ScienceDaily (Jan. 12, 2010) — A new study reinforces the potential value of stem cells in repairing major injuries involving the loss of bone structure.

The study shows that delivering stem cells on a polymer scaffold to treat large areas of missing bone leads to improved bone formation and better mechanical properties compared to treatment with the scaffold alone. This type of therapeutic treatment could be a potential alternative to bone grafting operations.

“Massive bone injuries are among the most challenging problems that orthopedic surgeons face, and they are commonly seen as a result of accidents as well as in soldiers returning from war,” said the study’s lead author Robert Guldberg, a professor in Georgia Tech’s Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering. “This study shows that there is promise in treating these injuries by delivering stem cells to the injury site. These are injuries that would not heal without significant medical intervention.”

In this picture:

Micro-CT (top) and X-ray (bottom) images of bone formation in massive bone defects that received a polymer scaffold alone (left), a scaffold seeded with bone marrow-derived mesenchymal adult stem cells (middle), and a scaffold seeded with amniotic fluid fetal stem cells (right). (Credit: Image courtesy of Robert Guldberg)

Details of the research were published in the early edition of the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on January 11, 2010. This work was funded by the National Institutes of Health and the National Science Foundation.

The study was conducted in rats in which two bone gaps eight millimeters in length were created to simulate massive injuries. One gap was treated with a polymer scaffold seeded with stem cells and the other with scaffold only. The results showed that injuries treated with the stem cell scaffolds showed significantly more bone growth than injuries treated with scaffolds only.

Guldberg and mechanical engineering graduate student Kenneth Dupont experimented with scaffolds containing two different types of human stem cells — bone marrow-derived mesenchymal adult stem cells and amniotic fluid fetal stem cells.

“We were able to directly evaluate the therapeutic potential of human stem cells to repair large bone defects by implanting them into rats with a reduced immune system,” explained Guldberg, who is also the director of the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience at Georgia Tech.

Micro-CT measurements showed no significant differences in bone regeneration between the two stem cell groups. However, combining the two types of stem cells produced significantly higher bone volume and strength compared to scaffolds without cellular augmentation.

Although stem cell delivery significantly enhanced bone growth and biomechanical properties, it was not able to consistently repair the injury. Eight weeks after the treatment, new bone bridged the gaps in four of nine defects treated with scaffolds seeded with adult stem cells, one of nine defects treated with scaffolds seeded with fetal stem cells, and none of the defects treated with the scaffold alone.

“We thought that the functional regeneration of the bone defects may have been limited by stem cells migrating away from the injury site, so we decided to investigate the fate and distribution of the delivered cells,” said Guldberg.

To do this, Guldberg labeled stem cells with fluorescent quantum dots — nanometer-scale particles that emit light when excited by near-infrared radiation — to track the distribution of stem cells after delivery on the scaffolds and completed the same experiments as previously described.

Throughout the entire study, the researchers observed significant fluorescence at the stem cell scaffold sites. However, beginning seven to 10 days after treatment, signals appeared at the scaffold-only sites. Additional analysis with immunostaining revealed that the quantum dots present at the scaffold-only sites were contained in inflammatory cells called macrophages that had taken up quantum dots released from dead stem cells.

“While our overall study shows that stem cell therapy has a lot of promise for treating massive bone defects, this experiment shows that we still need to develop an improved way of delivering the stem cells so that they stay alive longer and thus remain at the injury site longer,” explained Guldberg.

The researchers also found that the quantum dots diminished the function of the transplanted stem cells and thus their therapeutic effect. When the stem cells were labeled with quantum dots, the results showed a failure to enhance bone formation or bridge defects. However, the same low concentration of quantum dots did not affect cell viability or the ability of the stem cells to become bone cells in laboratory studies.

“Although in vitro laboratory studies remain important, this work provides further evidence that well-characterized in vivo models are necessary to test the ability of regenerative tissue strategies to effectively integrate and restore function in complex living organisms,” added Guldberg. “Improved methods of non-invasive cell tracking that do not alter cell function in vivo are needed to optimize stem cell delivery strategies and compare the effectiveness of different stem cell sources for tissue regeneration.”

