Posts tagged with "disease"

MONKEYPOX LA

The United States declares monkeypox a national health emergency

Unfortunately, Los Angeles is plagued by monkeypox. As mysterious as it has become, human scientists have defined it as a disease that is further from the truth. In fact, many authoritative sources have labeled it a disease of gay men, when in fact it is closer to the dermis than a medical skin condition. A rash that begins to appear like chickenpox. These are the types of hybrids of ebene pimples that he obtained through several seasons. According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), it is widely spread through kissing, anal, oral, vaginal, skin-to-skin contact, and soiled bedding such as towels. TikTok, the social media platform, has come to the rescue with recorded testimonials assuring us that ghee we are not gay and that they got it from the masseur during a spa service or a night out with a woman. Yet with more than 6,000 cases moving from west to east as covid unfolds, one wonders if hospitals will be overwhelmed during their intersection. One thing is for sure as Los Angeles’ coronavirus numbers flatten. Click HERE for Los Angeles County’s Weekly Monkeypox Case and Vaccine Summary.

Although where the Monkeypox is most inclined is in three states: The states of Washington, New York and Georgia have the highest concentration of cases. Most infections have happened among homosexual men. The World Health Organization (WHO) prescription of reducing the number of partners for men who have sex with men to curb the disease has offended the gay community, which fears that a stigma like that experienced with HIV will be repeated. Efforts to combat monkeypox are not being enough to prevent its rapid spread in the United States. For this reason, the Joe Biden government has decided to declare a national health emergency regarding the disease, a step that it has resisted taking until now. The WHO already declared an international emergency on July 23.

Limit Concealed Carry Guns

After conducting investigations on the homeless, they seem to be in the direct line of danger. Pleading for water and a cell charger around 3am in central LA, this is bar far from the most marginalized group at risk. During a probe of Pico Blvd, we witnessed the indigent in search of finding electricity for their small appliances. On the other hand, this walking case study began at a popular bar in Santa Monica and ended at a Brazilian restaurant with hanging canopy lights attached to an exposed extension cord and plug. Once both our cell and smart watch died, this became a lifeline for us to grab am shared ride as there were no law enforcement in site for well over seven hours. With petty crime and murder on the climb, there’s a huge demand to own a concealed weapon in both LA and NYC. The new law in New York establishes a strict licensing process to obtain a concealed carry permit and a list of places considered “sensitive”.

Click HERE for Los Angeles crime statistics and citywide traffic statistics.

Apply for a License

Every day, New York residents seeking a CCW permit begin their gun permit certification process with US Concealed (New York state approved agency). To find out if you can have a gun license in New York State, US Concealed has put together a simpler online concealed carry permit qualification survey and see if you could get a license. click HERE for further information.

Article: Vaughn Lowery

Tick Test – Reduce Lyme Infection

Between global warming and the post-pandemic push to move to the suburbs, there has been a huge uptick in the number of tick-borne illnesses. Lyme, recently dubbed the fastest growing disease in the world, is a major concern primarily in the Northeast but there are a host of other tick-borne illnesses including 15 others such as Borrelia, Powassan, and Alpha-gal Syndrome. Bottom line: reduce the chance of infection by removing ticks fast and safely. Get detailed information, illustrations, and videos about how to check yourself, your family, and your pets for ticks, and how to remove them correctly, at TickEase.com.

1. Ticks only bite in the summer—False

Ticks are active year-round and found in all 50 states. Nymphal ticks are harder to see and are out in the spring and early summer. Cold weather does not kill them. They are mostly dormant but have been seen in February thanks to global warming.

2. Ticks only live in wooded areas, not the beach—False

Ticks also hide in bushes, ground cover, and beach grass.

3. You must live near deer to find deer ticks—False

Deer are not the only deer hosts. They feed on mice, birds, chipmunks, raccoons, squirrels, birds, and even reptiles. Ticks have been around for millions of years and have infected many food sources.

4. Ticks jump from trees or fly—False

No, ticks do not jump or fly but they do climb trees and hide in the bark. They usually stay closer to the ground waiting for prey, such as you or your pet.

5. You can feel a tick bite you—False

Untrue as ticks secrete a numbing agent before they bite. Fewer than 50 percent of Lyme patients recall being bitten.

6. Ticks can smell blood—False

Ticks can detect carbon dioxide, ammonia in sweat, and heat from potential hosts. Your breath is their favorite scent. No amount of insect repellent can detect you from 50 feet or more away.

