaging companies to get into genomics. In the next three-five years, it will be possible for an AI algorithm to look at the radiology image and give genomic readings on it," says Vidur Mahajan, Associate Director, Mahajan Imaging.

Chennai-based Trivitron Healthcare sees in IndiGene data an opportunity to develop multiple testing platforms. It wants to develop tools using genomic data that can work on conventional platforms. "There are almost 1,00,000 pathology labs in India. Hardly 500-1,000 must be doing genetic testing. Companies like ours are talking to IGIB and trying to get the knowhow to manufacture products for a larger population," says Jameel Ahmad Khan, Head, R&D, Trivitron. "IGIB will develop the knowhow, provide proof of concept, and we will convert it into a product which pathology labs without highly trained manpower can also run," he says.

Bengaluru-based Medgenome Labs considers itself a private sector avatar of IGIB, perhaps even a couple of years ahead in research and development. The company not only does genetic tests but also carries out research. It has collaborated with Singapore's Nanyang Technological University to sequence 1,00,000 whole genomes from Asia. The Genome Asia project has already completed sequencing of 10,000 whole genomes, of which about 8,000 are from India. On December 4, international journal Nature published the initial findings from the project - genetic variation, population structure, disease associations, etc., from a whole-genome sequencing reference dataset of 1,739 individuals of 219 population groups and 64 countries across Asia. "We sequence a person's genes and other relevant parts of the genome for specific mutations to understand what is causing the disease and specific drugs and dosage the person will respond to. We also help pharmaceutical companies understand genomes and discover new drug targets and biomarkers," says Sam Santosh, Chairman, MedGenome. With about 120 sales people, the company claims it is generating samples from around 10,000 clinicians across the country. "We were the first to enter the market. In that sense, we created the market, and would be having 60-65 per cent market share. The sequencing market must be in the range of $70-75 million," says Santosh. The company expects its diagnostic business to touch $100 million in four years. Interestingly, MedGenome's research associates recently sequenced and analysed the genome of Cobra snake. The findings, published in Nature, suggest the possibility of developing a new method of producing anti-venom completely in the lab.

Other Sectors

Illumina's India partner Premas Life Sciences is not selling its next generation sequencers only to healthcare firms. Gupta says it has more than 200 installations in India alone. "Anything which is living has a DNA nucleic acid and can be sequenced. We have a mass research market and practically every institute has the sequencer. Somebody will be working on cow, somebody on rice, a third institute on some bacteria," says Gupta.

IGIB researchers Dr Sridhar Sivasubbu and Dr Vinod Scaria vouch for this. The institute is getting requests, including partnership offers, from non-medical players. Tagtaste, an online platform for food professionals, wants to understand the genomics of taste. "In a lighter vein, you could say that the efficiency of a professional wine taster depends on his genes," says Scaria. With customers and partners such as Pepsico, Coca Cola, Nestle and ITC, and a clientele that includes chefs of global hotel chains, taste is serious business. "The point is, if a person is paying Rs 3,000 for a curry or Rs 5,000 for a soup, you better get the taste right," says Scaria. IGIB also works with Adam's Genetics for R&D and product development in the area of fitness. "One of the companies works in the cricket industry. Each player can be genetically tested for performance and food intake because not all muscles have the same size and some people gain weight, some don't gain muscle mass, while some may be more prone to injury. Genetic tests can find out who is prone to injury, or whether weightlifting is the right exercise for a player or not," says Sivasubbu.

The Future

Indians are 17 per cent of the world's population. But only 0.2 per cent genomic data is from the Indian population. This is one area where India can lead. We have so many diseases, and if we can provide the genetic design, the world can develop diagnostics and therapies. "We can create ideas. We didn't invent computers but we created the IT industry. In the same way, we didn't invent genomic sequences but tomorrow we can create a genome informatics economy," says Premas' Gupta.

There are other possibilities, too. "A lot of pundits say that in the next five-six years, 15 per cent of the world's population will be whole genome sequenced. If I require 100 GB data for a genome sequence, for 1.5 billion people, 25-30 exabytes of data will be needed. The entire data content on YouTube, globally, is 0.8 exabytes. Imagine the kind of data generation and analytics possibilities we are talking about," says Gupta. "We need people to analyse this data. If we can take the lead and train our manpower, we can move the world, we can create a new industry which can lead for the next 20 years just the way the IT industry did," he adds. Incidentally, Gupta claims that TCS has already bought Illumina's sequencing platform. So has WIPRO. It seems IT companies are already sensing an opportunity.

Sivasubbu says it took India 10 years to scale up from sequencing one genome to 1,000 genomes. "In the next decade, it may be a million."

@joecmathew

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The Gene Business - Business Today

The fountain of youth may be lurking in the DNA of a remarkable fish which manages to survive out of water for several lifetimes.

African turquoise killifish which are native to Zimbabwe and Mozambique, inhabit shallow puddles that are prone to drying out, leaving the fish stranded for large parts of the year.

But to beat the problem, killifish embryos enter a state of suspended animation called diapause where they essentially stop the clock until the rain returns and they resume life as if nothing has happened.

Now scientists at Stanford University and theStowers Institute for Medical Researchhave worked out how they do it and believe it could help humans prevent ageing, or even hibernate, which might be necessary on lengthy journeys into space.

A study of killifish DNA showed that during diapause, genes which trigger the rapid turnover of cells dial down, as do those involved in metabolism, while those involved in muscle maintenance become more active.