Guldberg is currently exploring alternative cell tracking methods, such as genetically modifying the stem cells to express green fluorescent protein and/or other luminescent enzymes such as luciferase. He is also investigating the addition of programming cues to the scaffold that will direct the stem cells to differentiate into bone cells. These signals may be particularly effective for fetal stem cells, which are believed to be more primitive than adult stem cells, according to Guldberg.

Lessons learned from the current work are also being applied to develop effective stem cell therapies for severe composite injuries to multiple tissues including bone, nerve, vasculature and muscle. This follow-on work is being conducted in the Georgia Tech Center for Advanced Bioengineering for Soldier Survivability in collaboration with Ravi Bellamkonda and Barbara Boyan, professors in the Wallace H. Coulter Department of Biomedical Engineering at Georgia Tech and Emory University.

Other authors on the paper include Andrés García, professor and Woodruff Faculty Fellow in Georgia Tech’s Woodruff School of Mechanical Engineering and the Petit Institute for Bioengineering and Bioscience; Georgia Tech research scientist Hazel Stevens, Georgia Tech graduate student Joel Boerckel; and National University of Ireland medical student Kapil Sharma.

Source: www.sciencedaily.com

Image by Martin LaBar via Flickr

A new study performed in Kerala brings further evidence to support the theory of colony collapse disorder (CCD) among honeybees due to bioactive microwave radiation from cell phones and their relay towers.

The disappearance of bee colonies is far more serious than just a farmer losing his livelihood or you having to go without honey for a while. This could result in disruption of food production because most of the crops depend on bees for pollination.

A full one-third of the U.S. food supply depends on pollination from bees. Apple orchards, for instance, require one colony of bees per acre to be adequately pollinated. The California almond crop alone requires 1.3 million colonies of bees, and bees actually add an estimated $15 billion in value to crops like these. So if bee colonies continue to be wiped out in unprecedented numbers, major food shortages could result.

In an average year, beekeepers expect to incur losses of between 5 and 10 percent. But in 2007, U.S. beekeepers surveyed by the USDA Agricultural Research Service reported a total loss of about 36 percent of their bee colonies, up from 13.5 percent the year before.

The phenomenon of (suspected) mobile tower-induced CCD and resultant crop loss were first noticed in the US several years ago, but this had spread to most European countries by 2007. Now, experiments by Sainuddeen Pattazhy, a researcher and dean in the department of zoology at SN College, Punalur, Kerala, have found that worker bees fail to return to their hives when their navigation skills are interfered by the mobile microwaves.

Sainuddeen conducted his experiments by placing mobile phones near beehives (as some scientists in the West had done earlier). He found that these hives collapsed totally in five to 10 days with the worker bees failing to return to their homes, leaving the hives with the queens, eggs and immature bees.

“The navigation skill of the worker bees is dependent on the earth’s magnetic properties. The electro-magnetic waves emitted by the mobile phones and relay towers interfere with the earth’s magnetism, resulting in the loss of the navigation capacity of the bee. Then it fails to come back. Also, the radiation causes damage to the nervous system of the bee and it becomes unable to fly,” said Sainuddeen.

When nature’s pollinators start to mysteriously die off, it is a major clue that something is out of balance. This mysterious malady has been dubbed “colony collapse disorder” (CCD), and while a definitive cause has yet to be determined it seems cell phones may be playing a role.

Reference:

The Pioneer

Dr Mercola

High blood sugar levels can cause damage to the arteries that supply the nerves with blood and ultimately cause nerve damage, which results in numbness, pins and needles, burning sensation and pain. This briefly explains why neuropathy has a high occurrence rate among people with diabetes.

TREATMENT FOR DIABETIC NEUROPATHY

Even though currently there is no known cure for diabetic neuropathy, there are things that can be done to slow down the progression of the disease, to relieve the pain, to manage complications and even to restore function.

Since the high blood sugar levels are the main cause of neuropathy, the focus in both treatment and prevention of diabetic neuropathy is on keeping blood sugar within a narrow target range. It is also important to keep your blood pressure under control. These can help delay the progression of peripheral neuropathy and may even cause an improvement in the already existing symptoms.