7. Ticks must remain attached to you for 24-36 hours to transmit a disease—False

The length of time a tick stays attached depends on the tick species, tick life stage, and host response to the bite. The bottom line: You want to get rid of a tick as quickly as possible. An infected tick can transmit the deadly Powassan virus in a matter of minutes.

8. Best way to remove a tick is with a match—False

This is potentially dangerous and painful. Agitating the tick can put you at a higher risk of exposure. Other popular myths about removing ticks by smothering it with oil, butter, nail polish, nail polish remover, dish detergent, Vaseline, alcohol, or aftershave all pose the same risk as burning.

9. A tick head borrowed under your skin can transmit disease after you remove the body—False

Ticks don’t have heads. They have barbed mouth parts that can remain in the skin if the entire tick is not removed. These can cause skin inflammation or local infection.

10. Dispose of an embedded tick by flushing it down the toilet—False

There are several reasons not to flush it. It is best to save the tick and so it can tested if needed, and many states have free testing services. It’s helpful to know what type of tick bit you and what type of pathogens or parasites it is carrying.

11. If you get Lyme from a tick, a bullseye rash will appear—False

Less than 50% of Lyme disease patients ever find a bullseye rash or any rash at all. Rashes can present in many different ways. Some are red and some are pink. Some are big and blotchy or spotted.

12. If your blood test is negative, you have not been infected—False

There’s still no reliable blood test for tick-borne diseases. That’s why it’s so important to be vigilant about checking for ticks and removing them properly if you find one.

Don’t Freak Out During Tick Season

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By: Sandra Lee, CEO, NJ Labs

Ticks are a year-long issue, but the season for ticks peaks from April to October. Are you ready for tick season? Do not ignore it. Do not freak out.

What was once a regional issue has now become a national problem because of the migration of these bugs and the increasing frequency in which people travel and spend time outdoors. When it comes to ticks, most people are concerned about being infected with Lyme disease, a bacterial infection caused by the bacterium Borrelia Burgdorferi that is transmitted to humans through the bite of blacklegged or deer ticks. Lyme Disease is an inflammatory disease that if left untreated can lead to possible arthritis and neurological and cardiac disorders. The CDC estimates that there are about 300,000 cases of Lyme Disease per year, with more than 96% concentrated in the Northeast and upper Midwestern United States. However, there are many other tick species across the United States that also spread disease and cause virus-like symptoms including headaches, fever, fatigue, chills and muscle aches. This makes tick testing crucial, so you know the tick that bit you. Tick testing is a proactive measure to take that can help a doctor or veterinarian determine the best course of action to treat a tick-borne pathogen.

Be Aware of the Tick Types

Before learning more about tick testing, it is important to know the kinds of tick you or your pet may come across. The known species of ticks in the United States that bite and transmit diseases include:

Black-legged Tick (deer tick), which transmit Lyme disease, Anaplasmosis, Babesiosis and Powassan Disease; found mostly in the Northeast and Upper Midwest of the United States.
American Dog Tick (wood tick), which transmits Tularemia and Rocky Mountain Spotted Fever; mostly found east of the Rocky Mountains and along the California coast.
Lone Star Tick (turkey tick), which transmits bacteria that cause Ehrlichiosis, Tularemia and STARI; found widely in the eastern half of the United States.
Gulf Coast Tick, which transmits Rickettsioses; found across the Atlantic seaboard and the Gulf of Mexico.
Brown Dog Tick (kennel tick), which transmits Rocky Mountain spotted fever; found worldwide and transmits the fever in Southwestern United States.
Western Black-legged Tick, which transmits Lyme disease and Anaplasmosis; found along the Pacific Coast.
Rocky Mountain Wood Tick, which transmits Rocky Mountain spotted fever, Colorado tick fever and Tularemia; found in the Rocky Mountain states.

Tick Prevention

You may encounter a tick during everyday activities. Tick populations tend to be in elevated, wooded and grassy areas where creatures they feed on live. However, they can also be found in populated urban areas and coastal locations. Ticks enjoy moist and humid environments, like wood piles, leaf piles and litter, bird feeders, or fallen and low-hanging branches. Some ticks are also found in homes, such as the Brown Dog Tick and Soft ticks. To prevent the at-home ticks from entering your home be sure to keep lawn grasses low, eliminate leaf litter and distribute gravel to create a zone that prevents ticks from coming in. Additionally, here are some tips to prevent tick bites:

Avoid direct contact with ticks by avoiding wooded and grassy areas; and if hiking, stay near the center of trails.
Dress appropriately with long pants and long sleeves, and ensure the clothing has been pretreated with permethrin, or spray 0.5% permethrin on clothing.
Immediately take a shower after coming home from outdoors, and check for ticks on body, gear and pets.
Tumble dry clothes on high heat for 10 minutes to kill any ticks.
Use monthly flea and tick medications for pets as recommended by your veterinarian.