Scientists are now keen to find out if activating the same genes in humans could prevent ageing and disease in later life.

The killifish lives in transient ponds that are only present during the rainy season and entirely desiccate during the dry season, the authors wrote in the journal Science.

To survive the long drought and enable perpetuation of the species, African killifish embryos enter diapause.

Although features of diapause have been described in killifish species the mechanisms by which diapause protects organisms remain unknown.

The time spent in diapause does not come with observed tradeoffs for future life, and diapause confers protective mechanisms to complex organs against damage caused by the passage of time.

Killifish survive for around four to six months so can complete their lifecycle and spawn before their puddle drys out.

Commenting on the research, Marc Van Gilst, of the Department of Anesthesiology and Pain Medicine, University of Washington, Seattle, said: In the simplest sense, aging is considered the inevitable wear and tear brought on by the passage of time.

The basic idea is that the more time passes, the more an animal ages and the more it progresses toward its ultimate demise.

This simplistic perspective is somewhat fatalistic and defines time as the ultimate enemy of youth.

However, it has been established in many animals that aging is also heavily influenced by genetic and physiological programs, such that aging may not necessarily be an inevitable consequence.

Dr Alejandro Sanchez Alvarado, Scientific Director, Stowers Institute for Medical Research, added: "Our work provides us with an opportunity to make inroads into understanding this fascinating natural manifestation of suspended animation in the vertebrate killifish."

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How a fish out of water could help humans find the fountain of youth - Telegraph.co.uk

LIVERMORE, Calif.--(BUSINESS WIRE)--S2 Genomics, a manufacturer and provider of automated tissue sample preparation systems, and the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences (IMS), a leading genomics research institute, today announced that RIKEN IMS has joined the S2 Genomics Early Technology Access Program to evaluate and further develop single cell sequencing applications on the S2 Genomics Singulator tissue preparation system.

Achieving high-quality single cell data from solid tissues relies upon consistent and reproducible cell or nuclei dissociation procedures. To overcome the challenges often seen with manual cell dissociation methods, S2 Genomics has developed the automated Singulator system to process solid tissue samples into suspensions of cells or nuclei for single-cell analysis.

Current methods of cell isolation are a significant bottleneck for researchers and can lead to inconsistencies in their data. The Singulator automates and standardizes the dissociation of solid tissues and can improve the quality of single-cell and single-nuclei data from a variety of solid tissue types, said Dr. Stevan Jovanovich, President and CEO of S2 Genomics. We are excited to work with the RIKEN IMS to evaluate the performance of the system and to develop new applications for the Singulator platform.

Dr. Aki Minoda, Unit Leader of the Epigenome Technology Exploration Unit, commented on the collaboration: We are delighted to collaborate with S2 Genomics and incorporate the Singulator into our workflow for single-cell analyses.

About S2 Genomics, Inc.

S2 Genomics, founded in 2016, is a leading developer of laboratory automation solutions to process solid tissue for life science applications. S2 Genomics technology platforms integrate advanced fluidics, optics, and biochemistry capabilities to produce sample preparation solutions for the next generation sequencing (NGS) and cell biology markets. For more information, visit http://www.s2genomics.com.

S2 Genomics, the S2 Genomics logo, and Singulator are trademarks of S2 Genomics, Inc.

About the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences

The RIKEN IMS aims to elucidate the pathogenesis of human diseases and establish new therapeutic methodologies by conducting cutting-edge research on human genome and immune function. To that end, we have established four Divisions: (1) Division of Genomic Medicine, (2) Division of Human Immunology, (3) Division of Disease Systems Biology, and (4) Division of Next Generation Cancer Immunology. These groups work together to promote state-of-the-art research.

For more information, visit https://www.riken.jp/en/research/labs/ims/index.html.

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S2 Genomics and the RIKEN Center for Integrative Medical Sciences Collaborate on Single-Cell Genomics on Solid Tissues - Business Wire

February 21, 2020

Two globally recognized physicians, a renowned integrative medicine expert, and one of the worlds leading restaurateurs will join the more than 50 leading designers, architects, business leaders, academicians and public health professionals speaking at the WELL Conference, March 29th April 1st, 2020, in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Dr. Jerome M. Adams, the 20th Surgeon General of the United States, is an American anesthesiologist and a vice admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, which represents the whole gamut of public healthfrom engineers to doctors to nurses to pharmacists to environmental health officers. Prior to becoming Surgeon General, he served as the Indiana State Health Commissioner from 20142017.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Chief Medical Correspondent, CNN, multiple award-winning journalist, author and neurosurgeon, is frequently referred to as everyones doctor. He recently anchored a six-part CNN docuseries called Chasing Life, exploring unusual traditions and modern practices around the world that constitute a healthy and meaningful life.

Chef David Bouley, one of New Yorks most famous chefs, earned several four-star reviews in The New York Times, multiple James Beard Foundation awards including Best Chef in America, and countless others. He hosts The Chef & the Doctor, a collaborative lecture and dinner event with world-renowned doctors and nutritionists at his New York restaurant, Bouley at Home, demonstrating a practice of well-being that is accessible to home cooks anywhere.

Dr. Mark Hyman is leading a health revolutionone that revolves around using food as medicine to support longevity, energy, mental clarity, happiness and so much more. A practicing family physician and an internationally recognized author, speaker, educator and advocate in the field of functional medicine, Dr. Hyman is a regular participant in The Chef & the Doctor series and will join Chef Bouley onstage for a lively discussion on how what we eat is at the top of the list for creating the vibrant health we deserve.