A healthy lifestyle is also extremely important in order to prevent diabetic neuropathy or slow its progress. This includes eating a healthy diet, getting plenty of physical activity, maintaining a healthy weight and avoiding alcohol and smoking entirely. The most beneficial type of exercise for people suffering from neuropathy is low-impact exercise, in order to prevent injury. A great trainer for this purpose is the GlideCycle, which offers great workout with virtually zero impact.

One important step in the research of treatment for diabetic neuropathy was the discovery of what alpha-lipoic acid can do. Alpha-lipoic acid is a powerful antioxidant which occurs naturally, in small amounts, in such foods as spinach, broccoli, beef, yeast, kidney, and heart. It is also available as a supplement, but those who want to purchase alpa-lipoic acid supplements have to make sure that what they get is Stabilized R Alpha Lipoic Acid.

ALPHA LIPOIC ACID BENEFITS FOR PEOPLE SUFFERING FROM NEUROPATHY -STUDY RESULTS

In a study conducted by Mayo Clinic and a Russian medical center, 60 patients suffering from diabetic neuropathy received five treatments a week consisting of 600 mg of alpha lipoic acid in intravenous form. The other 60 patients were given a placebo. In less than 20 days the alpha lipoic acid patients reported dramatic improvement in symptoms, including a 6 point drop in pain levels on a 10 point scale. “But it didn’t act only as a pain medication,” says researcher and Mayo Clinic neurologist Peter Dyck, MD. “Alpha lipoic acid seems to actually change the metabolism of the nerve or blood supply to the nerve, and we noted some relief in symptoms.”

CONCLUSION

We hope that further research will find new efficient ways to treat diabetic neuropathy. Till then, do all you can to prevent it: control your blood sugar level, eat healthy, do exercise and take Alpha Lipoic Acid supplements.

Ruth Taylor

RELATED ARTICLES:

• Benefits of Exercise for People Suffering from Neuropathy
• R-ALA and Glucose  Metabolism
• Alpha Lipoic Acid Benefits for Neuropathy (including study)
• The Big Difference Between R-Alpha Lipoic Acid and STABILIZED R-Alpha Lipoic Acid

Image via Wikipedia

The insulin-control system, which governs how the body processes sugar, may also reset our internal clock, according to a study published online September 17 in Cell.

If you pay attention to the way your body ticks, you’ll realize it may be your best timekeeper. In the morning, your blood pressure has its sharpest rise, allowing you to safely assume a vertical position. Around lunchtime, your liver enzymes kick into full gear in anticipation of food. In the evening, the pineal gland in the base of your brain begins producing the hormone melatonin, which makes you feel sleepy. As you sleep, your body temperature drops. At dawn, as the sun comes up and light hits your retinas, your body stops making melatonin and your temperature rises, revving up your metabolism for the day ahead. Isn’t all this mechanism just wonderful?!

Many basic biological functions follow a 24-hour cycle. These rhythms—called circadian, Latin for “about a day”—are hardwired, controlled by a master clock, a cluster of specialized nerve cells in the hypothalamus, and other subservient clocks in the tissues of the body—the liver, for example. Still, cues like the sun or an alarm clock are crucial for keeping these internal clocks in synchrony with the external world.

The more researchers look into the biological clock, the more they realize how complicated it is.

Recent research has found out that genes that regulate insulin in the body also play a role in the timing of the body’s sleep-wake cycle. This finding could potentially lead to treatments for disorders that arise when circadian rhythms are disrupted.

“People knew that the clock regulates many different processes, but what they didn’t realize was that when you tweak those processes, it feeds back and alters the clock,” study co-author Steve Kay, dean of the Division of Biological Sciences at the University of California San Diego, said in a university news release.

“What came out very strongly was this close relationship between circadian regulation and insulin signaling,” Kay explained. “There’s a reciprocal relationship between circadian dysfunction and metabolic dysfunction.”

According to Kay, mice with malfunctioning internal clocks get fat and develop diabetes.

Chronic jetlag may cause similar problems in people, he noted. “Understanding this close relationship between circadian regulation and metabolic homeostasis should provide novel ways of identifying new therapies for metabolic disease,” Kay said.

According to a study published in this month’s issue of Archives of Pediatrics and Adolescent Medicine, children who spend a lot of time watching television have higher blood pressure than those who watch less, even if the children are thin and get enough exercise. Associations between television viewing and obesity have already been found by previous studies, but the new report suggests a more direct relationship between extensive TV watching and increases in blood pressure.

