Tag: 24/11/20

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A New Initiative to Boost Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products Development

On By ModernMedia

The University of Sheffield in concert with pharmaceutical giant Pfizer, has announced the creation of a new consortium to help accelerate the development of Advanced Therapy Medicinal Products (AMTPs), enabling radical new treatments such as gene therapy to reach patients sooner.

The Accelerating Research and Innovation for Advanced Therapies (ARDAT) consortium will bring together 34 academic, nonprofit and private organisations from across Europe and the United States. They will bring their expertise to bear on a €25.5 million project to accelerate ATMP development.

Rapid growth is expected in the AMTP field, with the submission of some 10-20 new drug applications annually to the FDA by 2025.
“While still an emerging field, ATMP research has largely been fragmented and siloed within organisations with little opportunity to share best practices and information,” said Dr Greg LaRosa, Head of Scientific Research, Rare Disease Research Unit at Pfizer.

“As gene and cell therapies research grows and more potential ATMPs move into later-stage clinical trials, it is in the interest of the industry and of patients to further our collective understanding of their mechanisms by sharing data and regulatory expertise.”

Source: University of Sheffield

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Cutting Edge Bio-printing Fabricates Tiny Kidneys

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Researchers from the Murdoch Children’s Research Institute (MCRI) and biotech company Organovo have successfully bio-printed miniature human kidneys with unparalleled speed and quality to be used for toxicity screening of medications known to cause kidney damage. 

A world leader in modeling the kidney, Professor Melissa Little of the MRCI said, “Drug-induced injury to the kidney is a major side effect and difficult to predict using animal studies. Bioprinting human kidneys are a practical approach to testing for toxicity before use.”

The new study involved testing the toxicity of aminoglycosides, a class of antibiotics that commonly damage the kidney. The study revealed deaths of certain types of kidney cells when exposed to aminoglycosides.

Organovo first began bio-printing kidneys in 2015, but their new processes are much faster, allowing 200 mini-kidneys to be produced in 10 minutes. The improvement in speed and quality has opened the doorway for bioprinting entire organs for transplant. “3-D bioprinting can generate larger amounts of kidney tissue but with precise manipulation of biophysical properties, including cell number and conformation, improving the outcome.”

Professor Little said that prior to this study, the possibility of using such technology for transplantation was too complicated to consider. “The pathway to renal replacement therapy using stem cell-derived kidney tissue will need a massive increase in the number of nephron structures present in the tissue to be transplanted,” she said.

“By using extrusion bioprinting, we improved the final nephron count, which will ultimately determine whether we can transplant these tissues into people.”

Source: Medical Xpress

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Standing Protects against Heart Failure in Older Women

On By ModernMedia

A study examining elderly women’s amount of time spent sitting or standing has shown a marked increase in the risk for hospitalisation for heart failure.

The Women’s Health Initiative Observational Study followed 81 000 postmenopausal women for 9 years. None of the women had been diagnosed with heart failure and could walk at least one block unassisted, and they self-reported the amount of time they spent sitting or lying down. Over this time, 1402 women were hospitalised with heart failure.

The researchers graded the amount of sedentary time (sitting or lying down) into three categories: 6.5 hours or less; 6.6-9.5 hours; and more than 9.5 hours. Those who sat 9.5 hours or more experienced a 42% increase in the rate of heart failure compared to those who sat for 6.5 hours or less.

Lead author of the study,  Michael J LaMonte, PhD, MPH, research associate professor of epidemiology in the School of Public Health and Health Professions at the University at Buffalo in Buffalo, New York, said that there was a lack of data on sedentary time and heart failure, and even less so in elderly women.

“Our message is simple: sit less and move more. Historically, we have emphasised promoting a physically active lifestyle for heart health—and we should continue to do so! However, our study clearly shows that we also need to increase efforts to reduce daily sedentary time and encourage adults to frequently interrupt their sedentary time.” 

He added, “This does not necessarily require an extended bout of physical activity; it might simply be standing up for 5 minutes or standing and moving one’s feet in place. We do not have sufficient evidence on the best approach to recommend for interrupting sedentary time. However, accumulating data suggest that habitual activities such as steps taken during household and other activities of daily living are an important aspect of cardiovascular disease prevention and healthy aging.”

Source: Medical Xpress

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Anaesthetic Clues Hidden in Tarantula Venom

On By ModernMedia

In a finding that promises new research into pain management, a tarantula toxin molecule has been revealed to use a “stinger” to permanently close the voltage sensors on nerve cells’ sodium channels.

Chronic pain is difficult to treat, and attempts to seek relief can sometimes lead to opiate overdose, addiction, prolonged withdrawal, and even death. This means that there is a critical need to develop pain management medications that are safer, more effective and non-addictive. Tarantula toxin is of interest because it has to be fast-acting, shutting down the nerves of the tarantula’s prey and immobilising it before it can escape.

The tarantula toxin’s mechanism of action has proved elusive: the tarantula toxin-ion channel chemical complex has been hard to capture in its functional form. This has made it especially challenging to replicate the calcium-channel blocking effect in a small molecular form suitable for anaesthetic compounds. To overcome this obstacle, the researchers took a toxin-binding region from a specific type of human sodium channel that is key to pain transmission and imported it into their bacterium-derived model ancestral sodium channel. In doing so, they successfully obtained a clear molecular view of the configuration of the potent toxin from tarantula venom as it tightly binds to the sodium channel receptor site.

Prof William Catterall of the University of Washington School of Medicine explains: “Remarkably, the toxin plunges a ‘stinger’ lysine residue into a cluster of negative charges in the voltage sensor to lock it in place and prevent its function. Related toxins from a wide range of spiders and other arthropod species use this molecular mechanism to immobilise and kill their prey.”

The researchers hope that these insights will lead to the development of a new variety of anaesthetic compounds.

Source: News-Medical.Net

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SA Medicinal Plants Show a COVID Treatment Promise in New Study

On By ModernMedia

Researchers at the Durban University of Technology and the University of KwaZulu-Natal have been examining plants used in traditional African medicine to see if they have any application in treating COVID.

There has been increasing interest in investigating medicinal plants for compounds to use in the treatment of COVID, which still lacks an effective treatment despite effective vaccines being demonstrated.

The researchers began with 29 compounds from medicinal plants known to be effective in treating the common cold, flu, other respiratory conditions, as well as their antimalarial, antiviral and antioxidant activity.

Using a biocomputational approach that does simulated “molecular docking” with various compounds and the known molecules of SARS-CoV-2, the researchers found a number of plants, including the Rooibos bush, contained useful compounds. These displayed favourable binding orientations and were thus identified as being potential inhibitors of the SARS-CoV-2 receptor binding domain and SARS-CoV-2 RNA-dependent polymerase. Four compounds showed extremely good binding to the virus, indicating that they may prevent viral replication.

The next stage of their work will be an in vitro study, before moving onto animal models but is contingent on the team being able to secure funding.

Source: The Conversation