LEXINGTON, Ky. (Nov. 15, 2019) Students face challenges today that generations before them couldnt even dream of. From using technology in the classroom to the pressures they feel from social media, the college experience today is monumentally different than it used to be.

Students come to college to express themselves in a way that they may have always wanted to, but never thought they could. With open hearts and minds, they leave their routine theyve always known, ready to find themselves whatever that means to them.

Today, more and more teens are identifying as transgender or gender nonconforming. Somestudents say they feel unwelcome even before they set foot on a college campus. Joanne Brown, a nurse practitioner at University Health Service (UHS), is making it her mission to support students through their transitions.

UK is a leader in transgender health, definitely, but we can always do better. I can always do better, said Brown.

Brown is a provider who never stops learning. She often attends conferences and informational events about student health to learn how to better care for patients. Shortly after starting at UK, she attended a meeting where some medical students were sharing experiences theyve had in the health care system, and it inspired her.

One of the students who identified as lesbian said their provider had just assumed they were sexually active with a male partner and asked, What are you doing for birth control? Arent you afraid of getting pregnant? And I went, Oh ouch, Ive done that before. And I can do better, said Brown.

So she started to do better. She reached out to other providers for guidance and advice. She began cultivating a more inclusive environment by speaking to patients differently and replacing outdated signage in her exam room. But it didnt seem to be enough.

She had a new patient, a graduate student from Washington, D.C., come see her.

Theyd been to four providers before they came to see me, said Brown. Four other providers in Lexington, and couldnt get anybody to prescribe PrEP. Which is absurd, because PrEP is so effective in preventing HIV infection. So I figured things out. I looked at the guidelines, and I wrote that prescription.

From then on, Brown was determined to put LGBTQ* health at the forefront of her career. In 2016, a task force of UK HealthCare providers and individuals from campus organizations came together and created the UK HealthCare Transform Health Clinic.

Transform Health was created with the goal of providing and improving care for the LGBTQ* population. It also trains health sciences students and residents in LGBTQ* health best practices and offers mental health counseling support. The group consists of providers from several different UK HealthCare institutions, including UHS, Family and Community Medicine and the Counseling Center.

The original task force that created Transform Health wanted to bring attention to one particular marginalized population people who identify as LGBTQ*. Brown said starting there helped her realize there are many other populations that need attention in health care too.

This understanding led to the establishment of the UHS Inclusive Care Committee. This group meets to improve care for all populations of students first-generation, students of color, veterans, international students and several other marginalized groups.

The intersectionality of a patients identity has such a large impact on their overall health, said Brown. Im hopeful that this understanding helps us take better care of all our patients, not just LGBTQ* students.

Brown considers herself lucky to work in student health, especially at UK. Dr. Ann Hays, a provider and clinical director at UHS, played an influential role in Browns push for better LGBTQ* care.

Dr. Hays support demonstrated that UHS and UK HealthCare aligned with my goals of providing more inclusive health care, said Brown. Its clear its a priority here at this institution.

Student health also appealed to Brown because of how it allows her to put her patients first in every way. Students dont have a co-pay for every appointment, so if Brown wants to see them sooner than normal for a follow-up, theres no hesitation.

Im thinking about all the other things that are involved in their transition, said Brown. Not just the medical piece of it, but whats going on at home? Whats going on in their classes? Whats going on with their roommates and their peers?

Brown said shes often been inspired by her patients. For a lot of students, going to see Brown is the first step of becoming who theyve always wanted to be.

I think its taken everything they have towalk through our door and talk to me for the first time, said Brown. Theyre afraid this step is going to alienate them from their families of origin. It might mean those families withhold financial support, they cant continue in school, that they lose a relationship with somebody.

Jace Peters-White, a UK student and patient of Browns, is an exemplary model for what the right kind of care can do. They have been seeing Joanne since their first semester here in 2017.

Ive never had any doubts or worries being here at UK, said Peters-White. The campus is such a welcoming and affirming place to be my true self.

White had already been receiving hormone therapy before coming to UK. They feel lucky to have Brown here to continue their care.

Its so difficult to find affirming transgender health care anywhere; I used to travel two hours to go to an office that had the expertise in the type of care I needed, said Peters-White. Having Joanne as a resource this close to me is a complete blessing.

Brown is proud to be a representative of this university and what we do for our LGBTQ* students. However, she says theres much more to be done, like including LGBTQ*-centered health in more of the curricula here. In the future, she wants UK to be known as the place to go, for inclusive care.

As Brown continues to advocate for her patients, she also celebrates with them.

The most rewarding thing is when I see my patients out in public, particularly after theyve been on hormones for a while theyre happy, theyre smiling, theyre whole, said Brown. The exciting thing is theyre graduating with their undergraduate degrees. Theyre completing graduate programs. Theyre becoming.

Click here for more information on Joanne Brown, or to request an appointment with her. Students can also make an appointment with her through their myUK portal.

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UHS Nurse is Changing the Narrative Surrounding Transgender Health - UKNow

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The globalmarket for testosterone replacement therapyis characterized by the presence of a large number of small and large scale manufacturers. All of the manufacturers have been steadfast in filling the meagre market gap in order to enhance their prospects of growth. Furthermore, research and development has been the central characteristic of al the market players operating in the global market.

In 2015, it was found that 80% of the total market share was held by the top five market vendors with AbbVie Inc. taking the lead. The large scale vendors are focusing on establishing an iconic brand for their product by resorting to rigorous marketing and advertising tactics. The smaller companies are expected to concentrate on capturing the local and regional markets to sustain themselves in the current scenario of stiff competition. A negative implication for the leading market players in recent times has been the loss of patents for their products. This has not only plundered them of revenues but has also affected the workflow of these companies.

Request a Sample to get Extensive Insights into theTestosterone Replacement Therapy Market

The market players are expected to launch awareness campaigns about testosterone replacement therapies in order to educate and inform the consumers. Hence, the market for testosterone replacement therapies is expected to witness the emergence of several new trends and opportunities over the forthcoming years. Some of the key players in the global testosterone replacement therapy market include Bayer AG, Endo Pharmaceuticals, Inc., Novartis AG, and Allergen plc.

The CAGR for theglobal testosterone replacement therapy marketis estimated to be -4.20% over the period between 2016 and 2024. The negative growth rate of the global market is expected to take the market value from US2.0 bn in 2015 to a decreased value of US$1.3 bn by 2024-end.

High Incidence of Hypogonadism to Drive Market Demand

Research studies suggest that around 30% of all men suffer from testosterone deficiency, which has driven demand within the global market for testosterone replacement therapy. Furthermore, the population demographic of men in the age range of 40-79 years is more likely to suffer from testosterone deficiency. The need for mutation or having an offspring amongst men in the aforementioned age range has driven demand within the global market.

Enquiry for Discount onTestosterone Replacement Therapy Market Report

Moreover, the geriatric population has been on a rise, which underhandedly contributes to market growth. Several campaigns aimed at educating people about the benefits of testosterone replacement therapy have been an important propeller of demand within the global market. It is anticipated that more people suffering from testosterone deficiency would resort to these therapies over the coming years.

Side Effects of Testosterone Replacement Therapy Could Obstruct Market Growth

Despite the rising awareness amongst the masses about the advantages of testosterone replacement therapies, the market growth is hindered by the apprehension of the people. The chances of developing metabolic disorders are higher in men who undergo testosterone replacement therapies. Furthermore, the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases also discourages people from resorting to testosterone replacement therapies. The FDA has also cautioned people about the use of such therapies by issuing strict warnings, which has further obstructed the growth of the global market.

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Transparency Market ResearchAlbany, NY 12207United StatesTel: +1-518-618-1030Website:www.transparencymarketresearch.comEmail:[emailprotected]Research Blog:https://theglobalhealthnews.com/

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Testosterone Replacement Therapy Market To Witness Huge Growth in 2024 - Downey Magazine

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Thanks to a $62 billion acquisition of Shire, Takeda is one of the world's largest developers of rare disease drugs.

Despite that, the 238-year-old Japanese pharmaceutical company lacks any mid- or late-stage cell or gene therapies, two technologies that figure to play a large role in how many rare cancers and inherited diseases will eventually be treated.

It's a mismatch Takedais putting substantial effort into addressing. Last week, executives made cell and gene therapy a notable focus of the company's first R&D day since closing its Shire deal.

"We have a world-class gene therapy platform," Dan Curran, head of Takeda's rare disease therapeutic area unit, told investors and Wall Street analysts gathered in New York city.

"We intend to build on that over the next five years. Because as we look to lead in the second half of [next]decade, we believe patients will demand and we can deliver transformative and curative therapies to patients globally."

But right now that's just an ambition. While Takedahas begun to explore how it can improve on current gene therapies, its candidates are early stage and lag their would-be competitors.

"Our heme A program we're behind. Our heme B program we're behind," admitted Curran in an interview. "But we're behind the first generation and when has there only been one generation of anything?"

Takeda's hemophilia A program is currently in Phase 1, with the hemophilia B candidate about to join it in human testing well back from leaders BioMarin Pharmaceutical, Spark Therapeutics and SangamoTherapeutics in hemophilia A and UniQure in hemophilia B.

Curran laid out three priorities for Takeda'spush: exploring whether gene therapy, typically pitched as a one-time treatment, can be re-dosed; lowering the doses currently used for first-generation therapies; and developing alternative gene delivery vehicles than the adeno-associatedand lentiviralvectors that are predominant today.

"We need to figure out how to re-dose AAVvectors if we want to provide functional cures for patients for the rest of their lives."

How long a gene therapy's benefit lasts is a critical question. In theory, it could last decades or potentially for life, depending on the treatment's target.

But clinical evidence presented to date suggests that benefit for some therapies could wane over time. BioMarin, for example, presented data this year that it argued is proof its gene therapy could raise Factor VIII expression levels in patients with hemophilia A above the threshold for mild disease for at least eight years a long time, to be sure, but not life-long.

Still, it's an unusual objective. Much of gene therapy's promise lies in the potential for it to be given just once and still deliver lasting benefits. And the therapies that have reached market most notably Spark Therapeutics' Luxturna, Novartis' Zolgensma and Bluebird bio's Zynteglo are among the most expensive drugs to ever reach market. Were a gene therapy to be re-dosed, the current value proposition those drugmakers describe would need to be re-evaluated.

Curran recognizes that bringing down costs substantially will be essential to any attempt to advance a multi-use gene therapy. But Takeda might have an advantage. In buying Shire, the pharma inherited a viral vector manufacturing plant, originally built by Baxalta, that Curran calls the company's "best kept secret."

"It's an enormous competitive advantage," he said, adding that Takeda believes it's among the industry's top three facilities by production capacity. "Roche trying to acquire Spark, Novartis and AveXis a significant component of value of those transactions was that these companies had actually invested in manufacturing capabilities."

Curran emphasized that Takeda's ambitions in gene therapy will require it to partner with academic leaders in the field, a playbook that it's followed over the past three years as it's worked to expand into cell therapy.

"In the cell space, there's more innovation you can bring up into proof of principle milestones in academia," said Andy Plump,Takeda'shead of R&D, in an interview.

"An academic can manipulate a cell, but it's very hard in an academic setting to optimize a small molecule," he added. "This is a space where Novartis, and now we, have been quite successful in creating those relationships."

Takeda has put partnerships in place with Japan's Center for iPS Cell Research and Application, GammaDelta, Noile-Immune Biotech, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center and, just this month, The University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center.

That last collaboration gives Takeda access to a chimeric antigen receptor-directed natural killer, or NK, cell therapy.The drugmaker believes NK cells could offer advantages over the T cells modified to create the currently available cell therapies Kymriah and Yescarta.

Most notably, MD Anderson's approach uses NK cells isolated from umbilical cord blood, rather than extracting T cells from each individual patient a time-consuming and expensive process that has complicated the market launch of Kymriah and Yescarta. Cord blood-derived NK cells are designed to be allogeneic, or administered "off the shelf."

Additionally, CAR NK cells haven't been associated (yet) with cytokine release syndrome or neurotoxicity, two significant side effects often associated with CAR-T cell therapies. That could help Takeda position its cell therapies as an outpatient option.

"Even if we were a company that entered a little bit later into the immuno-oncology space, we've very much tried to turn this into an advantage," said Chris Arendt, head of Takeda's oncology drug discovery unit, at the company's event.

"We believe we have a chance to establish a leadership position rather than jumping on the bandwagon and being a follower."

While Takeda's choice to pursue NK cell therapy stands out, its choice of target does not. TAK-007, a drug candidate from MD Anderson that is now Takeda's lead cell therapy program, is aimed at a cell surface protein called CD19 that's found in leukemias and lymphomas.

Both Yescarta and Kymriah target CD19, and a recent count by the Cancer Research Institute tracked 181 cell therapy projects aimed at the antigen.

Takeda is planning to advance TAK-007 into pivotal studies in two types of lymphoma and chronic lymphocytic leukemia by 2021, with a potential filing for approval in 2023.

By then, Kymriah and Yescarta will have been on the market for six years and current bottlenecks in cell therapy treatment could be solved, helping both Takeda's potential entry as well as the host of competitors it will likely face.

Next year will be a test of how productive Takeda'scell therapy unit can be. In addition to TAK-007, the pharmaexpects to have four other CAR-T and gamma delta cell therapies in the clinic, two of which will target solid tumors.

Cell and gene therapy are part of what Takeda calls its "second wave" of R&D projects, a group of early-stage drugs and programs that it sees as progressing to regulatory stages by 2025 or later.

In the nearer term, the drugmakeris advancing a "first wave" of clinical candidates that it told investors will deliver 14 new molecular entities by 2024. Five of those will come in rare disease, with the others spread across oncology, neuroscience, gastro-enterology and vaccines.