Tick Testing Peace of Mind

There are specific steps to take if you or your pet get bit by a tick. When removing the tick, you must be cautious because the way the tick is removed can affect whether or not a pathogen-positive tick’s disease will be transmitted to you or your pet’s bloodstream. To safely remove a tick, use plastic tweezers to grasp the tick, pull the tick upward with steady pressure, and thoroughly clean and disinfect the bite area. Do not use metal cosmetic tweezers that could damage the tick or the skin. After the tick is removed, do not burn, freeze or squeeze the tick. Make sure to monitor the affected area for signs of infection. Immediately send the tick into a lab that uses a DNA-based method to test for common tick-borne pathogens, including Lyme disease.

Having a tick test and sample collection kit can make this process easier, especially if you are on vacation or outdoors. For peace of mind, and to be sure about the tick that bit you, I recommend including a Tick SURE kit to your first-aid kit. The Tick SURE kit includes simple directions on how to remove a tick along with plastic tweezers and safe packaging for the tick to be sent in a pre-paid, first-class envelope that is delivered to the FDA and DEA inspection lab for full identification and testing. Once the tick arrives at the lab, the tick’s DNA is extracted to identify the species, then tested for the different pathogens it may carry. Having a tick test and sample collection kit on hand will alleviate unnecessary stress if you come in contact with a tick because you will know what to do with it. At the same time, you send the tick in for testing, make an appointment with your doctor or veterinarian if you or your pet are not experiencing any symptoms. Sometimes symptoms do not show up until later, but the sooner you can get checked out the quicker you can be treated. Having the lab results of the tick in hand will help the doctor determine the best course of action.

What Does A Positive Test Mean?

If the tick test results from the lab come back positive, don’t panic. A positive tick test does not mean that you or your pet have the disease; a positive tick test just means the pathogen in the tick has been detected. If you are diagnosed with Lyme disease early, doctors can use antibiotics to get rid of the disease within the first 14 days after transmission. However, if left untreated, Lyme disease may stay with you for the rest of your life. Another reason why testing is so important.

Don’t Freak Out

Being aware of tick season and taking preventive measures are the first steps toward protecting you and your pet’s health. A tick test and sample collection kit is an important addition to your first aid kit so you can enjoy your time outdoors. You can view videos and pictures HERE so you can be sure about the types of ticks you encounter and be prepared with the next steps. Most importantly, do not freak out when you encounter a tick. Mistakes can be made with tick removal if you are in a panic. We cannot avoid the outdoors, but we can be aware of the critters that live there, and the hitchhikers that come along with them, so we know what to do if a tick bites you.

Biography

Sandra Lee is the CEO of NJ Labs, a nationally recognized provider and advocate for quality in chemistry and microbiology testing that serves the pharmaceutical, nutraceutical, dietary supplement, cosmetic and cannabis/CBD industries. As a scientist and one of the few female CEOs in the analytical testing industry, she has a passion for chemistry and how it influences multiple aspects of our daily lives. At NJ Labs she leads the privately-owned FDA and DEA inspected facility that has been a mainstay in the testing industry for 85 years with a certified full-service contract analytical testing laboratory that follows strict Current Good Manufacturing Practice (CGMP) regulations and holds ISO/IEC 17025:2017 accreditation. She also hosts the “Going Beyond Testing” podcast series to help companies and consumers get an insider’s look at testing practices and what should be tested to keep products safe and effective. Lee is a graduate of the University of Michigan where she holds a Bachelor of Science degree in Chemistry.

LISTERIA OUTBREAK

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If you are a frequent buyer of bagged salad or vegetable greens items, you will want to proceed with caution during consumption for the next few weeks.

Dole Fresh Vegetables announced on December 23, 2021, that there would be a recall of 180 different packaged salads due to probable contamination with Listeria monocytogenes. The recall affects nine different brands, including Dole-branded salads, Ahold, Lidl, Kroger, Little Salad Bar, Marketside, Naturally Better, Nature’s Promise and Simply Nature. 180 products were spread through 25 states in total.

The Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) issued an announcement stating there is an investigation underway to examine the listeria outbreak that connects to two separate packaged salads produced by Dole. Research is ongoing to determine if more products may be affected.

The recall is directly linked to Dole’s Bessemer City, North Carolina, and Yuma, Arizona, production facilities. Listeria monocytogenes were discovered in a Dole-branded Garden Salad package at the site in North Carolina, as well as a package of shredded iceberg lettuce from the Yuma location, via the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA).

Operations at both spots have been halted to ensure cleaning and sanitation procedures are followed through.

Products in the recall lot

Packaged products consisting of mixed greens, garden salads, Caesar kits and varying types of salads in bags or clamshells
“Best if used by” dates from November 30, 2021, to January 8, 2022
Product lot code begins with the letter “N” or “Y” found in the upper-right corner of packages

A full list of recalled products can be found HERE.

To stay safe…

Dispose of recalled packaged salads and follow cleaning procedures to ensure your space is clean.

Call your healthcare provider if you experience any of the following symptoms following the consumption of packaged salads:

Pregnant individuals encountering fever, fatigue and muscle aches. Listeria can result in pregnancy loss or premature birth, as well as serious illness or death in newborns.
Non-pregnant individuals may suffer headache, stiff neck, confusion, loss of balance and convulsions, paired with fever and muscle aches.

Beach Yoga SoCal × LupasLA – Friendsgiving

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Beach Yoga SoCal is celebrating Friendsgiving with a month of gratitude offering unique, beachfront wellness experiences throughout the month of November to raise awareness for Lupus LA. The popular Santa Monica wellness studio is offering a Friendsgiving package of “10 shareable classes for $150” through Nov. 30, with 10% of all profit from Friendsgiving sales being donated to Lupus LA, a leading nonprofit health organization dedicated to finding the causes and a cure for Lupus. Perfect for locals and tourists alike, Beach Yoga SoCal provides daily wellness by the water for all levels while supporting a great cause!

Vee Desai Gomez, Founder and Lead Instructor of Beach Yoga SoCal began teaching yoga after being diagnosed with Lupus, an autoimmune illness five years ago. Vee quickly realized the benefits of yoga and how it helped her cope with her illness. “I am excited to offer our all-levels yoga classes to raise awareness and support Lupus LA, a wonderful organization supporting a cause near and dear to my heart,” says Gomez. Vee is also an Autoimmune Coach, and her coaching program is called Immune Strong Coaching.

“The therapeutic effect of being by the water improves mental and physical health and has a number of important mental health benefits that help cope with the disease. All of your senses are heightened when you spend time on the beach. Staring at the blue ocean actually changes brain wave frequency, and puts us in a meditative state. The sound of the waves, coupled with the sight of the ocean, activates the parasympathetic nervous system which allows us to relax and be more engaged. The oxygen atoms by the ocean have an extra electron which gives the atom a negative charge. This allows you to breathe deeper and fill your lung capacity resulting in an energy boost. In my classes, I show students how to connect with their environment while bending and moving the body in a functional way.”

In addition to the “10 classes for $150” Friendsgiving promotion, BYSC will also be offering a full moon ceremony on Nov. 19th which includes intention setting, yoga, and sound bath. Athleta will also be sponsoring the Signature Beach Flow class on Nov. 14 & Nov. 28th at 10:30 a.m. and giving away free swag bags and raffling a $100 gift certificate to attendees (while supplies last).

Beach Yoga SoCal (BYSC) offers 25 classes per week for all levels taught by leading West Coast wellness instructors, with a variety of wellness experiences such as yoga, sound baths, meditations, various sunrise and sunset beach flow sessions, restorative slow flow, and sunset Yoga nidra and savasana. Class prices range from 10 classes for $150 (3 months to use and are shareable with family and friends), $25 drop-in, and unlimited $200 (excludes workshops or events). Members get special invites, discounts, events, health happy hours, and more.

Beach Yoga SoCal has two locations directly on the beach in Santa Monica, CA. The first is in front of Perry’s Cafe by the water, South of Santa Monica Pier and just North of Lifeguard Tower 26. The second location is North of Santa Monica Pier by Lifeguard Tower 2, in front of the Annenberg Community Beach House. Parking is located at 2600 Barnard Way Santa Monica, CA 90405 for $1/hr, 2 hr Max (lot is on the right). The big lot on the left is all-day parking for $12 per day. Walk towards Perry’s Beach Cafe.

