Self Propelling Motors

This article was about a new way of delivering drugs and/or imaging agents to a specific area of the intestines. Two scientists, Liangfang Zhang and Joseph Wang, led a team at the University of California, San Diego, which created self-propelling motors that can travel through the human digestive track. The motors are 15 um long and 5 um wide hollow cylinders made of gold and poly(3,4ethylenedioxythiophene). The cylinders are filled with magnesium particles and a fluorescent dye; they are then coated in a pH-sensitive methacrylate-based polymer. This coating allows the cylinders to withstand acids in the stomach but begins to dissolve in the neutral pH intestinal fluid. By adjusting the thickness of the coating, researchers can control how far through the digestive system the cylinder travels. The thicker the coating is, the further the cylinder will travel. Once the cylinder reaches its target destination and the coating has dissolved, both ends of the cylinder open up and release the magnesium particles into the intestinal fluid. The magnesium then reacts with water to produce hydrogen bubbles that propel the tubes forward, creating a motor. The propulsion results in a collision with the mucus layer that lines the intestines and traps the tubes into place.

To test this experiment, researchers fed mice suspensions of micro motors. The mice were divided into four groups which were either fed uncoated devices or devices with varying thickness of coating. The various coatings were 0.3, 0.8, and 1.2 um. By measuring the gold content of the animal’s intestines using a mass spectrometer, researchers were able to find that 79% of the uncoated devices stayed in the stomach.  Most of the coated devices reached their target destinations, just as researchers had expected. The researchers hope to further their experiment by filling the devices with drugs and testing how well they will deliver the drug in mice.

Studying Traditional Lore for new Antibiotics

Ferris Jabr writing in the New York Times Magazine reports that traditional treatments for human ailments may provide clues in the search for new antibiotics.  The emergence of anti-biotic resistant strains of bacteria increasingly threatens our ability to treat infection.  New antibiotics are desperately needed.  Jabr reports past research has focussed on examining soil bacteria for species that produce natural products useful as anti-biotics.  The possibility that plants might produce species with useful anti-biotics has been less explored.  Yet thousands of years of experience reflected in traditional oral and written sources provides clues as to what plants may have useful properties.  Pursuing these clues is the business of the ethnobiologist who is both a cultural anthropologist and a molecular biologist. Studies in this are have provided promising leads on a number of possible anti-biotics including some with new and unique modes of action.  Some of these species, for example, prevent the formation of deadly assemblies of microbes known as plaques.  This is potentially as effective as killing the microbe in treating disease, and yet is not likely to lead to the development of resistant strains of the organism.

Brazillian Peppertree which is being studied for anti-biotic potential

Improving Naloxone-Delivery to treat Opioid Overdoses

This article was about improving the formula and delivery of an antidote for opioid overdoses. The antidote used is known by the trade name Narcan, but it is called naloxone by chemists.This is a pressing issue because overdose deaths from heroin and prescription opioids have skyrocketed over the past decade in the United States. Naloxone is a competitive receptor antagonist and competes for the same receptors as opioid agonists. It pushes those drugs out and substitutes in their place. Naloxone does not activate opioid receptors upon binding, so it produces no opioid high. All it does is prevent those other opioids from acting and it can reverse overdoses in a matter of minutes.

I know from personal experience that we are in a heroin epidemic. Where I'm from (Dover,DE) heroin has hit the city very hard and it's becoming the southern Wilmington. I cannot even go fishing without finding used syringes in the forest. Over the past 15 years, prescription opioid and heroin overdose deaths have quadrupled. Now, Narcan is known to bring overdose victims on the brink of death back to life, but improvements in how it is delivered can still be made.

One of the problems is that naloxone is only available by prescription in 38 states and naloxone is what prevents an overdose from becoming fatal. Many people who overdose are in the presence of another person and that person may hesitate to call for help; in fear of the victim or themselves being arrested. Time is a huge factor in determining life or death, and waiting for paramedics to administer the treatment is not good enough. That is why some medical professionals feel that naloxone should be available to people who take opioid medication and people who are addicts. They feel that naloxone should be in the medicine cabinet of all patients taking opioid pain medication or for families of addicts. However, the only FDA-approved way of administering naloxone is through intravenous or intramuscular injection , and that can be troublesome for people not trained in that manner.

Giving an overdose victim an injection is also dangerous because many opioid abusers could have bloodborne diseases such as Hepatitis C or HIV and expose people to it. To get over this problem successful intranasal naloxone delivery systems were developed,but they have a high rate of error with dosage amounts and people must be trained to use them. Therefore, development of nasal-delivered naloxone with the same effectiveness as injection-delivered naloxone was created. The FDA required injection-like pharmacokinetic properties for approval of any intranasal version of naloxone. The new nasal spray contains a solution of naloxone 40 times as concentrated as the original intranasal naloxone delivery system.                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                  The new product is easy to use and another product, an autoinjector, has been created to be easy to use by the addict or first responder (which could be anybody). For the autoinjector, "the company’s scientists went through 22 different naloxone formulations before finding one that had a long shelf life and could withstand high temperatures, Williamson says. They also studied how people interact with Evzio to ensure it was easy to use." In addition, "As the opioid crisis expands, elected officials are beginning to support efforts to get naloxone into the hands of first responders and bystanders. President Barack Obama’s 2017 budget includes $500 million to expand overdose prevention, including improving access to naloxone."