In different ways, each of these globally renowned leaders is instrumental in shaping this movement towards a healthier future, said Rick Fedrizzi, chairman and CEO of the International WELL Building Institute, the presenter of the conference. They are tremendous ambassadors for health and well-being and their expertise will further the innovative and inspiring experience The WELL Conference is set to be.

The WELL Conference features an expanding roster of thought leaders who are committed to improving the health and wellbeing of people through better buildings and communities and stronger organizations. The education sessions are structured around six distinct tracksLead WELL, Learn WELL, Work WELL, Live WELL, Design WELL and Connect WELL. Attendees will hear perspectives that range from working dads (and their kids) discussing how wellness is advanced when they have more time with each other, to storytellers like Robin Raj, an expert in building citizen brands for organizations interested in living their purpose. Top editors of design publications Contract, Hospitality Design, Healthcare Design and Environments for Aging will report on changes, shifts and the creative thinking they expect to see in the new decade.

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The WELL Conference Welcomes Three More Speakers to its Lineup - Hospitality Design

By Amy Smith, FNP, NBC-HWC

Besides being known for bringing candy hearts and lots of snow, February is National Heart Health Month. Heart disease is identified as the leading cause of death in both men and women by the Centers for Disease Control. In addition to screenings that can be done to monitor your hearts health, there are fundamentals of following a preventative heart health lifestyle that can help prevent heart disease and maintain heart health. In addition to not smoking, regular exercise, stress management, it is possible to significantly reduce your risk of heart disease by incorporating heart healthy foods in your everyday diet.

Eating foods known as phytosterols can lower LDL, or, "bad cholesterol. These include Brussels sprouts, peanuts, almonds and wheat germ. Foods that produce nitric oxide as a metabolite by-product can lower blood pressure and keep the lining of the blood vessels healthy; beets and kale are great sources of this beneficial metabolite. Also good for your blood vessels (and gut health) are fermented foods, like yogurt, kimchi and sauerkraut. Magnesium-rich foods like almonds, cashews, pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds can help maintain a healthy heart rhythm and reduce blood pressure. Anti-inflamatory foods like mushrooms, red grapes, apples, blueberries, salmon and sardines are beneficial as well.

Besides eating a variety of whole foods packed with phytosterols, supplementing with Co-enzyme Q-10 is beneficial to heart and blood vessel function. This also reduces the risk of heart attack and improve cholesterol levels. It is always recommended to talk with your care provider, cardiologist or an integrative medicine practitioner prior to starting any specific supplementation plan.

Healthy fats from an omega-rich diet provides anti-inflammatory benefits and may reduce cholesterol levels. The skinny on fats is to eat sources of monounsaturated fats such as olives, avocados, and extra-virgin olive oil; and polyunsaturated fats from sockeye salmon, sardines and tuna.

Again, it is always recommended to talk with your care provider, cardiologist or an integrative practitioner prior to starting any supplementation. For more information about cardiology services available through Barton Health, visit bartonHealth.org/cardiology. And to schedule an appointment with an integrative medicine practitioner to learn more nutrition and other heart-healthy lifestyle choices, call 530.539.6620. Heres to your heart this February, and throughout the year.

Amy Smith, FNP, NBC-HWC is an integrative medicine practitioner and primary care provider at the Barton Center for Orthopedics & Wellness.

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A response to the CT Viewpoints op-ed Treating chronic Lyme disease: Is it medical fraud? By Lawrence Zemel MD and Paul G. Auwaerter MD, Dec 13, 2019.

The authors reference to so-called chronic Lyme disease ignores the substantial body of evidence that suggests Lyme disease can be chronic and infection can persist following treatment with antibiotics.

The first investigation into the effectiveness of antibiotics for the treatment of Lyme disease was published by Steere in 1983. The study was conducted at a time when prevailing thought held that antibiotics would cure all infectious disease caused by bacteria. Because the findings of the 1983 study were not consistent with that belief, the data were re-categorized to generate the expected result. Critical analysis of the data reveals, however, that nearly 50% of the patients in the study who were treated with antibiotics for 10-20 days continued to experience significant symptoms.

Other studies have produced similar results, yet the Infectious Diseases Society of America (IDSA) ignores independent research and continues to claim that Lyme disease at any stage of infection is cured by a short course of antibiotics.

A 2019 subcommittee report to the Tick Borne Disease Working Group (established by Congress in 2016), stated that the results of more recent studies in animal models by different investigators, lend support to the probability that the effects of persisting organisms are a source, if not the likely source, of ongoing symptoms in patients who have unresolved Lyme disease.

In 2019, The International Lyme and Associated Diseases Society (ILADS) Working Group published a paper in which they systematically reviewed over 250 peer reviewed papers in the international literature and concluded that Lyme disease is the result of ongoing and active infection by any of several forms of B. burgdorferi capable of causing disease in humans.

Zemel and Auwaerter refer to an unsubstantiated notion that 50% of patients with Lyme disease test negative by standard laboratories but there is abundant evidence demonstrating that the two-tiered testing method recommended by the Centers for Disease Control is problematic.

There are many reasons why infected individuals may generate a negative result. Chief among them is the fact that the test relies on the ability of the infected individual to produce antibodies when Lyme bacteria have the ability to suppress the immune system preventing antibody production. Further, there are over 100 species of Borrelia in the U.S. (not all cause disease in humans) and the current two-tiered testing method misses the majority of them. Independent studies have shown these tests to correctly identify only about 56% of those with Lyme disease.