"We think the cascade of news coming forward on these programs will transform how people view Takeda," Curran said.

More importantly to the investors gathered in New York, Takeda expects these experimental drugs will eventually earn $10 billion in peak annual sales, which would represent a sizable addition to a business that generated $30 billion in sales last year.

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Takeda sees cell, gene therapy in its future. Is it too late? - BioPharma Dive

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The Medical Health Institute offers the Bio identical Hormone Replacement Therapy Miami, allowing people to redesign their health and get back their energy and vitality.

Men and women living in Miami may not have to worry a lot about their growing age. The age related complications can be delayed with the help of the Hormone Replacement Therapy Miami that The Medical Health Institute is offering now. The

Medical Health Institute specializes in HRT for men and women, allowing them to redesign their health with the advanced medical science. The anti-aging clinic is located in two places in North and South Miami, and their treatments help men and women to restore their bodies to optimal health. Besides HRT, the clinic also offers a variety of advanced medical services, which also includes addressing the problem of erectile dysfunction.

The clinic offers Bio identical Hormone Replacement Therapy Miami that could prove a holistic approach to anti-aging. The spokesperson of the clinic reveals that they try to address the whole system of a patient rather than treating just the symptoms. This holistic approach brings a long-lasting result or a permanent cure by eliminating the root cause of the problem. The doctors of the clinic focus on personalized treatment programs for each individual patient. They closely monitor each patients health and improvement throughout the treatment process. The HRT is an ideal therapy for men and women experiencing the problem of hormonal imbalance.

With the growing age, both men and women often suffer from the low level of testosterone. This hormone is essential to help maintain energy and vigor of the human body. The HRT Clinic in Miami offers Testosterone Replacement Therapy Miami that can improve the physical stamina and sex drive for one to experience the same youthful energy despite the growing age.

For all men suffering from the problem of erectile dysfunction, the clinic has an effective ED Treatment Miami. The clinic takes advantage of the latest GainWave technology in which sound acoustic waves are used that stimulate mens tissues, helping them to achieve a full erection, and which also lasts for a longer period of time. This is a tried and tested ED treatment, and numerous men have been treated in the Miami Clinic to regain their sexual strength.

The spokesperson talks about one more important treatment of their clinic, which is the IV Therapy Miami. In this therapy, one can absorb nutrients bypassing the bodys digestive system. The clinic delivers Vitamins and proteins to ones body through an intravenous system. These nutrients, thus directly reach a humans bloodstream, to help improve health conditions. The spokesperson reveals that IV therapy could be useful not only for aging people, but people with an active lifestyle can also choose it for their better health.

To know more about these cutting-edge treatments offered by the Medical Institute, one can visit the website https://hormone-replacement-miami.com.

About The Medical Health Institute

The Medical Health Institute is an HRT Clinic with 2 locations in North Miami and South Miami. As a full service anti-aging clinic, The Medical Health Institute specializes in Bio-Identical hormone replacement therapy. Not only are they treating low energy levels in men, but also erectile dysfunction and hair loss.

Media ContactCompany Name: Medical Health InstituteContact Person: Michael BertonattiEmail: Send EmailPhone: +1 (786) 401-5244City: MiamiState: FLCountry: United StatesWebsite: https://hormone-replacement-miami.com

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Hormone Replacement Therapy Miami Now Available for Improving Health & Overall Life - Press Release - Digital Journal

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Women are desperate to figure out why they dont feel good. By the time they come to see me, theyve been dismissed so many times, says Heather Hirsch, lead physician of Brigham and Womens Hospitals Menopause and Midlife clinic, set to open early next year. When we think about womens health, we talk about puberty, pregnancy and postpartum. The menopause transition is really important, and it gets no attention.

Hirsch, 37, is part of a new generation of doctors, tech developers and investors determined to change that, and aiming to replace stigma with public conversation, better medical research and more accessible training. Research for treatment of common symptoms like hot flashes, low libido, sleep disruption and weight gain is notoriously underfunded, they note, even as an estimated 38 million American women are menopausal and account for approximately 20 percent of the American work force.

The lack of medical research is coupled with a lack of clinical training, even for gynecologists.

In many family medicine, internal medicine and OB/GYN residency programs, there is perhaps an hour of instruction on menopause, at best, says Stephanie Faubion, medical director of the North American Menopause Society (NAMS) and director of the Mayo Clinic Center for Womens Health, where she co-authored the report Menopause Management Knowledge in Postgraduate Family Medicine, Internal Medicine, and Obstetrics and Gynecology Residents.

Anna Barbieri

Frustrated by misconceptions and shame surrounding the topic, doctors have found new ways to communicate with the women they say are deeply underserved. Hirsch has her own podcast series, Health by Heather Hirsch, with accessible and irreverent segments like Perimenopause, what the HEL! [sic]. In New York, a new telemedicine start-up called Elektra Health is recruiting doctors like Anna Barbieri and hosting frequent salon discussions with titles like Hormonal Harmony: Thriving in Perimenopause and Beyond.

Its important to provide current and valid information about symptoms and their management, and to discuss how this phase of life is so strongly related to other health factors, says Barbieri, 46, an assistant clinical professor of OB/GYN at Mount Sinai. We know, for example, that the time of menopause marks an increase in cardiovascular risk, diabetes risk and risk of dementia for women. How can we optimize this transition, and by doing so optimize other aspects of health? Menopause can vary widely from woman to woman, and were interested in how to practice patient-centered medicine based in evidence and rational treatments.

A reasonable approach, to be sure, but one hampered by myths and misunderstandings.

Among them, Hirsch says, is the fear of hormone replacement, largely stemming from media reporting on the early closure of a 2002 Womens Health Initiative study. That study, which examined one combined oral dose of estrogenand progesteronein a population of women whose average age was 63.5, was widelyandincorrectly interpreted as indicating that the hormones led to a significant increase in the risk of breast cancer and heart attacks.

WHI was an incredible research study with lots of information, but it was a skewed population of older, non-symptomatic women, Hirsch says. When the media spun the results, it made a huge impact in most peoples mind that estrogen is dangerous and harmful, and this idea is still very much ingrained into society.

Today, NAMS-trained providers say that hormone therapy, given to symptomatic women within 10 years of menopause (typically starting in their 50s), often has benefits.

Story continues

Recent studies, Hirsch notes, say that women who take estrogen and progesterone within 10 years of menopause have a tendency to live longer, die less from all causes and have less heart disease. These are results from several large clinical trials ofdifferent preparations ofhormone therapy in women who start within 10 years of their last menstrual period.

Even when women are willing to take hormones, they are often confused about the best sources, struggle to find well-informed doctors and are susceptible to marketing of unregulated, compounded hormones, Hirsch says.

The compounded hormone therapy industry is extremely profitable, as they are preying off the insecurities of patients and then providers who are otherwise uncomfortable discussing the risks and benefits of FDA-approved hormone therapy, with the risks being overestimated, she notes. There are approximately 15 million women on hormone therapy, of which about two-thirds use unregulated and one-third use FDA-approved medications. However, this number could be larger if there are women using compounded HT we cannot account for. Therein lies another risk of inadequate education and counseling: women taking unregulated HT with the idea that it is safer.

Theres confusion, too, about how to use and source supplements like Chasteberry and Vitex, which some women take for PMS and irregular periods; silymarin, which supports liver function; and melatonin and valerian, which may help with sleeplessness and anxiety.

I find that the use of supplements in the U.S. can be controversial and polarizing, similar to hormone therapy, with many sharing either the extreme view that no FDA oversight means that herbs and supplements are mostly ineffective and can be dangerous, and others believing the opposite, that anything that is natural is safer and gentler than regular medications, says Barbieri. I fall in the middle and believe we should apply regular scientific principles to both drugs, many of which have botanical origins, and herbs/supplements.

This fraught climate, investors say, is ripe for growth.

Last year, market research firm Frost & Sullivan predicted that the market for femtechtechnology products that focus on female wellness, everything from reproductive health to general wellnesswill be $50 billion by 2025.

Jill Angelo

Women control the majority of healthcare dollars spent, and are so influential in their spending power, but I was really taken by the lack of attention to womens health in the second half of life, says former Microsoft executive Jill Angelo, 46. This is a huge opportunity, and in terms of how much is capitalized or consumed, were just getting started.

In September 2016, Angelo launched the online platform Gennev, initially focused on selling hygiene products geared toward easing menopausal symptoms. With her partner Jacqueline Brandwynne, a retired Neutrogena executive, Angelo has branched out to providing services to its 16,000 registered users. It now offers $35 telemedicine appointments with NAMS-certified physicians and a $10 monthly subscription to unlimited consultations with health coaches, dietitians and nutritionists specifically trained to counsel menopausal women. Gennev currently partners with physicians in 30 states and expects to cover all 50 states and the District of Columbia by the end of 2020.

We interviewed 1,500 women, and they said, I have no idea who to go see. My doctor brushes me off, Angelo says. Were still growing our product line into dietary supplements but have also expanded to telemedicine and on-demand coaching. Theres a lot you can do from a lifestyle perspective to alleviate symptoms.

Amy Domangue

Amy Domangue, cofounder and CEO of the virtual medical care aggregator Jessie, calls Angelo a pioneer. The opportunity for virtual care for menopause and perimenopause is finally giving women a place so they know exactly where to turn. The way our healthcare system works is outdated, Domangue says. We have primary care and OB/GYN doctors, but what if instead of general doctors you have specialists uniquely trained to your gender and age? How can we segment healthcare better, so people know where to turn?

And while some women in their 50s and 60s may be wary of virtual visits, Domangue and other menopause entrepreneurs predict the approach will soon become normalized.

Alessandra Henderson

Telemedicine has been around for a very long time, so the technology itself is nothing new, but user behavior is very much a consideration. How do you onboard women in a way that feels comfortable and natural and that builds trust from the get-go? As we grow over time, and continue to get more women on to the platform, well continue to see more digitally native women join, says Alessandra Henderson, 34, the cofounder and CEO of Elektra Health, a new company set to debut telemedicine services in 2020, starting with a beta test group of 30 women in New York state.

Elektras model is to focus on building a virtual care practice with a dedicated care team of gynecologists on staff.We believe dedicated Elektra providers trained in our proprietary care protocol is the best way to deliver an optimal customer experience, real healthcare results, as well as to foster a long-term relationship over the seven-to-10-year menopause journey, says Henderson. Another focus for Henderson: fostering community and accountability.

Elektra checks in regularly with women in the first week, month and beyond on not only their health goals but also their symptoms. Well then use that information to inform their next meeting with the gynecologist. We also plan to add women to private, curated groups for support and accountability, she says. One hundred percent of women go through this. Its nothing to be ashamed about. Its a natural, universal experience. We want to give women the tools to live really well during this time.

This perspective is long overdue, says Faubion, noting that despite the fact that most menopausal women will suffer symptoms, theres not a great deal of new research. One area that does look promising: phase three trials on drugs inhibiting receptors in the hypothalamus that are linked to brain pathways responsible for hot flashes and night sweats. They block the NK3 receptors believed to be in the hot flash neural pathway, but an exact mechanism hasnt been determined, Faubion explains.

Doctors emphasize that menopause should also be assessed in terms of how it may relate to other health issues, particularly cardiovascular disease and dementia.

There is basically a disruption in brain energy metabolism during the menopausal transition linked to decline in estrogen, Barbieri says, adding that the decline can leads symptoms like insomnia, disturbed sleep, hot flashes, depression and short-term memory impairment. It is this metabolic change, as well as recognized vascular changes that occur with menopause, including the impact on the brains vascular system, that may be linked to higher risk of dementia for women.

Ideally, Barbieri says, technology will help researchers target womens symptoms more precisely.

Id love to see research that focuses more on precision medicine for menopause and the choice of intervention based on ones particular genetic makeup and individual situation. That could translate to different types of medicines, dosing or modalities, she says. Id also love to see more research devoted to non-pharmaceutical approaches, including natural and mind-body approaches.

These are exactly the possibilities inspiring entrepreneurs like Elektras Henderson.

The more women that we treat, the faster we can help identify what is and is not going to work, she says. We have a lot of independent research studies on diet, acupuncture and meditation, but we are aiming to build an incredibly rich data set to help informwith hard, science-based evidencewhat has helped treat symptoms, as well as what are best practices.

The post The Womens Health Issue Thats Finally Starting to Get Recognition appeared first on Worth.

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Doctors have been sued out of medicine for a lot less than what was done to Nathaniel, a teen boy wholl never be the same again. Having undergone sex-change surgery a year ago including, of course, his genitalias removal he now calls it a Frankenstein transition that has ruined his life.

Nathaniel is a 19-year-old whose story was told Sunday, with his permission, by author, public speaker, and proprietor of website SexChangeRegret.com Walt Heyer.

The young man, whose last name was withheld, relates that he was bullied by other boys in grade school because he had some characteristically female passions such an affinity for girl games. Then, when he was a bit older, Heyer writes at the Daily Signal, he discovered internet pornography, heard about transgenderism, and as he says, convinced myself thats what I was.

After mustering the courage to reveal this to his mother the summer following eighth grade, she scheduled an appointment for him with a doctor at an informed-consent clinic, as Heyer says he put it.

The medical visits started just after Nathaniel turned 15 and sparked a downward spiral. From then on,' he says, I slowly detached from everything until I was just staying home, playing video games, and going on the internet all day, Heyer relates. I stopped reading, drawing, riding my bicycle. I surrounded myself in an echo chamber that supported and validated my poor decisions, because the others were also, unfortunately, stuck in that pit, too.

A month after his 18th birthday, Nathaniel had whats euphemistically called bottom surgery, Heyer continued. For a male like Nathaniel, that means refashioning the male genitalia into a pseudo-vagina. He suffered some complications that required a second surgery a few months later, and he had facial surgery to further feminize his appearance. The result?