Rice Team Creates New Treatment for Diabetes

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Rice University bioengineers are using 3D printing and smart biomaterials to create an insulin-producing implant for Type 1 diabetics.

The three-year project is a partnership between the laboratories of Omid Veiseh and Jordan Miller that’s supported by a grant from JDRF, the leading global funder of diabetes research. Veiseh and Miller will use insulin-producing beta cells made from human stem cells to create an implant that senses and regulates blood glucose levels by responding with the correct amount of insulin at a given time.

Veiseh, an assistant professor of bioengineering, has spent more than a decade developing biomaterials that protect implanted cell therapies from the immune system. Miller, an associate professor of bioengineering, has spent more than 15 years researching techniques to 3D print tissues with vasculature, or networks of blood vessels.

“If we really want to recapitulate what the pancreas normally does, we need vasculature,” Veiseh said. “And that’s the purpose of this grant with JDRF. The pancreas naturally has all these blood vessels, and cells are organized in particular ways in the pancreas. Jordan and I want to print in the same orientation that exists in nature.”

Type 1 diabetes is an autoimmune disease that causes the pancreas to stop producing insulin, the hormone that controls blood-sugar levels. About 1.6 million Americans live with Type 1 diabetes, and more than 100 cases are diagnosed each day. Type 1 diabetes can be managed with insulin injections. But balancing insulin intake with eating, exercise and other activities is difficult. Studies estimate that fewer than one-third of Type 1 diabetics in the U.S. consistently achieve target blood glucose levels.

Veiseh and Miller’s goal is to show their implants can properly regulate blood glucose levels of diabetic mice for at least six months. To do that, they’ll need to give their engineered beta cells the ability to respond to rapid changes in blood sugar levels.

“We must get implanted cells in close proximity to the bloodstream so beta cells can sense and respond quickly to changes in blood glucose,” Miller said. “We’re using a combination of pre-vascularization through advanced 3D bioprinting and host-mediated vascular remodeling to give each implant several shots at host integration.”

The insulin-producing cells will be protected with a hydrogel formulation developed by Veiseh, who is also a Cancer Prevention and Research Institute of Texas Scholar. The hydrogel material, which has proven effective for encapsulating cell treatments in bead-sized spheres, has pores small enough to keep the cells inside from being attacked by the immune system but large enough to allow passage of nutrients and life-giving insulin.

“Blood vessels can go inside of them,” Veiseh said of the hydrogel compartments. “At the same time, we have our coating, our small molecules that prevent the body from rejecting the gel. So it should harmonize really well with the body.”

If the implant is too slow to respond to high or low blood sugar levels, the delay can produce a roller coaster-like effect, where insulin levels repeatedly rise and fall to dangerous levels.

“Addressing that delay is a huge problem in this field,” Veiseh said. “When you give the mouse, and ultimately a human, a glucose challenge that mimics eating a meal, how long does it take that information to reach our cells, and how quickly does the insulin come out?”

By incorporating blood vessels in their implant, he and Miller hope to allow their beta-cell tissues to behave in a way that more closely mimics the natural behavior of the pancreas.

Brain Tumor Infocon

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By: Skyler Johnson

The Brain Tumor Infocon was an event that took place this past week, via Zoom because of the pandemic. The event was not for cancer patients themselves but for those that cared for them. They gave four talks on four separate days, each regarding a different topic. I attended the workshop focusing on children and young adults. All different types of people attended, from parents caring for children to friends caring for friends. But they came for the same reason, to try and gain advice towards dealing with cancer patients. And hopefully they left gaining more information then they had entered with. Here’s what I learned from the event:

Brain Cancer Changes Who a Person is

This must be terrifying to go through, but it does make sense. After all, the brain is where a person’s thoughts, feelings, and emotions are stored, and cancer destroys that. When a person has cancer you have to see them change. There’s not much anyone can do about it, there’s no way to prevent it, but it is something that happens nonetheless.

Don’t Be Afraid to Say “Cancer”

For a person with cancer, it can be incredibly isolating when their caregiver doesn’t use the actual word. For children, it can be hard to understand what’s wrong with them if they don’t know what they’re going through if they don’t have the actual term to define it. It’s the same with emotions. Caregivers shouldn’t be afraid to show emotions just because they don’t want to upset those they’re caring for. It’s another thing that can make people feel very alone.