In a 2018 publication in its own journal, the IDSA admitted that reliable direct detection methods for active B. burgdorferi have been lacking in the past but are needed and appear achievable. Despite this, the IDSA guidelines fail to offer treatment options to patients who test negative but have the disease.

The authors suggestion that vulnerable patients need to be protected from Lyme-literate practitioners is both intentionally misleading and unsubstantiated.

Lyme-literate practitioners have a wide variety of medical backgrounds. Many are board-certified medical doctors with expertise in a variety of specialties and have additional training in tick-borne disease, while others are board-certified osteopathic physicians, naturopathic doctors, or nurse practitioners. Many are members of ILADS. Some practitioners have a background in integrative medicine, a holistic approach to health and wellness that combines conventional medicine with complementary and alternative medicine therapies grounded in science. Others are trained in functional medicine whose aim is to determine how and why illness occurs and to restore health by addressing the root cause of illness for each individual.

Some practitioners use a multimodal approach to address factors that might be keeping a patient sick including poor digestive health, food allergies, inflammation, toxicity, and hormone imbalance. They may use prescription and herbal medicines as well as other supplements. Because treating Lyme disease is a time consuming process, it fits poorly into the current model for medical reimbursement. As a result, many practitioners do not accept insurance but will provide documentation that can be submitted to an insurance carrier.

Just as they would with any other medical professional, patients are capable of exercising due diligence when selecting a Lyme practitioner to ensure that the approach to care is consistent with their preferences and beliefs.

The authors reference to the careful scientific rigor associated with the IDSA guidelines revision process does not hold up to scrutiny.

In 2006, Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal conducted a landmark anti-trust investigation into the IDSAs process for writing its 2006 Lyme disease guidelines. Blumenthals office uncovered undisclosed financial interests held by several of the most powerful IDSA panelists and found that the guidelines panel improperly ignored or minimized alternative medical opinion and evidence regarding Lyme disease, potentially raising serious questions about whether the recommendations reflected all relevant science.

One of the most egregious and dangerous recommendations by the IDSA is the use of a single dose of doxycycline to prevent the development of Lyme disease when given within 72 hours of a tick bite. This advice is based upon a single study with illogical and flawed methodology published nearly two decades ago. It has never been replicated. Data from this study show only that the dose was sufficient to prevent formation of the rash that sometimes develops at the site of a tick bite but not that it halted development of the disease itself. This treatment may promote antibiotic resistance and lead to negative antibody testing making diagnosis even more difficult.

Why this issue is important.

The problem that can arise when evidence is scarce is the misperception that guidelines are based on evidence rather than opinion. The evidence on which both sets of guidelines are based is weak. The authors of the ILADS guidelines acknowledge this directly and the fact that there two sets of conflicting guidelines. The authors of the IDSA guidelines fail to do so.

The 2011 report by the National Academy of Medicine (NAM), Clinical Practice Guidelines We Can Trust, the 2006 IDSA Lyme Disease Guidelines were cited as an example of lack of transparency in guidelines development to illustrate the problems associated with it.

When evidence is weak, clinician discretion is especially important. The ILADS guidelines allow for this and for shared decision-making between patient and practitioner. In contrast, the IDSA guidelines severely restrict the use of clinical judgment.

Why is this important even to those that dont have Lyme disease? Clinical practice guidelines greatly influence the practice of medicine. When lack of transparency, scientific bias, and financial conflicts of interest are allowed to affect them, it places the health of all of us at risk.

Jennifer Shea lives in Longmeadow, Massachusetts.

CTViewpoints welcomes rebuttal or opposing views to this and all its commentaries. Read our guidelines andsubmit your commentary here.

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Why the controversy over chronic Lyme disease is important to everyone - The CT Mirror

The leading federal spokesperson on matters of public health, CNNs chief medical correspondent, functional medicine advocate and New Yorks favorite chef to speak at the inaugural wellness event March 29 April 1, 2020.

Two globally recognized physicians, a renowned integrative medicine expert, and one of the worlds leading restaurateurs will join the more than 50 leading designers, architects, business leaders, academicians and public health professionals speaking at The WELL Conference, March 29-April 1, 2020, in Scottsdale, Arizona.

Dr. Jerome M. Adams, the 20th Surgeon General of the United States, is an American anesthesiologist and a vice admiral in the U.S. Public Health Service Commissioned Corps, which represents the whole gamut of public healthfrom engineers to doctors to nurses to pharmacists to environmental health officers. Prior to becoming Surgeon General, he served as the Indiana State Health Commissioner from 20142017.

Dr. Sanjay Gupta, Chief Medical Correspondent, CNN, multiple award-winning journalist, author and neurosurgeon, is frequently referred to as "everyones doctor." He recently anchored a six-part CNN docuseries called "Chasing Life," exploring unusual traditions and modern practices around the world that constitute a healthy and meaningful life.

Chef David Bouley, one of New Yorks most famous chefs, earned several four-star reviews in The New York Times, multiple James Beard Foundation awards including Best Chef in America, and countless others. He hosts The Chef & the Doctor, a collaborative lecture and dinner event with world-renowned doctors and nutritionists at his New York restaurant, Bouley at Home, demonstrating a practice of well-being that is accessible to home cooks anywhere.