Now that Im all healed from the surgeries, I regret them, Nathaniel laments nine months later. The result of the bottom surgery looks like a Frankenstein hack job at best, and that got me thinking critically about myself. I had turned myself into a plastic-surgery facsimile of a woman, but I knew I still wasnt one. I became (and to an extent, still feel) deeply depressed.

I feel as though I have ruined my life, he sadly confesses.

Sadder still is that Nathaniel is hardly alone. Transgender ideology is destroying lives, writes PJ Media. In 2016, two women spoke about how they werepermanently scarredby taking male hormones and having top surgery the removal of their breasts, the site continues, providing an example.

I myself have provided a great number of such examples over the years, a good one being the case of Australian Patrick Mitchell. In 2015, at age 12, Mitchellinsisted he was a girland wanted to transition; his mother and other authority figures pandered to him, but after two years of female-hormone treatments he changed his mind. Of course, if the adults had tried early on to change his mind and not his body, both would be in better shape today.

Another example is Heyer himself. He once identified as female, but now says that the reckless gender medical practitioners have blood on their hands. By turning a blind eye to the scientific and ethical aspects of their chosen profession, he elaborates, they are directly responsible for poor outcomes, regret, detransitioning, suicides, and families torn to shreds by unnecessary surgeries.

This is no exaggeration. After many years of studying and writing about this issue, just as striking to me as the transgender agenda itself is that we dont hear about malpractice suits filed against its physician enablers. It seems like an open-and-shut case, too.

Consider an example I use to illustrate the point: If you tell a cardiologist youre concerned you may have heart disease, hell perform medical tests confirming the problems existence before prescribing any interventions, let alone invasive ones. Imagine, though, you tell him youre certain based on your feelings that youre a heart attack waiting to happen. Now imagine he asks, Have the feelings been strong and persistent? Have they lasted for more than six months? Yes? Alright, then Ill cut open your chest and perform a bypass!

This would be gross malpractice. Any doctor thus proceeding and operating on a healthy heart would be sued into oblivion. Of course, nothing this preposterous would ever happen in cardiology.

Yet this is, incredibly, precisely the basis on which physicians make the transgender diagnosis: feelings. Really.

Its called a diagnosis of gender dysphoria, made based only on the presence of strong and persistent feelings of cross-gender identification that have lasted more than six months. Theres no blood test for gender dysphoria, no genetic test, no brain scan, no physiological marker at all indicating that at issue is anything but a psychological problem.

Nonetheless, a pediatrician Heyer quotes has observed that children and adolescents are put on the path to puberty blockers, cross-sex hormones, and sex reassignment surgery at gender clinics while receiving no psychological counseling all on this basis. Relying on a psychological phenomenon, feelings, and with no proof of an underlying biological one, bodies are broken with an irreversible biological fix. If this isnt classic and egregious malpractice, what is?

Buttressing the case, note that theres no conclusive evidence that sex change operations improve the lives of transsexuals, with many people remaining severely distressed and even suicidal after the operation, according to a medical review conducted exclusively for Guardian Weekend, the left-wingGuardianreportedin 2004.

Is this surprising? The unpopular truth, which Nathaniel unfortunately learned the hard way at a young age, is a man is not a woman and cant ever become a woman, even with surgically refashioned genitals and feminizing facial surgery, Heyer explains. Or as Australian Alan Finch, another former transsexual, put it, You fundamentally cant change sex. Transsexualism was invented by psychiatrists.

Transgender is not a legitimate medical status, but an ideological one. Yet this truth wont stop our times Lysenkoists from performing our ages version of lobotomies. What will is being sued into irrelevancy.

These medical professionals are ruining lives the least they should endure are ruined careers.

Selwyn Duke (@SelwynDuke)has written forThe New Americanfor more than a decade. He has also written forThe Hill,Observer, The American Conservative, WorldNetDaily, American Thinker, and many other print and online publications. In addition, he has contributed to college textbooks published by Gale-Cengage Learning, has appeared on television, and is a frequent guest on radio.

Read more from the original source:
Teen Regrets Sex Change, Says: I Feel I Have Ruined My Life - The New American

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

The City of Johannesburg is reminding its citizens that November is Diabetes Awareness Month a time to focus on creating awareness about the symptoms and causes of diabetes and how to reduce the chance of developing it.

According to the Citys statement, the City of Johannesburgs Health Department is increasing its effort to help residents understand diabetes and the importance of improving the health and lives of those who are affected by it.

The City said that the World Health Organisation observes World Diabetes Day annually on 14 November. The theme for this year is Family and Diabetes and aims to raise awareness on the impact diabetes has on the family and the support network of those affected by it.

Joburg Health conducts health education in clinics about diabetes. Nurses and health promoters are also being trained about diabetes and its link to nutrition. The health education focuses on the range of free services available at the Citys clinics and on healthy lifestyle choices to mitigate and control diabetes, the City said.

Hlubikazi Ntamehlo, the deputy director of Public Health in the City of Johannesburg, said, The aim is to make people aware of the social and economic effects of diabetes on the family and to promote the role of the family in the management, care, prevention and education of diabetes.

You can control diabetes by going for simple tests at your local clinic. This will show if you have diabetes and require additional examination and treatment. Talk to a healthcare worker about your health results. They will explain how your diabetes can be controlled. Some people need pills, other injections and some dont need medicine at all.

The City added that last year, it was reported that about 6 per cent of South Africans (about 3.5 million) people suffer from diabetes and 5 million more are estimated to have pre-diabetes, which is when blood sugar levels are higher than normal but not high enough to be considered as diabetes.

Diabetes is an endocrine disorder in which the bodys ability to produce or respond to the hormone insulin is impaired, resulting in abnormal metabolism of carbohydrates and elevated levels of glucose in the blood. Types of diabetes are Type 1 insulin-dependent DM-insufficient levels of insulin and Type 2 non-insulin dependent DM-unresponsiveness or resistance of cells to insulin, said the City.

The signs and symptoms of diabetes include, among others, excessive thirst; frequent urination; feeling very hungry; fatigue; blurred vision; irritability; weight loss even if you eat more and slow healing wounds.

We want to encourage residents to do free screening for diabetes at our clinics. Let us work together families, communities, and government to beat diabetes, said Ntamehlo.

Related article:

https://midrandreporter.co.za/229098/world-diabetes-day-symptoms-complicated-sometimes-difficult-diagnose-diabetes/

Read the rest here:
How to reduce your chances of developing diabetes this #DiabetesAwarenessMonth - Northcliff Melville Times

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

On a rainy November morning last year, a few days before Thanksgiving, I stuck my 11-month-old daughter in her car seat and took her with me to the obstetricians office. I had stopped breastfeeding her exactly six weeks before. I was pregnant again.

My appointment was with an obstetrician Id never met before, at a practice affiliated with our citys Catholic hospital. It was the largest practice in town, and the first appointment I could get.

Last menstrual period? the medical assistant asked as she wrapped a blood pressure cuff around my arm.

I dont know, I said, blowing out a breath.

She glanced at me, then at my daughter, who was kicking and babbling in her car seat. So, she said, This is unplanned. I knew her tone; I had heard it a thousand times.

Im just here for an ultrasound, I said, holding my voice steady. I just want to know how far along I am.

A recent trend in anti-abortion legislation has been the passing of so-called heartbeat bills, which ban an abortion after a heartbeat (the flicker of cardiac activity in an early embryo) can be detected on ultrasound. In 2019, such bills passed in six states including Georgia, Kentucky, Louisiana, Missouri, Mississippi and Ohio. Abortion rights advocates correctly point out that such legislation constitutes an outright abortion ban, because this early cardiac activity is detectable on a vaginal ultrasound at about six weeks, a time when most women do not even know theyre pregnant.

I often cringe when I hear this language when most women dont even know theyre pregnant because I imagine how anti-abortion individuals, particularly men, must read it: as evidence that women are clueless and careless. (I can see a white-haired male politician scoffing, How could a womannot knowthat shes pregnant for afull six weeks?)

But in reality, the technology used to detect a pregnancy and the counterintuitive method of pregnancy dating makes it almost impossible for any woman to know for sure that shes pregnant before such cardiac activity appears. I know from experience and not just my own.

What I didnt tell the nurse that day was that I am a doctor. A large part of my job is detecting early pregnancies, determining whether the pregnancy is normal and viable, and counseling women about their options. (In my home state of California, thankfully, my patients have options to terminate the pregnancy, for any reason, up to about 24 weeks.) So if anyone could have known she was pregnant at the earliest possible moment, it should have been me.

After giving birth to my first child Id made a conscious decision not to re-start birth control. I was 34 years old; I expected it might take several months or longer to conceive, but I was certain I wanted to be pregnant again. I breastfed my daughter until she was 10 months old, gradually introducing solid foods and formula until she was completely weaned. She was a good sleeper, and my husband and I were having sex again. I knew I could become pregnant at any moment but I had no idea when that moment would be.

Like many women at various points in life (or throughout their lives), I wasnt getting a regular period. I had never resumed my menses while breastfeeding (not uncommon, although not as many believe a reliable indicator of whether a woman has regained fertility). So I had no cue to watch for, no missed period to signal that I might be pregnant.

Sometime in early November, I just had a feeling. There were no classic symptoms: no sore breasts, no moodiness, no light spots of blood in my underwear. It was more like a premonition, a flutter in my chest, a suspicion.

Fortunately at my job, pregnancy tests are stacked on my desk like post-it notes. I took one home with me and peed on it: Positive. I was thrilled. The next afternoon on a walk with my husband, pushing our daughter in the stroller, we stepped into the lobby of a local hotel. I ordered two glasses of champagne at the bar and told him the news. He kissed me. When? He asked. I told him I didnt know.

I needed an ultrasound. So the following week, back at work, I asked a nurse practitioner colleague to perform one for me between patients. It took her five minutes. But what we saw was concerning.

In a very early pregnancy, before enough cells have clustered together to form an embryo, there is only a tiny sac of fluid, called the gestational sac, which appears as a black oval inside the uterus. This sac appears just before five weeks. Just before six weeks, a white halo appears, called the yolk sac, which is the early nutritional source for the embryo. The embryo itself appears a day or two later. At six weeks give or take a day or two the earliest flicker of cardiac activity, what anti-abortion groups call the heartbeat, appears, confirming a viable, growing pregnancy.

The important thing to emphasize is that these weeks do not tally the amount of time the woman has been pregnant. They tally the number of weeks since her last period if she was having a regular period at all. Ovulation, conception and implantation all take place at least two weeks after the menstrual period. Pregnancy hormone levels the ones that produce that double blue line on a home pregnancy test dont become reliably detectable for another several days after that.

So, the six weeks at which the heartbeat appears is clinically standard but misleading language. The amount of time that has passed since a woman could possibly have known she was pregnant (if she could get her hands on a pregnancy test) is less than two weeks. Very few women can get into a doctors office for an ultrasound within two weeks of a home pregnancy test, let alone arrange for an abortion procedure.

But I was not seeking an abortion procedure. I just wanted to know something about this pregnancy how long I had been pregnant and whether everything was okay.

That day in my clinic, because I didnt know how far along I was, I didnt know what I should expect to see on the ultrasound screen. What I saw was: nothing. Or, rather, only an empty gestational sac, with no yolk sac or embryo inside. I realized I was seeing either a very early pregnancy i.e., about five weeks, before the emergence of an identifiable embryo. Or I was seeing something else, a pregnancy that had started growing and then stopped, something that would never grow into a fetus. This very common occurrence is sometimes called a blighted ovum, a chemical pregnancy, or, more correctly, an anembryonic gestation.

I tried not to panic. That night, I told my husband there was only one thing to do: wait.

A week later, I was at the ob-gyns office. I had decided if I was going to get bad news, I wanted it from a dispassionate professional, someone I didnt know or work with.

The doctor breezed into the room and whisked out the vaginal ultrasound probe, coating it with a thick dollop of gel. He asked me again about my last period. I told him I hadnt had one and had no idea how far along I was. He glanced at my daughter, now asleep in her car seat, her little chin tucked to her chest. So, you werent planning on this, huh? he said.

I disclosed to him that I was a doctor, and that I had done an ultrasound a week earlier, but hadnt seen an embryo.

Where do you practice? he asked, I havent heard your name in town.

I named a clinic in a nearby city, well-known for its abortion care.

Look, he said, I understand youve got a very young kid already. I know how it is. You mean to plan these things, its harder than you think. The female body has a mind of its own. But you know I dont do terminations here.

I told him that I understood, said again that I wanted to be pregnant I just want to know if I really am or not.

He seemed unconvinced, but he slid the probe between my legs. Okay then, you know the drill: pressure, but not pain.

An image appeared on the screen: My uterus; inside it, a black oval the gestational sac and at its center, a white blob, the embryo, with a tiny flicker inside of it.

There you go, he said.

A spreading warmth rose behind my eyes and nose. Something like a gasp caught in my throat.

With his digital calipers, he measured the embryo. Six weeks and one day, he said. He mustve known I could see exactly what he did, but he said it anyway. So, weve got a heartbeat. Thats a viable pregnancy. Is this what you wanted?

I beamed at him, not caring about his patronizing tone, his stubborn insistence on judging me. The only possibility in that moment was that the whole world including this smirking doctor who knew nothing about me, my family, my choices shared in my relief and joy.

This was my experience as a family planning doctor: a pregnancy that I wanted and planned, but still didnt see coming. It wasnt a miracle that I detected the pregnancy this early: it was due to the pregnancy tests stacked on my desk at work, the colleague who could perform an ultrasound for me on request and when I finally sought care through the usual channels the fact that I was well-insured with relatively easy access to an obstetricians office, albeit one that offered limited services.