The Question Jar

The presenter recommended a question jar for child patients who may be shy about asking questions regarding their cancer. The caregiver, a parent, would leave the jar in a heavily trafficked part of the house, like a kitchen or living room, and the child can put questions in the jar whenever they’d like. The caregiver would answer their questions periodically, not directly after the child put the concern in. You wouldn’t want them to know you’re keeping track.

Feel Free to Take Time for Yourself

Having to take care of a cancer patient can be a daunting task, and one thing that was heavily encouraged was having caregivers taking time for themselves. They can’t be there for another person if they can’t be there for themselves. Exercise. Watch TV. Walk the dog. Anything that’ll help calm.

Everyone has a Different Definition of Caring

This is the first lesson I learned, and the most important. The presenter asked the group how they defined caring, which is not something I’d thought about previously. Several of the attendees answered, each in different ways. To some people, caring meant what caring means to most people: helping someone else through their day, making sure they’re content. If I answered the question I might’ve used an anecdote. But for one person it meant “loving and hurting,” which is, I can imagine, the most accurate. Caring can be painful. Caring can be suffering. Because you have to watch them fall apart, and get emotional in front of them, and despite all the advice people may give you, while caregiving will always be loving, it will also be hurting.

Houston Methodist × Rice University

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Houston Methodist, Rice U. launch neuroprosthetic collaboration

Center for Translational Neural Prosthetics and Interfaces to focus on restoring brain function after disease, injury

Neurosurgery’s history of cutting diseases out of the brain is morphing into a future in which implanting technology intothe brain may help restore function, movement, cognition and memory after patients suffer strokes, spinal cord injuries and other neurological disorders. Rice University and Houston Methodist have forged a partnership to launch the Center for Translational Neural Prosthetics and Interfaces, a collaboration that brings together scientists, clinicians, engineers and surgeons to solve clinical problems with neurorobotics.

“This will be an accelerator for discovery,” said center co-director Dr. Gavin Britz, chair of the Houston Methodist Department of Neurosurgery. “This center will be a human laboratory where all of us — neurosurgeons, neuroengineers, neurobiologists — can work together to solve biomedical problems in the brain and spinal cord. And it’s a collaboration that can finally offer some hope and options for the millions of people worldwide who suffer from brain diseases and injuries.”

Houston Methodist neurosurgeons, seven engineers from the Rice Neuroengineering Initiative and additional physicians and faculty from both institutions form the center’s core team. The center also plans to hire three additional engineers who will have joint appointments at Houston Methodist and Rice. Key focus areas include spinal cord injury, memory and epilepsy studies, and cortical motor/sensation conditions.

“The Rice Neuroengineering Initiative was formed with this type of partnership in mind,” said center co-director Behnaam Aazhang, Rice’s J.S. Abercrombie Professor of Electrical and Computer Engineering, who also directs the neuroengineering initiative, which launched in 2019 to bring together the brightest minds in neuroscience, engineering and related fields to improve lives by restoring and extending the capabilities of the human brain. “Several core members, myself included, have existing collaborations with our colleagues at Houston Methodist in the area of neural prosthetics. The creation of the Center for Translational Neural Prosthetics and Interfaces is an exciting development toward achieving our common goals.”

The physical space for the center’s operation includes more than 25,000 square feet of Rice Neuroengineering Initiative laboratories and experimental spaces in the university’s BioScience Research Collaborative, as well as an extensive build-out underway at Houston Methodist’s West Pavilion location that’s expected to be completed late this year. The Houston Methodist facility will include operating rooms and a human laboratory where ongoing patient/volunteer diagnosis and assessment, device fabrication and testing, and education and training opportunities are planned.

“This partnership is a perfect blend of talent,” said Rice’s Marcia O’Malley, a core member of both the new center and university initiative and the Thomas Michael Panos Family Professor in Mechanical Engineering. “We will be able to design studies to test the efficacy of inventions and therapies and rely on patients and volunteers who want to help us test our ideas. The possibilities are limitless.”

Houston Methodist neurobiologist Philip Horner describes the lab as “a merging of wetware with hardware,” where robotics, computers, electronic arrays and other technology — the hardware — is incorporated into the human brain or spinal cord — the wetware. The centerpiece of this working laboratory is a zero-gravity harness connected to a walking track, with cameras and sensors to record feedback, brain activity and other data.