Dr. Mark Hyman is leading a health revolutionone that revolves around using food as medicine to support longevity, energy, mental clarity, happiness and so much more. A practicing family physician and an internationally recognized author, speaker, educator and advocate in the field of functional medicine, Dr. Hyman is a regular participant in The Chef & the Doctor series and will join Chef Bouley onstage for a lively discussion on how what we eat is at the top of the list for creating the vibrant health we deserve.

"In different ways, each of these globally renowned leaders is instrumental in shaping this movement towards a healthier future," said Rick Fedrizzi, chairman and CEO of the International WELL Building Institute, the presenter of the conference. "They are tremendous ambassadors for health and well-being and their expertise will further the innovative and inspiring experience The WELL Conference is set to be."

The WELL Conference features an expanding roster of thought leaders who are committed to improving the health and well-being of people through better buildings and communities and stronger organizations. The education sessions are structured around six distinct tracksLead WELL, Learn WELL, Work WELL, Live WELL, Design WELL and Connect WELL. Attendees will hear perspectives that range from working dads (and their kids) discussing how wellness is advanced when they have more time with each other, to storytellers like Robin Raj, an expert in building "citizen brands" for organizations interested in living their purpose. Top editors of design publications Contract, Hospitality Design, Healthcare Design and Environments for Aging will report on changes, shifts and the creative thinking they expect to see in the new decade.

Visit thewellconference.com to register and review the schedule of events and speakers and follow along on social media: Twitter, Facebook, LinkedIn and Instagram.

About The WELL Conference

A first-of-its-kind wellness gathering, The WELL Conference is a curation of information and inspiration from thought leaders, experts and innovators representing multiple sectors of the wellness movement. Presented through thought-provoking and immersive content focused on how our buildings and everything in them can enhance, not compromise our health, this gathering will provide a deeper understanding how to live well at every turn. The event will take place March 29-April 1, 2020, at the Fairmont Princess in Scottsdale, Arizona. The WELL Conference is presented by the International WELL Building Institute in collaboration with the American Society of Interior Designers and powered by Emerald.

International WELL Building Institute, IWBI, the WELL Building Standard, WELL v2, WELL Certified, WELL AP, WELL, WELL Portfolio, The WELL Conference, the WELL Community Standard and others, and their related logos are trademarks or certification marks of International WELL Building Institute pbc in the United States and other countries.

View source version on businesswire.com: https://www.businesswire.com/news/home/20200220005961/en/

Contacts

Press Wanita Niehaus Media@thewellconference.com

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U. S. Surgeon General Dr. Jerome M. Adams and CNN Chief Medical Correspondent Dr. Sanjay Gupta Join Chef David Bouley and Dr. Mark Hyman at The WELL...

When most people clean up their diets to lose weight or boost their overall health, one of the first things they're told to cut out is alcohol. After all, no amount of alcohol is particularly "good" for you, per an August 2018 analysis in The Lancet and it's certainly not low in calories, no matter which type you're sipping.

Meditation is one way to relax without alcohol.

Credit: Westend61/Westend61/GettyImages

But for many, a glass of wine or a cold beer at the end of a long workday is a go-to way to de-stress and unwind. And that's nothing to sneeze at, because lowering your stress levels can be key for weight loss, too.

While a casual drink may seem harmless, there's often a biological component at play that keeps alcohol at the top of the list of favorite de-stressors, Roger Adams, PhD, personal trainer, doctor of nutrition and owner of eatrightfitness, tells LIVESTRONG.com.

"At its basic level, alcohol of any kind is a depressant, meaning it slows down the activity and processes of the brain and central nervous system," Adams says. "If used only occasionally for stress relief, alcohol is likely to be quite effective in the short-term. However, we tend to need to consume more over time to get the same de-stressed feeling, so consumption is likely to increase."

This increased alcohol consumption over time can cause myriad health problems, including mood and behavior disruptions, high blood pressure, stroke, liver disease and even cancer, according to the National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism.

Many of us may find it difficult to relax without alcohol, but there are compelling health benefits to limiting your intake.

Credit: BrianAJackson/iStock/GettyImages

On the other hand, stress is also a major health issue. One March 2018 study in the journal Psychological Science found that even stress that is seen as small and insignificant can lead to health problems including heart disease, anxiety and depression, chronic pain and more.

Another November 2018 study in Neurology discovered that a high-stress lifestyle could lead to memory loss and brain shrinkage before the age of 50.

And, like alcohol, stress doesn't help your waistline either. Those who suffer from long-term stress are more likely to be obese, according to a study published February 2017 in the journal Obesity. The main culprit is cortisol, a stress-induced hormone that can encourage your body to hold onto fat.

In short: If both stress and drinking are bad for you, the healthiest lifestyle is one that includes less of both.

Luckily, there are plenty of stress-relieving solutions that can help you whittle your waistline and boost your health. Here, experts share their science-backed alternatives to drinking that can still help relieve stress.

Exposure to nature has a lot o benefits, including a better mental state of wellbeing as you leave all the noise of life behind, Adams says.

This was shown in an April 2019 study published in Frontiers in Psychology, which examined two biomarkers of stress when exposed to nature: salivary cortisol, a measure of the amount of stress hormone in the saliva, and alpha-amylase, digestive enzymes. They found that both stress biomarkers dropped in people when they were exposed to nature.

So instead of happy hour after work, suggest taking a walk or throwing a frisbee in the park with your pals, or simply take a walk through the trees after dinner instead of parking yourself on the sofa with a cold one.