This was in a medically well-served suburban area of California. Imagine if I had been in rural Louisiana. Imagine if I hadnt been a doctor. Imagine how any woman can possibly confirm a pregnancy and have a chance to decide whether she can or should continue it before, according to her states laws, it is too late.

The answer is simple: She cant.

Christine Henneberg is a doctor and a writer.

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It Took Me More Than 6 Weeks To Figure Out I Was Pregnant -- And I'm A Doctor - HuffPost

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Calgary Nov 21, 2019 (Thomson StreetEvents) -- Edited Transcript of Oncolytics Biotech Inc earnings conference call or presentation Tuesday, November 12, 2019 at 10:00:00pm GMT

* Andrew R. de Guttadauro

Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - Global Head of Business Development & President of Oncolytics Biotech (U.S.) Inc

* Kirk J. Look

Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - CFO

* Matthew C. Coffey

Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - President, CEO & Director

Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - VP of IR & Corporate Communications

Canaccord Genuity Corp., Research Division - Principal & Senior Healthcare Analyst

Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division - MD of Equity Research of Biotechnology

Good day, ladies and gentlemen. My name is Kat, and I'll be your conference operator today. At this time, I would like to welcome everyone to Analytics (sic) [Oncolytics] Biotech Third Quarter 2019 Results Conference Call. (Operator Instructions) I will now turn the call over to your host, Michael Moore, Vice President, Investor Relations and Corporate Communications. Sir, the floor is yours.

Thanks, Kat. Good afternoon, ladies and gentlemen, and thank you for joining us on our call today to discuss our third quarter and corporate update, including our updated catalyst milestones. With me on the call this afternoon from Oncolytics are Dr. Matt Coffey, President and Chief Executive Officer; Kirk Look, Chief Financial Officer; and Andrew de Guttadauro, Global Head of Business Development.

On today's call, Dr. Coffey will review our clinical and operational progress, including a recap of catalyst milestones. Andrew will touch on our business development progress and our growing relationships with pharma and big biotech. And Kirk, of course, will then speak to our financial position. I'd like to point out, certain statements made on this call, such as those relating to our clinical development plans and business development plans are forward-looking within the meaning of applicable security laws. Please refer to our third quarter press release and MD&A for important assumptions and cautionary statements relating to forward-looking information.

I will now turn the call over to Dr. Matt Coffey. Matt?

Matthew C. Coffey, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - President, CEO & Director [3]

Hello, everyone, and welcome to our third quarter 2019 and corporate update conference call. The quarter was marked by continued clinical execution as well as even more validation of our unique oncolytic virus, and specifically our entry in this route of delivery, which I believe to be a vastly undervalued differentiator and will be something I'll come back to a few times on today's call. It's just that important.

We remain on track to report a steady cadence of value-driving catalysts across our robust and growing development pipeline before the end of this year and extending into the middle of 2021. I'll describe these important value inflection points later on this call. But first, let me provide a quick overview of our lead program and update on recent highlights from the quarter.

As everyone following Oncolytics should know, we are focused on advancing pelareorep in the lead indication of metastatic breast cancer, and we're conducting 2 key clinical studies with industry leaders that will determine the design of the Phase III registrational program for pelareorep in this indication. We have an approved study design for the Phase III, but we believe these 2 studies named AWARE-1 and BRACELET-1 will provide data supporting the addition of a checkpoint inhibitor to this registration study as well as a biomarker that we believe increases the chance of success in this critical study.

AWARE-1, our window of opportunity study in early-stage breast cancer with Roche's Tecentriq, is ongoing, and we expect to announce additional data before the end of the year. The BRACELET-1 study for which we have a co-development agreement with Pfizer and Merck KGaA, focusing on metastatic breast cancer, will begin enrolling Q1 of next year with our recently announced clinical partner, PrECOG. Last quarter, we announced encouraging results from the safety run in AWARE-1, which is being conducted by SOLTI in Spain to evaluate the efficacy of pelareorep in combination with Roche's Tecentriq and the utility of our biomarker measuring T cell clonality.

This data was also updated and highlighted last week at the Society of Immunotherapy for Cancer Conference in Washington, D.C. by Principal Investigator and Lead Author, Aleix Prat, and were presented by the lead investigator from SOLTI, Patricia Villagrasa. The data from these first patients demonstrated the creation of new T cells as well as the expansion of patients' existing T cell populations. What this means is that we have a brand-new T cells that recognize and react to tumor tissue, and that has some existing T cells that were previously blind to the tumor at baseline now react to the tumor 3 weeks later.

This data is very compelling and provides clinical proof that pelareorep is able to train the immune system to engage, to target and to kill tumor cells in primary disease as well as metastatic disease.

Specifically, it demonstrated viral replication within the tumor that led to tumor inflammation marked by a robust increase in new clones of tumor-targeting CD8-positive T cells. Now to put this in perspective, the average person walking around an urban environment will produce 2 or 3 new T cell clones per month, the immune system just doesn't require anything more than this in this environment. On study, we saw as many as 450 new T cell clones in a patient, which is a significant amount of T cell clones to recognize and attack tumor tissue. Simply put, we're creating a hot tumor microenvironment that did not previously exist. The exact environment required by checkpoint inhibitors that currently only work in a little as 1 in 5 patients.

So as we've stated time and time again, what if we can make a 2 in 5 and double a $25 billion drug class?

Additional data presented at SITC demonstrated additional support for our IV delivery based on an increase in T cells within both the tumor center and at the tumor periphery or stroma. This indicates that T cells are indeed getting into the tumor, not just gathering around the outside. Importantly, we also observed a decrease in the number of regulatory T cells or Tregs, which inhibit an antitumor immunological response by suppressing inflammation. This decrease in Tregs is also observed in checkpoint combination therapy experiments in breast cancer mouse models, further highlighting the robust transformations that pelareorep is making to the tumor microenvironment.

The next patient cohort to report from AWARE-1 study focuses on patients receiving pelareorep and standard of care without Tecentriq. This cohort will allow us to compare the patient population to those patients that have already received pelareorep with the standard of care and Tecentriq. This comparison of the 2 cohorts will allow us to confirm the impact pelareorep has on enhancing the antitumor T cell response, both on its own and in combination with checkpoint inhibitors. With respect to BRACELET-1, we are pleased to announce our recent partnership with PrECOG, a leading cancer research network and perhaps the preeminent breast cancer group in North America.

The principal investigator will be PreCOG member, Dr. Kathy Miller, Professor of Oncology at Indiana University School of Medicine and Associate Director of Clinical Research at Indiana University Melvin and Bren Simon Cancer Center. I cannot overstate how happy we are to be working with this group on this critically important study in our target patient population of hormone receptor-positive metastatic breast cancer. Quite simply, PrECOG and Dr. Kathy Miller, in particular, chose when and what they work on. So to have a group of their stature choose to work with Oncolytics and demonstrate their enthusiasm to work with an IV-administered oncolytic virus is incredibly gratifying.

We recently finalized the design of BRACELET-1 in collaboration with Pfizer and Merck KGaA, as well as input from PrECOG, and the protocol is currently under FDA review. PrECOG will begin patient enrollment in Q1 2020 at 15 centers across the United States.

Before moving on, I want to remind you that examination of our biomarker of T cell clonality for predicting patient response to pelareorep in combination with immune checkpoints is at the core of everything we're doing in the clinic. Confirming the utility of this biomarker across several studies as prognostically and predictably determined with a patient that's susceptible to treatment with pelareorep will be critical as we move forward into Phase III.

Being able to select and stratify patients who are likely to respond to treatment in our pivotal study substantially improves our chance of success and enables a precision medicine approach to fighting cancer. And quite frankly, as Andrew will go into, this is what pharma is looking for before making long-term commitments to pelareorep.

The use of the biomarker for the registration study is likely to be twofold. We will first use the assay to select patients for eligibility based upon having adequate immune reserves to respond to treatment. We will then further enrich the study after the first cycle by stratifying for patients that have not demonstrated a positive vaccination-like effect from those that have not. In doing so, we can get a potentially value inflection point sooner with greater financial flexibility.

We believe our biomarker is a game-changer for Oncolytics and our future clinical programs. So we are committed to fully characterizing its use in our current and planned studies.

I want to pause for a minute and highlight the most important differentiator for pelareorep with its systemic delivery by intravenous injection. As I mentioned earlier, I believe this is a tremendously undervalued differentiator for Oncolytics. It is globally accepted in the world of oncolytic viruses that this is a goal and a huge need in this space, and no other oncolytic virus has demonstrated meaningful data on IV delivery. They are all required intratumoral, which is very different in terms of tumors that can be reached and cannot effectively address metastatic disease.

We've consistently shown across multiple clinical studies that our virus can successfully infiltrate, replicate within and inflame multiple tumor types, including both primary and metastatic disease. These findings have been further validated by meta-analysis that was recently presented during the podium presentations at the Annual International Oncolytics Virus Conference. The data demonstrated that across 13 clinical studies, IV-delivered pelareorep resulted in an impressive average of 81% of patient tumor samples testing positive for virus replication, with no infection in normal tissue. This is a fantastic result across a broad range of tumor types, including our lead indication of breast cancer. Interestingly, though, this number climbs to 96% when we exclude melanoma skin biopsies. This analysis provides definitive proof that systemically delivered pelareorep can successfully avoid neutralization to reach both primary tumors and metastatic disease, making it a valuable therapy and immune adjuvant across a wide range of cancers.

While we're focused on our lead indication of metastatic breast cancer, this certainly speaks to the potential value of our delivery, both on clinics and for future development partners based on the breadth of cancers where pelareorep can become a cornerstone in combination with multiple immunotherapies.

Additional data presented at the IOVC and the data catalyst we highlighted in today's press release, and we will discuss now with data surrounding the synergies between pelareorep and CDK4/6 inhibitors.

Now as I mentioned last quarter, we're also exploring combination studies of pelareorep with other key oncology drug classes beyond checkpoint inhibitors, and CDK4/6 inhibitors are part of our initial investigations. Preclinical work with CDK4/6 inhibitors have been conducted by our academic collaborators and are also being worked on with industry partners to confirm the activity of this treatment combination.

Our preliminary data suggests that pelareorep synergizes with CDK4/6 inhibitors by blocking cellular signal pathways and releasing more double-stranded RNA into the tumor cell. This triggers a process called immunogenic cell death. Immunic (sic) [immunogenic] cell death is a cell's way of sending out a danger signal to our immune cells saying, come and eat me or come and kill me. The result is another very effective way to make a cold tumor very, very hot. And CDK4/6 combinations may not require checkpoint blockade.

Approved CDK4/6 drugs like Pfizer, Eli Lilly and Novartis', are targeting early-stage breast cancer around clinical trials for multiple solid tumor types. Like with checkpoint inhibitors, pelareorep's synergies with CDK4/6 inhibitors have the potential to expand the use of these drug classes in their current indications and to a broader patient population. It's obviously very early, but this drug class is important enough that these advancements can definitively play a role in business development activities.

On the subject of data and validation, we also recently reported the positive results from a Phase Ib study of pelareorep in combination with Merck's KEYTRUDA in patients with advanced pancreatic adenocarcinoma have been published in a peer-reviewed journal called Clinical Cancer Research. The publication highlights a partial response of 17.4 months. Now this is considerably longer than even typical OS data in these patients, let alone a partial response, and validate our biomarker demonstrating the creation of new T cell clones during the treatment. This is the first evidence published on the ability to actually predict for progression-free survival and the ultimate goal of overall survival and is the study that led to our ongoing Phase II study in pancreatic cancer.

It was also a factor of why Merck chose to be a collaborator on this study, and we look forward to announcing data on this study next year.

The publication of our study results helped drive broader appreciation for our unique oncolytic virus and its delivery within the medical community and is another important target indication and it supports our ongoing business discussions with this program.

We will also have data presented at the Annual American Society for Hematology Conference this December. This data highlighted in our recent announcement from the abstract supports an ongoing NCI-sponsored multiple myeloma study combining pelareorep with a proteasome inhibitor, carfilzomib, a.k.a. Amgen's KYPROLIS and helps us understand why we see such dramatic tumor results in these patients. Specifically, this study is investigating the potential mechanism underlying the apparent synergy of proteasome inhibition in pelareorep, and it's reported for the first time that proteasome inhibitors increased pelareorep's entry, infection and killing of multiple myeloma cells by inhibiting or minimizing any antiviral response.

Emerging positive results from this ongoing NCI-sponsored study conducted at Emory University and the University of Utah, has led to the current multiple myeloma checkpoint combination study at Emory University. These results will be presented by Dr. Flavia Pichiorri, Associate Professor at Judy and Bernard Briskin Center at the City of Hope, Los Angeles, California.

Now before handing the call to Andrew to discuss our BD efforts, we had one more corporate highlight from the quarter. Last month, we announced a strategic addition to our Board of Directors. Leonard Kruimer joined Oncolytics Board, bringing more than 30 years of experience in corporate finance, planning and strategy and M&A, 20 of which were in senior management positions in private and publicly listed biotechnology and life science companies, including his time at Crucell, where he played a leading role in selling the company to Johnson & Johnson for $2.3 billion. We're pleased to welcome him and look forward to benefiting from his extensive executive experience.

With that, now I'll hand the call over to Andrew de Guttadauro, Global Head of Business Development, to provide a brief business development review. Andrew?

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Andrew R. de Guttadauro, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - Global Head of Business Development & President of Oncolytics Biotech (U.S.) Inc [4]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you, Matt. As I mentioned on our last call, we've seen renewed interest among large pharma in gaining access to oncolytic viruses to potentially combine with their immuno-oncology assets. This interest is reflected by deals executed by Merck, BMS, J&J, Boehringer Ingelheim and others over the past 2 years. The majority of these deals were preceded by initial clinical collaborations designed to first evaluate the viability of the combination of the oncolytic viruses in question with the acquiring company's own immuno-oncology assets. That's exactly what Oncolytics is doing with our ongoing studies designed to demonstrate potential synergies with Bavencio, Tecentriq, KEYTRUDA and OPDIVO. Potential partners' interest is firstly driven by our demonstrating pelareorep's potential to synergize with a range of checkpoint inhibitors and tumor types.