While the Houston Methodist space is being built, collaborations already are underway between the two institutions, which sit across Main Street from one another in the Texas Medical Center. Among them are the following:

O’Malley and Houston Methodist’s Dr. Dimitry Sayenko, assistant professor of neurosurgery, will head the first pilot project involving the merging of two technologies to restore hand function following a spinal cord injury or stroke. O’Malley will pair the upper limb exoskeleton she invented with Sayenko’s noninvasive stimulator designed to wake up the spinal cord. Together, they hope these technologies will help patients achieve a more extensive recovery — and at a faster pace.
Rice neuroengineer Lan Luan, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering, and Britz, a neurosurgeon, are collaborating on a study to measure the neurovascular response following a subarachnoid hemorrhage, a life-threatening stroke caused by bleeding just outside the brain. Two-thirds of people who suffer these brain bleeds either die or end up with permanent disabilities. Luan invented very small and flexible electrodes that can be implanted in the brain to measure, record and map its activities. Her work with mice could lead to human brain implants that may help patients recover from traumatic brain injuries caused by disease or accidents.
Aazhang, Britz and Taiyun Chi, assistant professor of electrical and computer engineering at Rice, are collaborating on the detection of mild traumatic brain injuries (mTBI) from multimodal observations and on alleviating mTBI using neuromodulations. This project is of particular interest to the Department of Defense.

Antibody Cocktail May Prevent Symptomatic COVID-19 Infections

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An antibody cocktail being tested at UVA Health and other sites was able to block 100% of symptomatic COVID-19 infections among people exposed to the virus, early results from the clinical trial suggest.

In addition, those who developed asymptomatic infections accumulated far less virus in their bodies than usual and saw their infections resolve within a week, according to interim data released by the cocktail’s manufacturer, Regeneron Pharmaceuticals.

“This is the first treatment shown to prevent COVID-19 after a known exposure, and offers protection for unvaccinated individuals caring for a family member with COVID-19,” said UVA Health’s William Petri Jr., MD, PhD, one of the leaders of the trial at UVA. “We expect that Regeneron will file for Emergency Use Authorization from the FDA so that this drug can be used outside of the context of a clinical trial.”

Antibodies for COVID-19

The phase 3 clinical trial aims to determine if the antibodies will prevent COVID-19 infection in people who have been exposed but not yet developed the disease. This is known as “passive immunization.”

Regeneron’s new analysis, which has not yet been published in a scientific journal, looked at outcomes in approximately 400 trial participants. Of 186 people who received the antibodies, none developed symptomatic COVID-19. Of the 223 who received a placebo, eight developed symptomatic COVID-19, the company reports.

Asymptomatic infections occurred in 15 of the antibody recipients and in 23 of the placebo recipients. Overall rates of infection, including both symptomatic and asymptomatic infections, were approximately 50% lower in the antibody group.

Among those who developed infections, placebo recipients had, on average, a peak viral load (the amount of virus in the body) that was more than 100 times greater than antibody recipients. The antibody group also recovered more quickly–all the infections resolved within seven days, while 40 percent of infections in the placebo group lasted three to four weeks, Regeneron said.

The cocktail also appears to shorten the duration of viral shedding, the time when the virus is being manufactured in the body. The viral shedding period was nine weeks among antibody recipients and 44 weeks among the placebo recipients. While people with COVID-19 are not infectious for this entire time, reducing the duration of viral shedding may shorten the period when they can spread the disease.

There were more adverse events reported among placebo recipients than among antibody recipients – 18 percent and 12 percent, respectively. Regeneron attributed this to the larger number of COVID-19 infections in the placebo group.

There was one death and one COVID-19-related hospitalization in the placebo group and none in the antibody group. Injection-site reactions were reported among 2 percent of both groups.

“We are profoundly grateful to the nurses and staff of the UVA COVID-19 clinic, led by Dr. Debbie-Anne Shirley,” Petri said. “Their day-to-day support made our participation in this trial possible.”

About the Clinical Trial

Phase 3 clinical trials, such as the one under way at UVA, examine the safety and effectiveness of new drugs and treatments in large numbers of people. Positive results in the phase 3 trial could spur the federal Food and Drug Administration to make the antibody cocktail available for post-exposure COVID-19 prevention.

The antibody cocktail is not a vaccine and is not expected to provide permanent immunity to COVID-19.

The team conducting the study at UVA is led by Petri and Shirley and includes Gregory Madden, MD; Chelsea Marie, PhD; Jennifer Sasson, MD; Jae Shin, MD; Cirle Warren, MD; Clinical Research Coordinator Igor Shumilin; assistant Rebecca Carpenter; and COVID-19 Clinic nurses Michelle Sutton, Elizabeth Brooks, Danielle Donigan, Cynthia Edwards, Jennifer Pinnata, Samantha Simmons and Rebecca Wade.