Did you know that keeping a food diary is one of the most effective ways to manage your weight? Download the MyPlate app to easily track calories, stay focused and achieve your goals!

Meditation can be a powerful stress-reliever, according to a systematic review and meta-analysis published March 2014 in JAMA Internal Medicine. After reviewing 47 trials, the researchers concluded that mindfulness meditation can improve levels of anxiety, depression and pain as well.

Another study, published July 2019 in Scientific Reports, found that it takes as little as 40 days of meditating to change your brain waves enough to improve stress.

"Progressive relaxation meditation involves a guided experience where you relax each part of your body, as well as calm the inner chatter that often feeds stress and worry and keeps us too stimulated for sleep," Roseann Capanna-Hodge, PsyD, psychologist and certified integrative medicine mental health provider, tells LIVESTRONG.com.

One of the best parts about meditating is that it's easy to do anywhere all you need is a safe and quiet place to sit, reflect and calm your mind. If you're looking for a little guidance, consider downloading one of the many meditation apps out there, such as InsightTimer or Calm.

Practice yoga as a healthy alternative to alcohol for stress relief.

Credit: fizkes/iStock/GettyImages

Like meditation, yoga is a good alternative to drinking that can provide boundless benefits for the body and mind, particularly when it comes to reducing levels of stress, anxiety and depression, per a February 2018 study in the International Journal of Preventive Medicine.

"By performing yoga moves and breathing properly, you can promote your mental health through the relief of stress," Jamie Bacharach, medical acupuncturist and yoga practitioner, tells LIVESTRONG.com. "Due to its use of meditation-like posing and deliberate breathing, yoga has the ability to increase your own body awareness, relax the mind and give you a sharper focus, all of which contribute to optimized mental health."

Being mindful of one's surroundings and using visualization to reduce stress has become an increasingly popular technique. Though it sounds quite similar, visualization is different than mindfulness or meditation.

"Visualization involves actually visualizing what you want and honing in on one's authentic purpose to create goals around it," explains Dr. Capanna-Hodge. "It's a powerful way to not only get clarity on your goals but to help manifest them."

To incorporate visualization into your day-to-day, Dr. Capanna-Hodge suggests taking a few minutes to sit in a quiet place and visualize what you want to accomplish and pair it with action around those goals that move them to positive outcomes.

"Whether you have a goal to better manage stress or address a specific issue, intent-oriented visualization is a great way to create positive momentum by getting to the core of the issue and its resolution," she says.

"The lasting effects throughout the day of a short workout can provide the calming effect that you may be looking for in that after-work cocktail."

It might sound simple and it is but getting your heart rate up is one of the best ways to reduce the effects of stress.

When you exercise, your body amps up its production of the "feel-good" hormone known as endorphins, while stress does the complete opposite, explains Joseph De Santo, MD, board-certified physician and addiction specialist for the BioCorRx Recovery Program.

Indeed, in responses gathered for the American Psychological Association's Stress in America 2019 survey, a whopping 53 percent of adults reported that they feel good about themselves after exercising, and 30 percent reported feeling less stressed.

"No matter what you are doing, if you are moving, oxygen is getting to the brain more efficiently and endorphins are being released," Dr. De Santo says. "The lasting effects throughout the day of a short workout can provide the calming effect that you may be looking for in that after-work cocktail."

Using essential oils is one way to relax without alcohol.

Credit: JGI/Tom Grill/Tetra images/GettyImages

Essential oils not only smell nice, but they can have a beneficial effect on both your brain and body.

Lavender oil in particular, has been shown to help alleviate symptoms of anxiety, according to one July 2017 study published in The Mental Health Clinician.

"When essential oil molecules enter the nose or mouth, they pass to the lungs and eventually the brain and other parts of the body, stimulating the olfactory system, which is the part of the brain connected to smell," Dr Capanna-Hodge explains. "As the molecules reach the brain, they affect several regions, including the limbic system, which is linked to the emotions, our memory and attentional systems, as well as our hormone and immune systems, and can lower cortisol and stress levels."

She recommends using an infuser to disperse essential oils around your home or workplace to keep your stress levels low and your body relaxed.

This nutrient has numerous health benefits, including enhancing bone health and reducing one's risk for diabetes, heart disease and anxiety. It also has impressive stress-relieving perks, as shown in a May 2017 study published in Nutrients, which found magnesium supplementation to be beneficial in relieving anxiety as well as stress.

"By supplementing with magnesium, you not only calm the nervous system, you help your body combat stress and give it what it needs to work at an optimal level," says Dr. Capanna-Hodge.

You can take a magnesium supplement, but you can also score the nutrient in certain foods, particularly spinach, almonds, avocado, tofu and dark chocolate.

Keep in mind the recommended daily intakes for magnesium, according to the National Institutes of Health:

Most Americans (1 in 3) are not getting their fair share of shut-eye and it's having a negative affect on their health and overall wellbeing, according to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention.

What's more: Oftentimes stress is the cause of inability to sleep well. A National Sleep Foundation poll found that 43 percent of young and middle-aged adults report difficulty sleeping at night as a result of stress at least once a month.

"Getting to bed and getting enough sleep for four to five REM cycles (typically six hours minimum) can provide your brain the healing time that allows it the chance to re-organize and refresh, so you don't carry stress over from the previous day," Dr. De Santo says.