That said, these same partners are also excited about our systemic effect and attendant IV route of administration, as the latter allows for nurses to administer pelareorep in the chemotherapy suite, much the same way they do other infused cancer therapies. Pelareorep's ease of administration is attractive to potential partners because it addresses a major drawback of most OVs, which require intratumoral administration, which is an uncommonly used approach by which to treat oncology patients and carries commercial drawbacks not experienced with IV administration.

In addition, pelareorep's systemic effect allows it to directly impact metastatic disease, a critical therapeutic aspect that IT-administered OVs have yet to prove they can similarly impact. Pelareorep's systemic effect, therefore, allows pelareorep to impact cancer across a broader range of its life cycle to include its critical metastatic stage.

As Matt previously mentioned, we're also excited about pelareorep's emerging potential synergized with the CDK4/6 therapies, one of the fastest-growing drug classes in oncology, with 2019 worldwide sales projected to exceed $4 billion. Our goal is to strike a licensing agreement with either company with checkpoint assets or a company recognizing the significant clinical and commercial potential inherent in a therapy capable of being safely and efficaciously combined with multiple checkpoints to treat a range of tumor targets with unmet clinical need.

With that, I'll turn the call back over to Matt.

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Matthew C. Coffey, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - President, CEO & Director [5]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thanks, Andrew. Before I hand the call to Kirk for a quick review of our financial position, let me recap our guidance over the next 2 years in terms of upcoming catalysts.

As discussed in our most recent conference call that highlighted our robust set of catalysts and milestones for the first time, within our press release that went out earlier today, and on the call, we touched on preclinical data demonstrating the synergies between pelareorep as well as another oncology drug class called CDK4/6 inhibitors. We're also on track to announce additional AWARE-1 data before the end of the year.

Our planned Phase II study of pelareorep, in combination with Merck's KEYTRUDA in multiple myeloma, is in the hands of our Lead Investigator, Dr. Kevin Kelly at USC's Norris Cancer Center. Dr. Kelly is negotiating with the FDA to finalize the protocol, and we await updates from Dr. Kelly on the study initiation.

Now looking at the first half of 2020, we expect to complete enrollment in AWARE-1 and initiate the BRACELET-1 study and report final data from AWARE-1 as well as interim data from our ongoing Phase II study in second line pancreatic cancer with Merck's KEYTRUDA in Q2 of 2020. The study should also complete enrollment around the same time.

Now the second half of 2020 will include final data from the Phase II pancreatic study and interim data from both multiple myeloma studies with OPDIVO and KEYTRUDA as well as final data from our previously mentioned NCI-sponsored multiple myeloma study combining pelareorep and Amgen's KYPROLIS. We expect BRACELET-1 to complete enrollment in the second half of 2020 as well as report interim data before the end of the year. Final data from BRACELET-1 study is expected in the first half of 2021. Now this is without question the most robust set of data catalysts of any company in the oncolytic spire space. And it's so why we're so excited about the future.

I'll now turn the call to Kirk Look, our CFO, to discuss our financial results for the quarter.

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Kirk J. Look, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - CFO [6]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Thank you, Matt, and hello, everyone. At September 30, 2019, we reported cash and cash equivalents of $12.3 million to fund our continuing operations. This includes gross proceeds of USD 3.7 million from our underwritten public offering, which importantly added a full quarter to our runway, giving us a stronger financial position. Our net loss for the third quarter of 2019 was $3.5 million compared to $3.3 million in the third quarter of 2018, equating to a loss of $0.16 per share in 2019 compared to a loss of $0.20 per share in 2018. Research and development expenses for the third quarter of 2019 were $1.6 million compared to $1.9 million in the third quarter of 2018.

In the current quarter, our R&D activities centered on the continued enrollment in our AWARE-1 study, preparing for the first patient to be enrolled in our BRACELET-1 study, which continues to track towards Q1 next year, and supporting our other checkpoint inhibitor combination trials. Our operating expenses for the third quarter of 2019 were $1.8 million compared to $1.5 million in the third quarter of 2018. The increase in operating expenses are primarily due to transaction costs related to our August 2019 public offering and our continued investment in our Investor Relations and business development activities.

Subsequent to the end of the third quarter and as announced in this morning's press release, we have seen some warrants exercised with proceeds of over $1.25 million on the back of the recent share price appreciation, which has more than doubled in the last month. With our cash on hand, along with the proceeds from our warrants and our ATM, Oncolytics is positioned to capitalize on our catalysts and milestones.

With that, I'll turn it back to Matt.

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Matthew C. Coffey, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - President, CEO & Director [7]

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Thanks, Kirk. Now before we take questions, I want to reiterate just how highly differentiated we are within the oncolytic virus world, which as Andrew highlighted, is an area that is very attractive to large pharma.

Now almost all of these in development, including the only approved OV in North America, are genetically modified and require antitumoral delivery and therefore, cannot reach metastatic disease. We are the only OV with meaningful data demonstrating efficient and selective viral replication within the tumor following systemic delivery. Now this is supported by multiple scientific publications and highlighted by the recent meta-analysis presented at IOVC.

We also feel that this is still significantly underappreciated and believe will be a great source of value as we build our critical mass of data, continuing to confirm our intravenous systemic delivery. Pelareorep remains the only viral agent to show a survival benefit in late-stage metastatic breast cancer. Now these outstanding results have generated multiple big pharma partnership opportunities where discussions remain very active.

As we continue to advance our lead clinical program in breast cancer, our goal is to continue expanding our pipeline to access additional markets with an unmet need and to explore combination therapies with checkpoint inhibitors and other drug classes in oncology.

As I described, Oncolytics is entering a rich period of data catalysts over the next 21 months. We look forward to achieving these milestones in line with our guidance and guidance supplied by that of our clinical investigators and to build additional value for our company and its shareholders.

Now before we go to Q&A, I'd like to touch on a couple of things. First, I'd like to say welcome to our newest covering analyst, Jerry Isaacson at Roth Capital. Happy to see the interest in Oncolytics and the OV space. Second, and it's very important, as I know it's been on many people's minds, today was the 10th day in a row that we closed above $1 on NASDAQ and expect to receive formal notification from them as soon as being back in full compliance. We always knew we would meet this compliance issue, but happy to have it addressed as quickly as we did. I'd now like to open the lines to take some of your questions. Operator?

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Questions and Answers

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Operator [1]

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(Operator Instructions) And our first question comes from John Newton (sic) [Newman] from Canaccord.

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John Lawrence Newman, Canaccord Genuity Corp., Research Division - Principal & Senior Healthcare Analyst [2]

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You mentioned, I think, at the beginning of the call that you will be presenting some additional data for AWARE-1 by the end of this year. Just wondered if you could talk a little bit more about that.

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Matthew C. Coffey, Oncolytics Biotech Inc. - President, CEO & Director [3]

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Yes, John, thanks for the question. And sorry, everyone, I got a cough, I've had a cold all day, so I sound absolutely terrible, my apologies. So AWARE-1, just a reminder for everyone, AWARE-1 is the window of opportunity study. So these are women who are otherwise healthy, but they have a very small primary breast cancer lesion. Now going into this study, we first didn't know if the virus would actually access primary disease. So we were delighted that it did. But the other thing that we're very concerned about is Tecentriq is -- it can be toxic, and this is exacerbated if your immune system is completely healthy. You can imagine ramping up your immune system could potentially be harmful to the patient. So fortunately, it was tolerated in the patients when we presented all that initial data.

The next safety cohorts are in hormone receptor-positive patients only in standard of care and virus. And this cohort, I think almost all of them have either undergone surgery or are about to in the next week. So we'll do a similar analysis looking at cell TIL or inflammatory cell count, T cell characterization, both CD8 positives as well as using multiplexing to show whether Tregs are entering or exiting the tumor. And so we should have a pretty good sense from these first group of patients whether we see the diminishment of Treg in the presence of checkpoint inhibitors or if the virus can do it on itself. The number of clones, we're very interested to see whether or not the Tecentriq is expanding those as well as just looking at the cytokine profile and response in these patients.

So we're hoping to have that out, hopefully, December, if we can get everything on test quickly enough, but there'll be a DSMB meeting to review the safety of this combination as well. So we'll have that out to the marketplace with fuller data provided first quarter next year. And we're still hoping that this will be presented at ASCO 2020.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Operator [4]

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

And our next question comes from Wangzhi Li from Ladenburg.

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

Wangzhi Li, Ladenburg Thalmann & Co. Inc., Research Division - MD of Equity Research of Biotechnology [5]

See the rest here:
Edited Transcript of ONC.TO earnings conference call or presentation 12-Nov-19 10:00pm GMT - Yahoo Finance

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

20th November 2019

A new molecular test will allow scientists to identify the sex of juvenile and sexually regressed Antarctic krill, for the first time.

The test, developed by Dr Leonie Suter and her colleagues at the Australian Antarctic Division and the University of Padova in Italy, will provide insights into some of the unusual features of krill reproductive biology.

It will also help researchers identify the gender distribution within swarms.

The ratio between males and females in krill swarms is often very uneven, Dr Suter said.

On a recent voyage, we found one krill swarm contained only seven per cent females, while another was made up of 82 per cent females.

This gender bias could affect the reproductive capacity of the swarm, or the behaviour of the swarm, as males surrounded by males might act differently to when theyre surrounded by females, and vice versa.

We dont know how widespread this biased sex ratio is or what causes it, and determining whether there is a pattern to the distribution of these swarms could improve conservation measures and fisheries models.

But theres a catch. To identify the sex of krill, tell-tale physical characteristics have to be examined under the microscope, but these are only present in sub-adult and adult krill.

Larval and juvenile krill lack these characteristics, and over winter when food is limited, adult krill can shrink in size and revert or regress to a form without external sexual structures.

While finding a gene responsible for male or femaleness would be ideal, the krill genome is complex and 15 times larger than the human genome, so only a small amount of the DNA has been sequenced.

However the presence of genes related to sexual development can be identified using RNA (ribonucleic acid), which is produced from DNA when genes are actively expressed.

So Dr Suter examined the RNA in krill testes and ovaries to identify genes expressed in these tissues.

There were extensive gene expression differences between ovary and testis tissue, meaning that although the same genes are present in males and females, many are activated or expressed in a sex-specific way in their gonads, she said.

She then looked to see which of these differentially expressed genes were present in either whole female or whole male krill.

We found three genes that were only expressed in females and that these could reliably determine the sex of juvenile, sub-adult, adult and sexually regressed krill, but not larval krill, she said.

Using these genes weve been able to develop a molecular test for unambiguous sex determination of krill lacking external sexual characteristics, for the first time.

This will contribute to our understanding of krill population dynamics, genetic diversity and reproductive behaviour.

When it comes to sex, even amongst krill, its complicated.

More information:

Sex identification from distinctive gene expression patterns in Antarctic krill (Euphausia superba). Polar Biology 2019.

Continue reading here:
Battle of the sexes - Australian Antarctic Division

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

If you think you know who your relatives are, you might want to think again. Because, according to a new study, about one in every hundred of us doesnt have the dad with think we do. This is called extra-pair paternity - its where a man ends up bringing up another mans child - and city living, as well as lower socioeconomic status, make it more likely to happen.Researchers at Leuven University, in Belgium, discovered this by tracking down 513 pairs of men who, according to parish records, shared a male ancestor up to 500 years ago in their family trees. Because men inherit their Y chromosomes exclusively from their fathers, if thered been no naughtiness in their family trees, the genetic barcodes of the Y chromosomes of each of the pairs of men should match. But, in some cases, they didnt, with the obvious implications! And by using additional genetic techniques, they were able to work out when in the family history the assignation must have happened. Speaking with Amalia Thomas, Maarten Larmuseau...

Maarten - For the first time we reconstructed the historical patterns of extra pair paternity across the last centuries within our Western populations. What is 'extra pair paternity'. Well it is an event when a man was unexpectedly not the biological father of his legal child. What we found was that the 'extra pair paternity' rates were lower overall around 1 percent, but depending on social context we find that the highest 'extra pair paternity' rates were observed among urban families with low socio economic status, especially in the 19th century.

Amalia -And how did you find out that these women had been cheating on their husbands?

Maarten - But it's not only cheating. It can also be the result of sexual aggression'. Extra pair paternity' has potential different causes. So what we did was find persons who are living today with a common paternal ancestor in direct paternal line; if they have the same Y chromosomes - Y chromosomes are the chromosomes that each male get from his father - in a paternal line, every man should have the same Y chromosome, or variants. If that is not the case then at least one 'extra pair paternity' event happens across the generation.

Amalia -So you studied the genes of over 500 pairs of donors who are alive today and compare that to the family records dating back up to 500 years. How can you be so sure that records that are so old are accurate?

Maarten - We are quite sure about those genealogies, based on civil records and parish records. If we didn't find a biological connection between presumed related persons then we know that there is at least one 'extra pair of paternity In the past.

Amalia - What have you found out from this comparison?

Maarten -Well that the 'extra pair paternity' rate is quite low in average. It's always around 1 percent. But what we saw now is that there were quite differences between socioeconomic classes, especially the low social classes in the 19th Century, they had a 10 fold higher exit per paternity rate than formers in rural areas and this is quite surprising. We didn't expect this! We expected more in aristocratic families, especially because there is a lot of references to adultery in the 17th century in literature and theatre plays. So this looks like based on our results that it's not the case.

Amalia -Could you guess if you don't know exactly, why it's the socioeconomic status population, density and particularly the 19th century where this happened the most?