To keep up with the latest medical research news from UVA, subscribe to the Making of Medicine blog.

UVA on Battling Diseases by Exercise

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A top exercise researcher and colleagues at the University of Virginia School of Medicine have launched an ambitious effort to understand the whole-body benefits of exercise so that doctors can use that information to prevent and treat disease.

Zhen Yan, PhD, and his collaborators aim to identify the sources, functions and targets of the molecules that provide exercise’s well-documented health benefits. By understanding this, doctors will better understand how exercise helps fend off disease, and they may be able to design drugs to mimic those benefits for people who cannot exercise, such as those with limited mobility. The cutting-edge research could open new doors both for preventing and treating many common illnesses, the researchers hope.

“No one would dispute that physical activity or regular exercise is the best measures for health promotion and disease prevention,” said Yan, director of the Center for Skeletal Muscle Research at UVA’s Robert M. Berne Cardiovascular Research Center. “In fact, the health benefits of exercise are way beyond our imagination. The underlying reasons for the superb health benefits of exercise are being uncovered by many talented and passionate scientists around the world.”

Understanding How Exercise Improves Health

The UVA researchers have recently joined a national consortium seeking to create a “molecular map” of exercise benefits. Known as the Molecular Transducers of Physical Activity Consortium, or MoTrPAC, the group includes researchers at top institutions across the country, including Harvard, Duke, Stanford and Mayo Clinic.

The consortium came about after the National Institutes of Health invited Yan and a dozen other prominent scientists to a roundtable discussion in 2010 about the future of exercise research and the obstacles that stood in its way. The NIH then set aside almost $170 million for MoTrPAC’s research – believed to be the agency’s largest-ever investment into the mechanisms of how physical activity improves health and prevents disease.

“The program’s goal,” Yan explained, “is to study the molecular changes that occur during and after exercise and ultimately to advance the understanding of how physical activity improves and preserves health.”

The consortium is looking at exercise benefits in both humans and animal models. Initial animal research was conducted at Harvard, the University of Iowa and the University of Florida. In the latest round, UVA is joined by the University of Missouri, the University of Kansas Medical Center and the University of California, Los Angeles.

The vast amount of information collected as part of the project so far has poised the UVA team to make “unprecedented” advances, Yan reports. He and his multi-disciplinary team will employ advanced computer algorithms to sift through the heaps of data to identify specific molecules to study. They will then conduct state-of-the-art research in lab mice using gene editing, combined with a wide range of functional assessment, including muscle, cardiac, metabolic and cognitive/mental functions. This will let them determine the effects the molecules have and lay a foundation for doctors to harness the molecules to benefit human health in the future.

Yan’s team will work closely with colleagues at Stanford, who will conduct advanced “multiomics” analyses, meaning they will bring together data on genes, cellular proteins and much more to obtain a more holistic understanding of exercise’s benefits to the body.

UVA’s research team includes Yan, of the Robert M. Berne Cardiovascular Research Center and the Departments of Medicine, Pharmacology and Molecular Physiology and Biological Physics; Wenhao Xu, PhD, of the Department of Microbiology, Immunology and Cancer Biology; Chongzhi Zang, PhD, of UVA’s Center for Public Health Genomics, the Department of Public Health Sciences and the Department of Biochemistry and Molecular Genetics; Matthew Wolf, MD, PhD, of the Department of Medicine’s Division of Cardiovascular Medicine and the Robert M. Berne Cardiovascular Research Center; Thurl Harris, PhD, of the Department of Pharmacology; and Alban Gaultier, PhD, and John Lukens, PhD, both part of UVA’s Department of Neuroscience and the Center for Brain Immunology and Glia (BIG).

“It is well known that exercise is one of the best treatments for mood disorders,” Gaultier said. “We are excited to test the group discoveries using animal models of anxiety and depression.”

“This is an exciting opportunity for team science,” Zang said. “I am happy to work with colleagues at UVA and across the country and use data-science approaches to unravel the complex molecular effects of exercise.”

UVA’s effort has received almost a half-million dollars in backing from the NIH’s fund for MoTrPAC’s research.

“Our research team encompasses exceptional talents. The collective wisdom and expertise of the team at UVA and MoTrPAC will allow us to reach a level that we would not be able to reach by an individual,” Yan said. “It is an unprecedented opportunity in our lifetime to tackle this incredibly important question to mankind.”

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