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Alternatives to Drinking: How to Relax Without Alcohol - LIVESTRONG.COM

Investing in a good carbon offset project will probably help to do some good somewhere in the world, adds Hewitt, but it wont make the emissions from your flight go away. Offsetting just can't be a long-term solution, she says. Many people object to offsetting as it implies wealthier individuals can keep contributing to climate change without altering their behaviour.

While giving up flying can feel like a choice to curb your own freedom, travel and the opportunity to experience different cultures, its increasing role in climate change is putting many of our most cherished environments at risk.

But if we do choose to shift our mindsets, we could find the pleasures of slow travel and the discovery of what we have been missing on our own doorsteps could be worth the sacrifice.

* Jocelyn Timperley is a freelance climate change reporter. You can find her on Twitter @jloistf.

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The Global Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market has observed continuous evolution in the past few years and is projected to grow even more during the predicted period (2020-2026). This research report represents a 360-degree overview of the competitive landscape of the Core Elements of Market. Moreover, it offers huge data relating to recent trends, technological progressions, tools, and practises. The research report analyzes every aspect in a detailed and concise manner for better insights into the business.

The latest on report the global Tuberculosis Diagnostics market provides thorough understanding of important aspects of industry. It prepares players as well as investors to take important decisions and plan for growth beforehand by forecast 2026.

Click to Download and Get the Free Sample PDF File of the report: https://www.globalmarketers.biz/report/life-sciences-/global-tuberculosis-diagnostics-market-research-report-2020-2026-of-major-types,-applications-and-competitive-vendors-in-top-regions-and-countries/143942 #request_sample

Major industry players:

DanaherBioMerieuxBDRocheQiagenThermo Fisher ScientificOxford ImmunotecHologicAbbottHain LifescienceEpistemAkonni BiosystemsCreative Diagnostics

The competitive outlook segment of the report presents a clear diffusion into the market share analysis of key industry players. It includes numerous important aspects counting leading competitors which include their business profiling, Tuberculosis Diagnostics market share, gross margin, sales, revenue, growth rate as well as it provides value chain analysis, capacity utilization analysis, SWOT analysis to dig deeper. The companies referred to in the market research report include

The report comprehensively investigates the Global Tuberculosis Diagnostics market status, supply, sales, and production. The global market divisions of production and exchanges are evaluated along with the review of the production, capacity, sales, and revenue. Various aspects such as Tuberculosis Diagnostics import/export, price, gross margin, consumption, and value are also examined.

Market Can Be Split Into Product Types As

Culture-basedSputum Smear MicroscopyRapid MolecularOthers

Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Can Be Split Into Applications As

HospitalDiagnostic LaboratoriesOthers

The Geographical Analysis Covers the Following Regions

North America (Canada & U.S.) & Latin America (Mexico, Brazil, Peru, Chile, and others)

Western Europe (Germany, U.K., France, Spain, Italy, Nordic countries, Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg) & Eastern Europe (Poland and Russia)

Asia-Pacific (China, India, Japan, ASEAN, Australia, and New Zealand)

Middle-East & Africa (GCC, Southern Africa, and North Africa)

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Key Topic Covered:

Growth Opportunities

Market Growth Drivers

Leading Market Players

Market Size and Growth Rate

Market Trend and Technological

Company Market Share

Table of Contents for market shares by application, research objectives, market sections by type and forecast years considered.

This Report Provides Comprehensive Analysis Of:

Request for Detailed Report TOC (Table of Contents) @ https://www.globalmarketers.biz/report/life-sciences-/global-tuberculosis-diagnostics-market-research-report-2020-2026-of-major-types,-applications-and-competitive-vendors-in-top-regions-and-countries/143942 #table_of_contents

Table of Contents Describing Detail Research Report:

1. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Report Overview

2 Global Tuberculosis Diagnostics Growth Trends

3. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Share by Manufacturers by

4. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Size by Type

5. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Size by Application

6. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Production by Regions

7 Perfusion Imaging by Regions

8. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Company Profiles

9. Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market Forecast 2020-2026.

10 Value Chain and Sales Channels Analysis

11 Opportunities & Challenges, Threat and Affecting Factors

12 Key Findings

13 Appendix

Complete report on Tuberculosis Diagnostics market report spread across 100+ pages, list of tables & figures, profiling 10+ companies.

The report answers several questions about the Tuberculosis Diagnostics Market includes:

1. What will be the Tuberculosis Diagnostics industry size in 2026?

2. What will be the market growth rate in 2026?

3. Which key factors drive the market?

4. Who are the key market players for market?

5. Which strategies are used by top players in the market?

6. What are the key market trends in Tuberculosis Diagnostics market?

7. Which trends and challenges will influence the growth of market?

8. Which barriers do the markets face?

9. What are the market opportunities for vendors and what are the threats faced by them?

10. What are the most important outcomes of the five forces analysis of the market?

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Health Coaching Market 2020 To See Booming Ahead including top key vendors like -Aetna, American Association for Health Education, American Council of...