Maarten - Well we don't have a real explanation because we cannot interview older people any more and say what is the reason. Is it because of adultery is it because of sexual aggression and rape? We cannot ask them again. But what we see is that in the 19th Century there was a lot of social conflict, low social classes lived in very poor conditions. We also had a lot of cholera epidemics, especially in Belgium and the Netherlands where we looked. After the Industrial Revolution there weren't that good conditions and there were much higher differences between the social classes. So after all it was not so surprising that we could see differences.

See original here:
Sex in the city: when dad's not dad - The Naked Scientists

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

Three kin all conveyed two duplicates of a changed quality, which made their blood run white with fat.

An uncommon hereditary issue made three kins blood flood with fat

also, turn smooth white, as per another report of the strange case.

The three kin comprised of one lot of congenial twins (a little girl and child) and a more established child, all destined to a first-cousin couple in a Pennsylvania Dutch family. In their teenagers and mid 20s, each of the three kin experienced baffling side effects, including episodes of stomach torment. They had all been determined to have hypertriglyceridemia, a genuinely normal issue that causes greasy particles rang triglycerides to work in the blood

.

Presently in their 50s, the kin as of late experienced hereditary testing and discovered that they have a condition that is substantially more uncommon, influencing just 1 in each million individuals, as per the case report, distributed today (Nov. 18) in the diary Annals of Internal Medicine

.

Those with the ultrarare issue, known as familial chylomicronemia disorder (FCS), may collect in excess of 1,000 milligrams of triglycerides for each deciliter (mg/dL) of blood. For correlation, ordinary blood levels of the fat should fall underneath 150 mg/dL, and 500 mg/dL would be considered exceptionally high in a solid individual, as per the National Institutes of Health

.

Undoubtedly, in individuals with FCS, blood fat levels are high to such an extent that the typically dark red liquid turns the shade of milk. (FCS isnt the main condition that can cause milk-hued blood; the side effect may likewise show up in individuals with serious hypertriglyceridemia.)

Related: The Color of Blood: Here Are Natures Reddest Reds (Photos)

The three kin had since a long time ago battled to monitor their triglyceride levels and endured visit irritation of the pancreas, otherwise called pancreatitis a genuine condition that can cause stomach torment, fever and retching. At the clinic, the male twins triglyceride levels came to as high as 5,000 mg/dL, while the other siblings levels topped at around 6,000 mg/dL. The female twins triglyceride levels took off most noteworthy of all, arriving at 7,200 mg/dL at greatest.

The kin trusted their primary care physicians could help repress those forceful indications.

To affirm the kins uncommon finding, the specialists looked to their patients qualities. Triglycerides ordinarily develop in the blood because of various breaking down qualities and other related wellbeing conditions, for example, diabetes or hypertension, as indicated by the Journal of the American Board of Family Medicine

. However, when specialists examined the kins hereditary code, the scientists spotted just one transformed quality that was key for separating triglycerides in the body.

In solid individuals, the gene contains guidelines to construct a protein called lipoprotein lipase (LPL), which ordinarily covers the veins that go through muscles and greasy tissues in the body, as indicated by the Genetics Home Reference

. LPL separates fats conveyed in the blood; without a sufficient inventory, the kins blood plasma ran thick with abundance triglycerides.

Related: How to Speak Genetics: A Glossary

Every kin conveyed two duplicates of the changed LPL quality, which means both their folks went down the transformed hereditary code

to the kids, the case report noted. In addition, the specific hereditary transformation in the kin had never been seen, the creators said. The specialists set the kin on a fat-confined eating regimen

, which effectively balanced out their triglyceride levels and subdued their episodes of pancreatitis. Some of the time, when triglyceride levels spike, specialists should physically supplant the fat-filled blood of their patients with solid blood from benefactors, Live Science recently revealed

. Fortunately, the kins condition could be curtained with diet

alone.

Initially distributed on Live Science

.Need more science? Get a membership of our sister production How It Works magazine, for the most recent stunning science news.

Continued here:
A Rare Genetic Disorder The Blood ' Milky ' White of these Siblings - X Herald

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

FREMONT, Calif., Nov. 19, 2019 Penguin Computing, a leader in high- performance computing (HPC), artificial intelligence (AI), and enterprise data center solutions and services, today announced that it, along with partners Intel and CoolIT, will deliver the Magma Supercomputer to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory. The Magma system was procured through the Commodity Technology Systems (CTS-1) contract with the National Nuclear Security Administration (NNSA) and is one of the first deployments of Intel Xeon Platinum 9200 series processors with support from CoolIT Systems complete direct liquid cooling and Omni-Path interconnect.

Magma is based on Relion XE2142eAP compute servers. Magmas 752 compute nodes are each configured with dual Xeon Platinum 9242 processors, with a theoretical peak of over 7 TFLOPs and 293TB of system memory calculating an RPeak of 5.313 PFLOPS. CoolIT Systems provides the complete direct liquid cooling solution for Magma through a blind-mate coldplate loop design which captures +85% of the server heat through CPU, DIMM and VR coldplates, allowing the servers to operate at maximum efficiency. The CoolIT subfloor piping, in-rack manifolds and row-based CHx750 CDUs deliver the required heat exchanging capability and coolant flow to support all racks.

Funded through NNSAs Advanced Simulation & Computing (ASC) program, Magma will support NNSAs Life Extension Program and efforts critical to ensuring the safety, security and reliability of the nations nuclear weapons in the absence of underground testing.

The convergence of HPC and AI is here today. We are excited to deliver Magma, an HPC system that is enhanced by artificial intelligence technology, said William Wu, Vice President of Hardware Products at Penguin Computing. We are seeing artificial intelligence permeate every industry and, specifically in HPC, we can now deliver a converged platform that allows AI to accelerate HPC modeling for our data scientist customers.

We continue designing new, leading edge solutions with our partners for the DOE NNSAs CTS-1 contract. Magma is another example of a great shared effort resulting in an HPC cluster designed and built to meet new demanding workloads. We anticipate this system to qualify for the November 2019 Top500 HPC list said Ken Gudenrath, DOE Director at Penguin Computing.

Penguin Computing is committed to Expanding the worlds vision of what is possible! The Magma cluster brings a new level of synergy amongst our clients, partners and Penguin Computing. One of our primary goals with Magma is to bring new mission technologies and capabilities to Livermore National Labs and its user communities. said Sid Mair, President of Penguin Computing.

Magma is a major leap forward in HPC and AI convergence that could only be achieved with trusted engineering collaboration between Lawrence Livermore National Lab, Penguin Computing, and Intel, said Phil Harris, VP and GM of Intels Datacenter Solutions Group. With up to 96 cores per node, massive memory bandwidth, and integrated AI acceleration with Intel DL Boost technology, the Intel Xeon Platinum 9200 processor will provide a powerful foundation for Lawrence Livermore National Lab to enhance its ability to achieve its mission goals.

The Commodity Technology System efforts at NNSA represent a very cost-effective way to manage our workload at each of our three laboratories, said Mark Anderson, Director for NNSAs Office of Advanced Simulation and Computing and Institutional Research and Development Programs. In this model, commodity-based systems take on the bulk of day-to-day computing, leaving the larger advanced technology capability systems available for only the most demanding problems across the Tri-Lab community. This is just an example of the sophisticated approach NNSA is taking to manage demanding workloads in the most efficient manner for the country.

Magma represents a timely addition to our CTS machines in order to address the significant surge in demand coming from NNSAs major Life Extension Program, said Michel McCoy, LLNLs Advanced Simulation & Computing program director. It is essential to have available a supply chain that can respond essentially instantly, delivering state-of-the-art technology in just a few months to meet pressing national security needs. We look forward to moving this system into production as fast as possible.

Under the CTS-1 contract, Penguin has delivered more than 22 petaflops of computing capability to support the ASC program at the NNSA Tri-Labs of Lawrence Livermore, Los Alamos and Sandia national laboratories.

For more information about the Relion XE2142eAP server and Intel Xeon Platinum 9200 processors, or to speak with a Penguin Computing representative, please visit us atwww.penguincomputing.com.

Continue reading here:
Penguin Computing to Deliver Magma Supercomputer to Lawrence Livermore National Laboratory - HPCwire

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

SAN DIEGO, Nov. 19, 2019 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Pfenex Inc. (NYSE American: PFNX) is a development and licensing biotechnology company focused on leveraging its Pfnex Expression Technology to develop and improve protein therapies for unmet patient needs. Using the patented Pfnex Expression Technology platform, the Company has developed the FDA-approved PF708 product indicated for the treatment of osteoporosis in certain patients at high risk of fracture and created an advanced pipeline of therapeutic equivalents, biologics and vaccines. The Company announced today that Eef Schimmelpennink, President and Chief Executive Officer, will be presenting at the Evercore ISI HealthCONx Conference 2019 on Tuesday, December 3rd, taking place at the Four Seasons Hotel in Boston, Massachusetts.

Interested parties can access the live audio webcast and archive from the Investors Section of Pfenex's website at http://www.pfenex.com.

About Pfenex Inc.Pfenex is a development and licensing biotechnology company focused on leveraging its Pfnex Expression Technology to develop and improve protein therapies for unmet patient needs. Using the patented Pfnex Expression Technology platform, Pfenex has created an advanced pipeline of potential therapeutic equivalents, and vaccines. Pfenexs lead product candidate is PF708, a therapeutic equivalent candidate to Forteo (teriparatide injection). PF708 has been approved in the U.S. for the treatment of osteoporosis in certain patients at high risk of fracture, and marketing authorization applications are pending in other jurisdictions. In addition, Pfenex is developing hematology/oncology products in collaboration with Jazz Pharmaceuticals, including PF743, a recombinant crisantaspase, and PF745, a recombinant crisantaspase with half-life extension technology. Pfenex also uses its Pfnex Expression Technology platform to produce CRM197, a diphtheria toxoid carrier protein used in prophylactic and therapeutic vaccines.

Pfenex investors and others should note that Pfenex announces material information to the public about Pfenex through a variety of means, including its website (http://www.pfenex.com/), its investor relations website (http://pfenex.investorroom.com/), press releases, SEC filings, public conference calls, corporate Twitter account (https://twitter.com/pfenex), Facebook page (https://www.facebook.com/Pfenex-Inc-105908276167776/timeline/), and LinkedIn page (https://www.linkedin.com/company/pfenex-inc) in order to achieve broad, non-exclusionary distribution of information to the public and to comply with its disclosure obligations under Regulation FD. Pfenex encourages its investors and others to monitor and review the information Pfenex makes public in these locations as such information could be deemed to be material information. Please note that this list may be updated from time to time.

Investor Contact: Hans VitzthumManaging DirectorLifeSci Advisors, LLC.Office: 617-430-7578hans@lifesciadvisors.com

See the article here:
Pfenex to Present at the Evercore ISI HealthCONx Conference 2019 - Yahoo Finance

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

The Global Cryonics Technology Market report study includes an elaborative summary of the Cryonics Technology market that provides in-depth knowledge of various different segmentations. Cryonics Technology Market Research Report presents a detailed analysis based on the thorough research of the overall market, particularly on questions that border on the market size, growth scenario, potential opportunities, operation landscape, trend analysis, and competitive analysis of Cryonics Technology Market. The information includes the company profile, annual turnover, the types of products and services they provide, income generation, which provide direction to businesses to take important steps. Cryonics Technology delivers pin point analysis of varying competition dynamics and keeps ahead of Cryonics Technology competitors such as Praxair, Cellulis, Cryologics, Cryotherm, KrioRus, VWR, Thermo Fisher Scientific, Custom Biogenic Systems, Oregon Cryonics, Alcor Life Extension Foundation, Osiris Cryonics, Sigma-Aldrich, Southern Cryonics.

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The main objective of the Cryonics Technology report is to guide the user to understand the Cryonics Technology market in terms of its definition, classification, Cryonics Technology market potential, latest trends, and the challenges that the Cryonics Technology market is facing. In-depth researches and Cryonics Technology studies were done while preparing the Cryonics Technology report. The Cryonics Technology readers will find this report very beneficial in understanding the Cryonics Technology market in detailed. The aspects and information are represented in the Cryonics Technology report using figures, bar-graphs, pie diagrams, and other visual representations. This intensifies the Cryonics Technology pictorial representation and also helps in getting the Cryonics Technology industry facts much better.

.This research report consists of the worlds crucial region market share, size (volume), trends including the product profit, price, Value, production, capacity, capability utilization, supply, and demand and industry growth rate.

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The Study is segmented by following Product Type, Slow freezing, Vitrification, Ultra-rapid

Major applications/end-users industry are as follows Animal husbandry, Fishery science, Medical science, Preservation of microbiology culture, Conserving plant biodiversity

Cryonics Technology Market Report Highlights:

1)The report provides a detailed analysis of current and future market trends to identify the investment opportunities2) In-depth company profiles of key players and upcoming prominent players3) Global Cryonics Technology Market Trends (Drivers, Constraints, Opportunities, Threats, Challenges, Investment Opportunities, and recommendations)4) Strategic recommendations in key business segments based on the market estimations5) To get the research methodologies those are being collected by Cryonics Technology driving individual organizations.

Research Parameter/ Research Methodology

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The primary sources involve the industry experts from the Global Cryonics Technology industry including the management organizations, processing organizations, analytics service providers of the industrys value chain. All primary sources were interviewed to gather and authenticate qualitative & quantitative information and determine future prospects.

In the extensive primary research process undertaken for this study, the primary sources industry experts such as CEOs, vice presidents, marketing director, technology & innovation directors, founders and related key executives from various key companies and organizations in the Global Cryonics Technology in the industry have been interviewed to obtain and verify both qualitative and quantitative aspects of this research study.