The study performed by researchers at Michigan State University consisted of following a group of 111 children, ages 3 to 8, for about four years. The children wore accelerometers (devices that record physical motion) for a week in order to determine the amount of time that they were sedentary. The researchers also gathered information on how many hours the children spent watching TV, playing video games and using the computer. The children’s body fat was also measured.

The researchers found that children who watched television from 1.5 to 5.5 hours a day had significantly higher blood pressure than whose who watched TV less than half an hour a day. Data from the accelerometers showed that the increased blood pressure wasn’t associated with the sedentary behavior overall, but specifically linked to increased TV viewing.

Extensive TV viewing may have harmful physiological effects because:

• children often snack while watching TV;
• the programs are distressing to them;
• watching TV late at night may cut into sleep time or disrupt sleep;
• it’s also possible that watching television reduces the body’s metabolic rate more than other sedentary activities, says Joey Eisenmann, an assistant professor of kinesiology at Michigan Stat University and the paper’s senior author.

The American Academy of Pediatrics recommends that children watch no more than two hours of high quality television each day.

A newly released study from researchers at the Harvard School of Public Health in Boston found the link between diabetes and increased risk of contracting tuberculosis (TB). The researchers collected data on a sample population of 1.7 million people from 13 studies of people living in the United States, Canada, Mexico, Britain, Russia, Taiwan, South Korea and India. Their study revealed a three-fold increase in risk of having TB among the diabetic compared to the those who had none.

The researchers further noted that geographic differences did have no difference in the data collected. “With an estimated 171 million people afflicted with diabetes, a figure which is expected to double by year 2030, it is clear that (diabetes) constitutes a substantial contributor to the current and future burdens of TB globally,” epidemiologist Megan Murray, who conducted the research with Harvard colleague Christie Jeon, in an e-mail statement.

Tuberculosis is a disease caused by the germ Mycobacterium tuberculosis (TB). The bacteria usually attack the lungs but can also do damage to other parts of the body like the bones. Tuberculosis is easily contracted by people with weakened immune systems and spreads through the air when a person with TB of the lungs or throat coughs, sneezes or talks.

This development further complicates the international drive to turn back the spread of TB. Tuberculosis is second only to HIV/ AIDS among the list of top infectious diseases worldwide with high mortality rates.

Source:

www.reuters.com

Archives of Biochemistry and Biophysics, a professional journal, has recently published the results of a study done with laboratory rats which shows that alpha lipoic acid supplementation can significantly reduce triglyceride levels.

WHAT ARE TRIGLYCERIDES AND WHY DO THEY MATTER?

Triglycerides are a type of fat found in your blood. They come from the calories that you eat and which are not used right away by your body. Between meals, hormones release triglycerides for energy. If you constantly eat more calories than you burn, your triglycerides level may be high.

Along with cholesterol levels and blood pressure, triglycerides are one of the key risk factors in cardiovascular disease.

WHAT THE STUDY CONSISTED OF

Laboratory rats were under supervision for four weeks. Various previous studies have shown alpha lipoic acid supplements to be an appetite suppressant. That is why control groups of lab animals were used in this research to ensure that the cause of lower triglyceride levels was not just less food intake. The animals used in the experiment were obese to begin with, and their triglyceride levels increased as the experiment proceeded and as they aged, but the difference between the animals given alpha lipoic acid and those that were not given supplements was huge. At the end of the four weeks, the blood triglyceride levels doubled in the animals given the alpha lipoic acid supplement, but went up more than 400 percent in the group that was not given lipoic acid.

Alpha Lipoic Acid supplements reduced the triglyceride levels by up to 60 percent in the animals under study.

THE IMPORTANCE OF THIS STUDY RESULTS

Regis Moreau, an assistant professor with the Linus Pauling Institute at Oregon State University and a member of the team that conducted this study, said that “The extent of triglyceride reduction was really dramatic, we didn’t expect it to be this profound. (…) The potential is good that this could become another way to lower blood triglycerides and help reduce the risk of atherosclerosis. It’s pretty exciting.”