New Delhi, Feb 22: In a bid to address the concerns of the local populace after the revoking of Jammu and Kashmirs special status last year, Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Saturday assured the people of the Union Territory that the domicile law is coming very soon which would be followed by the Land Act.He also announced that more than the promised jobs will be provided to the youth after the notification of the rules is worked out.The domicile act is coming very soon, which will be immediately followed by the Land Act, the minister of state in the Prime Ministers Office said.Many parties have been demanding enactment of a domicile law for Jammu and Kashmir to protect the interests of landowners and the unemployed youth after the erstwhile state lost its special status following nullification of Article 370 by the Centre.Singh was addressing a function after signing of a major scientific collaboration agreement between CSIR-Indian Institute of Integrative Medicine, Jammu, and IndusScan, a Canadian pharmaceutical company, here.Describing the signing of the MoU as a historic moment, the minister said Jammu and Kashmirs journey to become a part of Indias five trillion global economy has started from the four walls of IIIM.Prime Minister Narendra Modi is saying again and again that we would have the same kind of focus on Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh as we did for North-East which saw major transformation over the last five years. Those who have doubts about it would see all this happening in a short while of time, he said.The minister said this is possible because the earlier embargoes have been removed and the Union Territory is directly reporting to the Centre.Many of the politicians have become unemployedheard yesterday one of them raising the issue of jobs to the local youth. I want to tell that more than the promised jobs will be advertised but as per the rules and in an impartial manner. We are waiting for a notification of the rules to come out, he said.Alleging brazen disregard for the concerns of the educated unemployed and underemployed youth by the incumbent government, National Panthers Party Chairman and former minister Harsh Dev Singh had said not a single post, out of the promised 50,000 jobs, had been advertised for filling up in the new UT after the abrogation of Article 370 provisions.Everything will be done. It will not be like when your government was in power and ruined the future of the youths by backdoor appointments and corrupt practices. The youth who were provided jobs have turned 35 years but are still waiting for their regularisation, the Union minister said.He said the jobs will be provided under rules which will be in the best interest of the youth and those who have been deprived of it.Asserting that India is going through one of the best phases under the leadership of Modi, he said a lot of development had taken place over the last five years and the country is looking forward to become a part of the global economy.On the one hand India is eyeing five trillion economy, dont you want that Jammu and Kashmir should also be part of that. It is possible only when our youth reaches such a stage to live up to the parameters which are followed globally and therefore, even if some of us have any doubts, confusion and skepticism or still unconvinced, ask themselves that dont you want your children to be part of five trillion economy.If you understand it, I think all the murmuring and whispering which is generated from thoughtless minds will vanish away, Singh said.The minister said Jammu and Kashmir is also under the process of a new industrial policy and a new scientific policy.The greatest disadvantage that has happened from Jammu and kashmir remaining in isolation because of Article 370 is that we become lazy and lethargic. We learnt to live on easy freebies, he said.

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POTUS India visit: Trump expected to talk Kashmir,says US Officials - The Kashmir Monitor

New Delhi, Feb 22: In a bid to address the concerns of the local populace after the revoking of Jammu and Kashmirs special status last year, Union Minister Jitendra Singh on Saturday assured the people of the Union Territory that the domicile law is coming very soon which would be followed by the Land Act.He also announced that more than the promised jobs will be provided to the youth after the notification of the rules is worked out.The domicile act is coming very soon, which will be immediately followed by the Land Act, the minister of state in the Prime Ministers Office said.Many parties have been demanding enactment of a domicile law for Jammu and Kashmir to protect the interests of landowners and the unemployed youth after the erstwhile state lost its special status following nullification of Article 370 by the Centre.Singh was addressing a function after signing of a major scientific collaboration agreement between CSIR-Indian Institute of Integrative Medicine, Jammu, and IndusScan, a Canadian pharmaceutical company, here.Describing the signing of the MoU as a historic moment, the minister said Jammu and Kashmirs journey to become a part of Indias five trillion global economy has started from the four walls of IIIM.Prime Minister Narendra Modi is saying again and again that we would have the same kind of focus on Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh as we did for North-East which saw major transformation over the last five years. Those who have doubts about it would see all this happening in a short while of time, he said.The minister said this is possible because the earlier embargoes have been removed and the Union Territory is directly reporting to the Centre.Many of the politicians have become unemployedheard yesterday one of them raising the issue of jobs to the local youth. I want to tell that more than the promised jobs will be advertised but as per the rules and in an impartial manner. We are waiting for a notification of the rules to come out, he said.Alleging brazen disregard for the concerns of the educated unemployed and underemployed youth by the incumbent government, National Panthers Party Chairman and former minister Harsh Dev Singh had said not a single post, out of the promised 50,000 jobs, had been advertised for filling up in the new UT after the abrogation of Article 370 provisions.Everything will be done. It will not be like when your government was in power and ruined the future of the youths by backdoor appointments and corrupt practices. The youth who were provided jobs have turned 35 years but are still waiting for their regularisation, the Union minister said.He said the jobs will be provided under rules which will be in the best interest of the youth and those who have been deprived of it.Asserting that India is going through one of the best phases under the leadership of Modi, he said a lot of development had taken place over the last five years and the country is looking forward to become a part of the global economy.On the one hand India is eyeing five trillion economy, dont you want that Jammu and Kashmir should also be part of that. It is possible only when our youth reaches such a stage to live up to the parameters which are followed globally and therefore, even if some of us have any doubts, confusion and skepticism or still unconvinced, ask themselves that dont you want your children to be part of five trillion economy.If you understand it, I think all the murmuring and whispering which is generated from thoughtless minds will vanish away, Singh said.The minister said Jammu and Kashmir is also under the process of a new industrial policy and a new scientific policy.The greatest disadvantage that has happened from Jammu and kashmir remaining in isolation because of Article 370 is that we become lazy and lethargic. We learnt to live on easy freebies, he said.

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Nine dead, five injured in Kathua mishap - The Kashmir Monitor