Secondary Research:

In Secondary research crucial information about the industry value chain, the total pool of key players, and application areas. It also assisted in market segmentation according to industry trends to the bottom-most level, geographical markets and key developments from both market and technology oriented perspectives.

Inquiry for Buying Report: http://www.marketresearchstore.com/report/global-cryonics-technology-market-2018-by-manufacturers-countries-392955#InquiryForBuying

Thanks for reading this article, you can also get individual chapter wise section or region wise report versions like North America, Europe or Asia. Also, If you have any special requirements, please let us know and we will offer you the report as you want.

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Global Cryonics Technology Market 2019 by Manufacturers, Countries, Type and Application, Forecast to 2025 - Industry News Time 24

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

3D bioprinting has come a long way in recent years, with scientists using living tissue to print organs as complex as human skin. Researchers in Austria have unveiled an advancement with a process that can integrate living cells into structures at unprecedented speeds and resolution.

TU Wien developed the new technique using a novel bioink that allows cells to be embedded in a 3D matrix and printed with micrometer precision. The technique performs at a speed of one meter per second, much faster than past methods.

Images show living cells spreading in a 3D scaffold -- from left to right: week 1, week 3 week 5. Top: 3D setup, bottom: one layer only. The process was developed by researchers at TU Wien to create precision bioprinting. (Source: TU Wien)

"Using these 3D scaffolds, it is possible to investigate the behavior of cells with previously unattainable accuracy, said Aleksandr Ovsianikov, head of the 3D Printing and Biofabrication research group at the Institute of Materials Science and Technology at TU Wien. It is possible to study the spread of diseases, and if stem cells are used, it is even possible to produce tailor-made tissue in this way.

Exact Science

To successfully bioprint cells that can turn into living tissue with various characteristics, its key to process the cells in a certain way. While there are many techniques for 3D bioprinting, not all are created equal, said Ovsianikov. Some methods are imprecise or only allow a very short time window in which the cells can be processed without being damaged, while others have material challenges.

He noted that the behavior of a cell behaves depends crucially on the mechanical, chemical and geometric properties of its environment. "The structures in which the cells are embedded must be permeable to nutrients so that the cells can survive and multiply, said Ovsianikov. But it is also important whether the structures are stiff or flexible, whether they are stable or degrade over time.

The team can print 3D objects at microscopically fine resolutions, but using living cells at this size has been challenging. "You need liquids or gels that solidify precisely where you illuminate them with a focused laser beam, Ovsianikov noted. However, these materials must not be harmful to the cells, and the whole process has to happen extremely quickly.

Speeding the Process

To solve this issue, TU Wien researchers have been using what are called two-photon polymerization methods, which use a chemical reaction that is only initiated when a molecule of the material simultaneously absorbs two photons of a laser beam with particularly high intensity. At the point of photon absorption, the substance hardens, while it remains liquid everywhere else, which makes this method best suited to produce extremely fine structures with high precision.

While this allows for high resolution, its a rather slow processtypically in the range of micrometers or a few millimeters per second. This means the cells could die before printing is complete.

Now using the scaffolds, researchers have developed a method that fabricates cell-friendly materials at greater speeds. This means they can print a structure in just a few hours, giving cells a good chance of surviving and developing further. "Our method provides many possibilities to adapt the environment of the cells," said Ovsianikov.. Depending on how the structure is built, it can be made stiffer or softer.

He added that even fine, continuous gradients are possible. In this way, it is possible to define exactly how the structure should look in order to allow the desired kind of cell growth and cell migration. The process can also alter the laser intensity to determine how easily the structure will be degraded over time.

Based on the research, the team has created a company, UPNano, to further develop this technique and create bioprinting innovations. They also published a paper on their work in the journal Advanced Healthcare Materials.

Elizabeth Montalbano is a freelance writer who has written about technology and culture for more than 20 years. She has lived and worked as a professional journalist in Phoenix, San Francisco and New York City. In her free time she enjoys surfing, traveling, music, yoga and cooking. She currently resides in a village on the southwest coast of Portugal.

January 28-30:North America's largest chip, board, and systems event,DesignCon, returns to Silicon Valleyfor its 25th year!The premier educational conference and technology exhibition, this three-day event brings together the brightest minds across the high-speed communications and semiconductor industries, who are looking to engineer the technology of tomorrow. DesignCon is your rocket to the future. Ready to come aboard?Register to attend!

View original post here:
New Process can 3D Print Living Cells with Precision and Speed - DesignNews

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

November is Alzheimers Awareness Month. Its a fitting time to look at the latest Israeli advances in preventing, diagnosing and treating the progressive and incurable brain disorder.

Alzheimers disease (AD) is the most common cause of the 9.9 million new cases of dementia diagnosed each year worldwide. The disease primarily strikes the elderly population, affecting 30 percent of those over age of 85.

AD impacts memory, thinking and language skills, and even the ability to carry out simple tasks.

The disease occurs when a protein called amyloid beta aggregates in brain tissues. These protein clumps kill nerve cells, leading to damage in the brain-function mechanisms.

Here are 10 examples of promising Israeli approaches reported within the past two years alone.

PREVENTION

Various genetic, lifestyle and environmental factors can put a person at risk for AD. Among them are diabetes, high blood pressure, obesity, smoking, depression, cognitive inactivity or low education, and physical inactivity.

Preventing the onset of AD is the focus of these approaches:

Eitan Okun, Alzheimers disease researcher at Bar-Ilan University. Photo: courtesy

Most vaccines work by mounting an immune response toward a weakened pathogen to boost the immune systems ability to fight the real pathogen.

Okuns approach primes the body to attack amyloid beta protein clumps in the brain, the signature sign of AD.

Following experiments on mice, Okun is preparing for human trials on people at known risk of developing the disease in their 50s or younger: those genetically inclined toward Alzheimers and people with Down syndrome.

These critical trials will determine whether the vaccine actually works in humans, said Okun. Depending on the success rate and side effects from [human] testing, we will be able to know how much more time is needed to make the vaccine available on a global scale.

Okun also is investigating new ways to diagnose AD earlier and more accurately using advanced MRI (magnetic resonance imaging) technologies to detect initial signs of amyloid protein aggregation in the brain.

BGU Prof. Alon Friedman has invented a new treatment to prevent neurological diseases. Photo courtesy of Dr. Merav Shamir

Introduced by BGN Technologies of Ben-Gurion University of the Negev, the novel therapy hinges on the fact that a malfunctioning BBB allows neurotoxic blood products to enter the brain and cause damage leading to neurological diseases.

The lab of Prof. Alon Friedman discovered that treating the BBB at early stages can protect the brain and prevent disease development.

Their proposed treatment would combine Memantine and Losartan, which have been shown in preclinical studies to protect the integrity of the BBB when administered together. Partners are being sought to continue development.

Prof. Ester Segal of the Technion. Photo: courtesy

They reported on this advance in a recent cover story of the journal Small.

Nanoscale silicon chips invented in Prof. Ester Segals lab allow for the direct insertion of neural growth factor protein into the brain and its gradual release into the target tissue, bypassing the BBB (see above). Afterward delivering all the therapeutic protein loaded onto them, the chips safely dissolve.

In a series of experiments, we showed in mice that the two ways of delivering the platform into the brain led to the desired result, said Technion doctoral student Michal Rosenberg.

Our technology has also been tested in a cellular model of Alzheimers disease and indeed, the protein release has led to rescuing the nerve cells.

DIAGNOSIS

PET scans and spinal taps are now the gold standard for diagnosing AD. Theyre both expensive and carry risks.

Cheaper, noninvasive tests being developed in Israel also could be critical in providing a much earlier diagnosis, when treatment would be most effective.

Thats because the same beta-amyloid proteins that clump in the brain of AD patients appear in the retina of the eyes up to 15 years before the onset of AD symptoms.

RetiSpec developed the retinal scanner at the Ontario Brain Institute in Canada. Clinical studies are ongoing in Israel and Canada.

In October, RetiSpec received the Alzheimers Drug Discovery Foundations Diagnostics Accelerator Award to fund continued development of its hyperspectral imaging technology.

This could allow doctors to compare brain scans taken over time from the same patient, and to differentiate between healthy and diseased brain tissue, without resorting to invasive or dangerous procedures such as brain tissue biopsies, explained lead researcher Dr. Aviv Mezer.

Clara is based on a relatively recent understanding that AD affects the brains orientation system before it affects memory.

The overlap between how the self is oriented to the world and the brain mechanisms that are disturbed by Alzheimers disease is astonishing, Arzy told ISRAEL21c.

Clara asks patients questions about themselves and their relationships to people, places and events. It then compares that information to a baseline and generates a computer-based test tailored for the individual that can diagnose very early Alzheimers.

The team from Dr. Shahar Arzys computational neuropsychiatry lab at Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center in Jerusalem. Photo: courtesy

According to a study Arzys team published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and in the American Psychological Associations journal Neuropsychology, Clara is 95 percent accurate.

Clara is now in the midst of a five-year test at Harvard to compare data generated by the system with data from AD markers taken via amyloid PET scan, quantitative and functional MRI and other neuropsychological tests.

Jaul and Oded Meiron (a cognitive neuroscientist who heads the Electrophysiology and Neuro-cognition Lab in Herzogs Clinical Research Center for Brain Sciences) published an articlein the Journal of Alzheimers Disease outlining their discovery of the link between the two conditions.

The reason is that the abnormal changes in the brain that lead to dementia are happening in other parts of the body, including the skin. Skin tissue and brain tissue derive from the same embryonic stem cells.

Jaul and Meiron are working with an American company to develop a test to identify a biomarker for abnormal cell density in the skin of dementia patients. They hope that this skin test could pinpoint an individuals type and stage of dementia. The biomarkers show the most promise in identifying AD, they say.

TREATMENT

A variety of approved medications for AD including Exelon, developed in Israel cannot cure or stop the progression of the disease. They only relieve or delay AD symptoms, such as memory loss and confusion.

A few Israeli pharmaceuticals under development aim to improve Alzheimer treatment options.

Breathing in pure oxygen in a pressurized room or chamber stimulates the release of growth factors and stem cells, which promote healing.

This revolutionary treatment for Alzheimers disease uses a hyperbaric oxygen chamber, which has been shown in the past to be extremely effective in treating wounds that were slow to heal, said lead researcher Prof. Uri Ashery.

Asherys group tested the therapy on a mouse model of Alzheimers disease. The treatment was found to reduce behavioral deficiencies compared to control mice.

Remarkably, the treatment also reduced plaque pathology and neuroinflammation in the test mice by about 40 percent.

Further research will investigate the underlying mechanisms of the therapy and evaluate its beneficial effects in Alzheimer patients.

Yotam Nisemblat, CEO of ProteKt Therapeutics. Photo: courtesy

Incubated at FutuRx in Ness Ziona, ProteKt was spun out of PKR kinase inhibitor research by University of Haifa Prof. Kobi Rosenblum. Inhibition of the enzyme PKR is a unique idea for improving memory consolidation.

Protein aggregation tends to increase with age and can lead to neurodegeneration because proteins can adopt an erroneous configuration, where theyre misfolded, explains Prof. Martin Kupiec.

The paper he and his colleagues published in Molecular Cell describes how removing glucose from a particular aggregated protein made the blob dissolve.

If the results can be replicated in more complex proteins, scientists will have a new research avenue toward treatments that could reverse the neurodegenerative effect of protein aggregates, Kupiec says.

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10 promising ways to prevent, diagnose and treat Alzheimer's - ISRAEL21c

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

This product gave our columnist her best-ever skin. Read on

The Sunday Times,November 17 2019, 12:01am

This is one of those ding-ding-ding with a knife on a glass occasions. Obviously I review products I love and recommend from the heart every week, but equally obviously, not every single one is necessarily a life-changer. My personal list of the skincare products I would never again be without is not especially long. However, I currently have the best skin I have ever had in my entire life, including during periods when I paid much more attention to it and had regular facials, microdermabrasions, peels and so on. Hence the glass dinging.

Decree is another line by a doctor, in this case a Dr AJ Sturnham, who is a GP with a special interest in dermatology and aesthetics. The idea is that the line

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India Knight on the facial serum that transformed her skin - The Times

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The latest lifestyle, fashion and travel trends

He is one of the most googled names in beauty, and she, one of the most prominent figures in fashion.

It was therefore a fitting match for Victoria Beckham to join forces with Augustinus Bader the notoriously publicity-shy director of stem cell biology and cell technology at the University of Leipzig for her first foray in to skincare.

Bader became a household beauty name in February 2018, after the launch of his cult-product The Cream caused convulsions of desire to ripple throughout the beauty industry thanks to its ultra-hydrating and restorative qualities.

And so when looking for a scientific collaborator to join her on her endeavour in to skincare, it seemed a natural fit for the two to merge theircomplementingareas of expertise.

The Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer (Victoria Beckham Beauty)

Cue the result of the pairing: Victoria Beckham Beautys Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer.

The moisturiser is the new-and-improved iteration of the Morning Aura Primer Beckham launched as part of her collaboration with Este Lauder in 2016.

The product, which Beckham has re-developed with the help of 59-year-old Bader, is a multifunctional cream thatclaims to prime, impart a glow and also to repair.

Commenting on the collaborative beauty effort, Beckham took to her Instagram page to note: It has been a dream to develop, with Augustinus, a priming moisturizer that works to improve the health of my skin and gives that fresh, natural glow that I love.

Meanwhile Bader said: "It was an honour to collaborate with Victoria for her first Skin launch. I'm excited to share some of our skincare benefits in this product. It's the first product of its kind to care for your skin cells while also preparing your skin for makeup application."

A celebrity facialist has revealed VB's 9-step daily skincare routine

This marks the first skincare product 45-year-old Beckham has launched under her beauty line, which she debuted to critical-acclaim in September, alongside the brands co-founder, Sarah Creal.