Microbe-Coated Seeds Could Help Us Thrive in a Dark, Dry Future

In an article found on the Smithsonian website, a new start-up company based in Boston, called Indigo is discussed. Indigo is a new agro-tech company that has begun to develop seeds that are resistant to apocalyptic type scenarios where lack of water and nutrients in soil would otherwise prevent crops from surviving. The seeds are coated with a careful mixture of naturally occurring microbes that help increase the seed's productivity and allow them to flourish in an environment where the soil is lacking in water and natural nutrients.

When soil is healthy, there are many microbes already present that come from dead plant matter and other living plants. However, in corporate agriculture crop rotation is not readily practiced resulting in severely nutrient deficient soil. Indigo's bacteria and fungi coated seeds do not replenish the soil with nutrients but instead allow plants a chance to continue to grow in an unhealthy environment. The start-up has attracted much attention and recently received a $100 million  investment.

Indigo's CEO, David Perry, recognizes the fact that in a way the company is only making unsustainability more sustainable but says that, "There are very few companies that have an economic incentive to promote crop rotation, cover crops, and use of natural insecticides. It is not that those things are necessarily less effective, but there is certainly less economic incentive to talk to a farmer about them." Indigo's seeds are designed to adapt to deficits in nature and allow farmers to plant crops that can survive in soil lacks in things like adequate nitrogen, rather than drenching soil in harmful fertilizer in order to make up for the lack.

More information about Indigo can be found on Indigo's website.

Nanorobotics (2016 Chemistry Nobel Prize)

     This IFLScience article details the work for which the most recent Nobel Prize in chemistry was awarded. Jean-Pierre Sauvage, Sir Fraser Stoddart, and Bernard Feringa were awarded the honor for thier groundbreaking work in the field of nanomachinery. According to the Nobels, "they developed the world's smallest machines: a tiny lift, artifical muscles, and miniscule motors." Indeed, the names of these researches have appeared in the news several times over the past few decades. In 1983, Sauvage succeeded in linking to molecular rings mechanically, rather than through covalent bonding. This is an early example of a molecular machine, as it technically contains individual parts capable of moving with respect to one another.

     This early advancement layed the groundwork for future achievements in the field of nanomachinery. Later, in 1991, Stoddart succeeded in developing a rotaxane, which consists of a molecular axis along which small molecular rings can move. These advancements have continued to develop, reaching higher and higher levels of sophistication. As recent as 1999, Bernard Feringa successfully developed a molecular motor. With his discovery, he succeeded in rotating a glass cylinder 10,000 times the size of the tiny machine.

 

     The work of the 2016 Nobel laureates only represents a part of the broadening field of nanorobotics. Bacteria-based nanomachines have been proposed, with a group at University of Nebraska successfully creating a humidity gauge from a bacterium cell fused to a silicon chip. In addition, chemistry-based machines have been used to treat cancer by giving them ligands which bond to unique surface proteins on cancer cells.

     This emerging field is definitely one of the more interesting contemporary developments in science and engineering, and though we can imagine this leading to a myriad of vast improvements in the living conditions of the average human, it's fun to speculate on what the public reaction will be when these devices become advanced enough to see common usage. We've observed how media spin can turn something innocuous and beneficial into a boogeyman in the public subconscious, so one has to wonder if a similar aversion will be displayed when nanomachines, in any of the miraculous applications that have been proposed for them, finally arrive on the scene.

Misconceptions in Alternative Medicine

In the Wall Street Journal article, the writer organizes the article with the list of opinions of the influential individuals about the misconception of alternative medicine. Alternative medicine is perceived as foreign, second or third class treatment, and the effect is not beneficial as conventional medicine. In the hospital or clinics, most of the physicians in the U.S. like to perceive alternative medicine in a negative way, because they are taught in the style of western medicine.

Alternative medicine is also a huge business and has its own tradition. The oldest tradition is from China. For example, herbal medicines had been used longer than the conventional medicine, but it is not valued the same. The science behind alternative medicine is not strongly favored in the U.S. because some of the problems relate to impurities and if it is FDA approved or not. "Once in the U.S., these products can be repackaged and marketed without any FDA inspection until serious injury occurs". This is one of the reasons that many patients and physicians do not like to choose alternative medicine. Patients and the physicians like to have the approved form of medicine that their body will cooperate with the chemistry within. This is a serious problem that could lead to not able to receive proper treatment. For example, foxglove (digitalis) is a plant which is used as a natural product for alternative medicine in the treatment of heart arrhythmia. The active ingredient is digoxin.

http://www.wsj.com/articles/SB10001424052702304337404579210332428805354
http://exhibits.hsl.virginia.edu/herbs/brief-history/