While medication used to treat hypertriglyceridemia has unwanted side effects which still remain a concern, alpha lipoic acid has been used by thousands of people for years as a dietary supplement and found to be safe.

“We believe that a novel means of controlling triglyceridemia in this animal model has been revealed,” researchers wrote in their report. “Given its strong safety record, lipoic acid may have therapeutic applications for the treatment or prevention of hypertriglyceridemia and diabetic dyslipidemia in humans.”

See below a good picture illustrating this article. On the left you can see the blood plasma of the rats that were fed a normal diet. It is murky and with higher levels of fat. In the vial on the right you can see the plasma from rats supplemented with lipoic acid. As you can see, it is much clearer and with lower levels of triglycerides.

Resources on alpha lipoic acid:

• one of my previous blog posts on alpha lipoic acid: ALA;
• great info on R vs S Alpha Lipoic Acid: R-ALA -very useful!;
• Alpha Lipoic Acid and it’s health benefits: R-ALA benefits

Ruth Taylor

Eighty percent of the US population eats some form of corn protein every day. Corn is normally a safe food which does not cause allergies. Then how come people like Grace Booth or Keith Finger almost died of anaphylactic shock after consuming chicken enchiladas and tortillas? It was all because of a genetically modified corn product called StarLink, which contained a potential allergen and was not approved for human consumption.

If StarLink was not approved for human consumption how did it get into tacos, tortillas, and other corn products?

What did the FDA do about this? What tests did they perform to establish whether StarLink was safe or not?

If you are interested in finding the answer to those questions you can read the entire article.

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The latest on the compound resveratrol: scientists and researchers at Eppley Institute for Research in Cancer and Allied Diseases at the University of Nebraska Medical Center have found that resveratrol, a compound naturally-occurring in red wine and grape skins, has suppressed abnormal cell growth that leads to the formation of most forms of breast cancer. The study was released in the latest issue for July 2008 of the Cancer Prevention Research.

The study proponents have found that resveratrol inhibited increased estrogen levels that fuels the formation of abnormal cell growth and multiplication. This is a well-known risk factor in most types of breast cancer. Though the study has yet to confirm this finding in human subjects, this preliminary finding has shown the promise of resveratrol as a preventive and supplement against the most common forms of breast cancer.

Resveratrol was also found to inhibit a cancer formation process in this case the expression of a gene (CYP1B1) and formation of a harmful compound (2,3,7,8-Tetrachlorodibenzo-p-dioxin) that usually precludes most types of breast cancer. The dosage of resveratrol used for the study was also noteworthy because it was just equivalent to the amount of resveratrol to be found in one glass of red wine.

Breast cancer incidence rate (2004 statistics being the latest) in the U.S. was reported at 186,772 in women and 1,815 in men. It is also the sixth-leading cause of death among U.S. women (2004).

Needless to say, prevention is still the key against breast cancer. With the increasing health benefits being discovered for resveratrol, prevention might have a new weapon.

Sources:

http://womens-health-news-feed.com/art617137.asp

http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/breast/statistics/

A report, released on July 1, 2008 done by Environmental Working Group (EWG), Washington-based nonprofit organization, has claimed that up to 84% of commercially available sunscreens have been found not as effective as their labels have claimed. This was arrived at by the group after review of reviewed articles on the effectiveness of active ingredients.

The problems of this supposed ineffectiveness were that ingredients found commonly in sunscreens offer limited protection against a broad spectrum of ultraviolet rays such as UVA and UVB. The group has called on the Food and Drug Administration (FDA) to implement stricter rules and labeling regulations concerning sunscreens.

It is of note too, that the FDA has been developing guidelines concerning sunscreens since 1978 but since 1999, there has been a standstill until the present, as there has still some issues like this one to warrant an issue of finalization of guidelines.

There is still no other protection to exposed skin from sun damage that can result to the development of skin cancer (melanoma) other than taking preventive measures. These measures are limiting one’s exposure to the sun between 11 am-3 pm in the day (when skin-damaging UVA and UVB rays from the sun are strongest), use of appropriate sunscreen and a healthy lifestyle which can also lessen the risk of having other types of cancer as well.

Prevention is still our best bet against skin cancer.

Sources:

http://www.cdc.gov/cancer/skin/

http://www.newsweek.com/id/33384

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