Victoria Beckham Beauty has the tagline Luxury Performance, Clean Beauty, and is refusing to pigeonhole itself as just a beauty brand, instead referring to itself as clean beauty movement.

Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer costs 92 for 30ml and launches tomorrow exclusively at victoriabeckhambeauty.com and augustinusbader.com.

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Everything you need to know about Victoria Beckhams first skincare product launching tomorrow - Evening Standard

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

Gallant Stem Cell Therapy For Dogs is one of the product companies to be featured on Shark Tank Season 11 Episode 8. The story behind the birth of Gallant Stem Cell Therapy For Dogs is pretty interesting. Here are some of the unknown facts about Gallant and its founders, Aaron Hirschhorn.

Aaron Hirschhorn is the founder and former-CEO of the popular dog-sitting marketplace DogVacay. Aaron is a noted entrepreneur with more than 20 years of experience in building companies and investing in them. DogVacay app was launched in 2013 and Aaron managed to raise $47 million from his erstwhile investors.

Aaron was the finalist in the Ernst & Young Entrepreneur of the Year Award 2016. In April 2017, Aarons DogVacay app merged with Rover.com and eventually went on to become a $1 billion pet services marketplace.

Trouble struck Aarons life when he suffered a massive back injury and was forced to undergo stem cell treatment which yielded amazing results to his surprise. Aaron, being an ardent dog lover wondered why this cutting-edge medical technology of stem cell transplants cannot be applied to dogs.

As a result, Gallant was born in the middle of 2018. According to Gallant, Your pups stem cells haveincredible healing power. Extract and store these powerful cells during your pets spay/neuter, so that you can unleash their potential when your best friend needs it most.

Ever since its inception, the mission of Gallant stem cell therapy is to help pets live a healthier life and make use of the epic technology of stem cell therapy in saving the lives of tons of dogs.

Dogs enter their senior years around 7 and begin feeling the effects of aging as early as 4! Traditional methods of treatment for injury and age-related conditions are expensive and can have harmful side effects. Stem cells are incredible natural healers. However, up to 99% of stem cells are lost over time due to aging. This forms the bottomline of Gallants business problem.

Gallant raised $7 million investment in August 2019.

https://gallant.com/

From the moment you entrust Gallant with your dogs stem cells, were actively invested in their long-term health and well-being. Working in tandem with you and your veterinarian, we will collect and store these powerful cells now, so down the road we can help to treat the most common health problems your dog may face. We will also update you on new and potentially life-changing treatments as they become available.

Pick your pups stem cell storage plan you dont have to have a spay/neuter procedure scheduled yet! You can always add that in later. Our proprietary process requires no additional training, so any veterinarian you trust to alter your dog is qualified. Ahead of your dogs spay/neuter, we will connect with your vet and send our collection kit directly to their office.

2. Collect

On the big day, we align with your vet before the procedure and arrange for a courier. During your dogs spay/neuter procedure, your veterinarian will take out the stem cell-rich reproductive tissue they would normally discard into the collection kit.

3. Preserve

Once the tissue is received by our scientists, we send confirmation to both you and your veterinarian. Your dogs tissue is first inspected for quality before isolating the stem cells. The stem cells are then counted and frozen in liquid nitrogen to preserve their potency in our secure, state-of-the-art laboratory. Once this process is complete, you and your veterinarian will be notified that your pets stem cells are safely stored. The cells are then monitored by our team to ensure they stay perfectly preserved.

4. Treat

Your pets stem cells are at the ready to be sent to your veterinarian if/when treatment is needed. Treatments are out-patient procedures and cost about $300. A stem cell procedure is not painful to your pet and does not require anesthesia to administer.

Gallants stem cell therapy is receiving a lot of exciting reviews online. The therapy has been successful in saving scores of dogs with conditions like osteoarthritis, skin conditions, chronic dry eye.

Gallant is offering a $395 off discount for using the code SHARKTANK

How did Gallant fare in Shark Tank Season 11? What did the Sharks have to tell about it? Did Gallant Get a Deal on Shark Tank? More information to be updated soon in this post.

Read the rest here:
Shark Tank Season 11 Episode 8 Everything About Gallant Stem Cell Bank For Dogs As Seen on Shark Tank! Unknown Facts - TheNewsCrunch

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

The tumor cells which have shed into lymphatic system and circulated over the body through blood circulation are called as circulating tumor cells. Circulating tumor cells may comprise seeds for metastasis. Stem cells are the type of cells that can differentiate into specialized cells and have the capacity of self-renewal.

Cancer stem cells are the cancer cells that possess the characteristics of normal stem cells. Cancer stem cells are said to be responsible for relapse of cancers in patients. There is a growing interest in these two cell types due to their fundamental biological and clinical implications. Circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells are an important element in order to understand cancer related mechanism and to find a cure from all type of cancers. These cells can be used for detecting of metastasis and the patients who are at a higher risk of cancer relapse.

The global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market is anticipated to grow at a rapid rate owing to development in biotechnology and biomedical engineering. According to WHO, Cancer is the leading cause of mortality and morbidity globally impacting about 14 million people annually, leading to rapid increase in research activities worldwide. Circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells are under research for various types of cancer such as breast cancer, lung cancer, colorectal cancer, skin cancer. Government and various government bodies are taking interest and initiative to boost funds and activities which is one of the major factor driving the growth of the global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market.

Increase in demand of oncology screening, diagnosis and treatment monitoring the patients disease progression is one of the factor likely to propel the growth of the market through 2024. Furthermore, application of the circulating tumor cell for the drug discovery, use of cells in development of tumor specific biomarkers for targeted therapies are driving the growth of the global market. However, the ethical issues involved in research and regulation to perform human trials are some of the major factor that are retraining the growth of the global market.

Based on technology type, the global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market is divided into following

Based on Application types, the global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market is divided into following

The global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market is segmented on the basis of technology type, application type and geographical region. On the basis of technology type the global market is divided into cell enrichment, Detection and CTC Analysis. Enrichment is further divided into positive selection, negative selection, Microchips and others. Detection is further divided into Immunocytochemicals technology, Molecular based technology, EPISPOT functional invitro assay.

Cell Enrichment accounted for the largest market share globally owing to higher usage in oncology research and highly accurate technology. Microchip technology is expected to register high growth in the global market due to introduction of cluster chip technology which enables to capture the clusters of circulating tumor cells. On the basis of application type, the global market is divided into Biomarkers, tumorigenesis, stem cell research and others.

Geographically the global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market is divided into North America, Europe, Asia Pacific, Latin America, Middle East and Africa. North America is the dominating region in the global market attributing to the factors like developed economy, developed healthcare domain, strong funding for oncology research, rise in prevalence rate of cancer, favorable initiatives by government bodies. Asia Pacific region is expected to register high growth during the forecast period as a result of awareness, development of research and healthcare domains and prevalence of cancer.

Some of the major player operating in the global circulating tumor cells and cancer stem cells market are QIAGEN Hannover, AVIVA Biosciences, Epic Sciences, ApoCell, Cynvenio Biosystems, Fluxion Biosciences, Rarecells, Janssen Diagnostics, LLC, CellTraffix Inc., Silicon Biosystems, Advanced Cell Diagnostics, Inc. among others worldwide.

To maintain a significant position in the global market key players are involved in collaboration with the cancer research universities and hospitals, for example in November 2015 Epic Sciences announced collaboration Abramson cancer Centre of University Pennsylvania. This collaboration is expected to explore the field of biomarkers which are identified by circulating tumor cells. The key participants are expanding the market by developing the facilities in different regions. For example, in September 2014 advanced cell diagnostic Inc. established a subsidiary in Europe to serve the European market.

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Circulating Tumor Cells And Cancer Stem Cells Market Revenue To Witness Steady Growth Through 2017-2025 - Statsflash

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Not everyone with diabetes is able to keep their blood sugar levels within a reasonable range. When blood glucose levels fluctuate from one extreme to the other every day, the patient is diagnosed with brittle diabetes.

Cleveland Clinic is a non-profit academic medical center. Advertising on our site helps support our mission. We do not endorse non-Cleveland Clinic products or services.Policy

As anyone who struggles with this condition knows, blood sugar levels that go up and down cause symptoms that can be severe enough to interfere with daily life. Efforts to control these unpredictable sugar swings and the symptoms they cause can be a source of frustration that only gets worse if you are made to feel responsible.

Some healthcare providers miss the diagnosis of brittle diabetes, because they think the patient is not being compliant, says endocrinologist Betul Hatipoglu, MD. However, most people try every trick in the book to bring their blood sugars in line, and nothing works.

Brittle diabetes primarily occurs in people with a long history of type 1 diabetes (juvenile diabetes), although it can occur in those with severe type 2 diabetes who take insulin.

Over the course of many years, diabetes damages the autonomic nervous system, which governs digestion. This interferes with the normal digestive process and affects how food is absorbed.

The body cannot regulate the release of insulin appropriately. Blood sugar levels swing wildly, no matter what you do to try to stop it.

Symptoms caused by very high and very low blood sugar levels can be frightening, and even dangerous. The extent and severity of symptoms interfere with quality of life. Many patients are unable to hold a job, or even make advanceplans with confidence. Personal relationships can suffer. Some patients end up in the emergency department multiple times a week.

Fear of low sugar levels is compelling, because the condition can cause someone to pass out. If it happens behind the wheel of a car, the result can be tragic.

Because it may be hard to sense when blood sugar levels are falling, some patients subconsciously keep their blood sugar levels on the high side. This is unwise, Dr. Hatipoglu emphasizes.

High blood sugar can be as dangerous as low blood sugar or even more so. Over time, consistently high sugar can damage the eyes and kidneys or induce coma, she says.

If this scenario sounds familiar, Dr. Hatipoglu recommends making an appointment with an endocrinologist who specializes in diabetes.

The first step is to ensure other hormone levels are normal.

I do a blood test to make sure something else isnt going on, such as hypothyroidism or adrenal insufficiency, says Dr. Hatipoglu. These things can be easily fixed.

If the diagnosis is brittle diabetes, Dr. Hatipoglu makes a recommendation that often surprises patients: She tells them to stop worrying so much about maintaining tight glucose control.

I suggest they relax their Hba1c goal a bit. They are already very stressed, and its not necessary to be so strict, she says.

The good news is that new technologies can be effective in controlling blood sugar swings and help you feel better. These include continuous glucose monitoring systems and closed-loop insulin pumps.

We dont hesitate to recommend them, if we think they will help, says Dr. Hatipoglu.

Sometimes, a pancreas transplant is the answer. As soon as the new pancreas produces insulin, the patients diabetes is cured. Yet surgery isnt always necessary. Closed-loop insulin pumps can be almost as effective as transplantation although they dont reverse the disease, says Dr. Hatipoglu.

These options mean that brittle diabetes is no longer a life sentence. However, to take advantage of these exciting options, the problem must first be diagnosed.

If you cant get your blood sugar levels under control, dont blame yourself and dont take measures that might actually be harmful, says Dr. Hatipoglu.

See a diabetes expert to determine whether an advanced technology may be helpful for you.

This article originally appeared in Cleveland Clinic Heart Advisor.

Continued here:
Trouble Controlling Your Blood Sugar? It Could Be 'Brittle Diabetes' - Health Essentials from Cleveland Clinic

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith

Maybe youre going through a particularly grueling period at work think tons of deadlines, responsibility on a major project or battling for a promotion. Simultaneously, youre also feeling exhausted as hell.

Most people associate stress with feeling wired. But stress and fatigue also go hand in hand. Its actually fairly common to feel the need to fall asleep when youre incredibly high-strung, although nothing has been definitively confirmed in scientific literature as to why.

Experts do have some theories, however. Stress frequently impacts your sleep cycle, said Deirdre Conroy, clinical director of the Behavioral Sleep Medicine Clinic at Michigan Medicines Sleep Disorders Centers.

When were under a lot of stress, the continuity and quality of the sleep can be affected, Conroy said. It might take longer to fall asleep, or we might have frequent or sustained awakenings during the night after we have fallen asleep. Broken sleep can increase your feelings of fatigue during the day.

Stress can also interfere with the quality of sleep while youre out, leading to a higher percentage of light stages of sleep across the night, according to Conroy. Since your body typically recharges during periods of deeper sleep repairing tissue, resting muscles and boosting immunity you might feel like youre not getting enough sleep.

You might also experience standard insomnia some nights, which will make you feel poorly rested.

Stress is a well-known contributor to insomnia, said Aric Prather, an associate professor in the Department of Psychiatry and Weill Institute for Neurosciences at the University of California, San Francisco.

Stress exposure can lead to more cognitive arousal, like rumination about what happened, and so on, Prather continued. Related to this, its thought that stress likely leads to increased activation of the sympathetic nervous system the fight-or-flight response and this can impair your ability to relax.

When Stress Leads To Extreme Fatigue

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Sleepiness is one thing, but some people experience intense fatigue during periods of high stress to the point where it can be debilitating. Experts have a few theories as to why, the first being that the fight-or-flight response simply taxes the bodys energy levels.

Because it is so metabolically expensive to keep the body on high alert, sleepiness may occur so that the body can replenish that energy, Prather said.

Others think that sleep is a coping mechanism for stress, because it can be so exhausting and unpleasant.

Under periods of stress, many people choose to spend excess time in bed, and often fall asleep, as a way of escaping from the stress, Prather explained. Because sleep, at least in the short term, can provide some relief from the distress, sleeping behavior can be reinforced.

Prather said that if you consistently use sleep as a means to escape stressful life periods, wanting to climb into your covers can become increasingly hard to resist and habitual.

The last theory is that your brain simply can only handle so much stressful content.

Theres the possibility that the brain can only hold so much emotional information, and sleep helps clear some space and help figure out which daily experiences need to be put in long-term memory storage and what can be discarded, Prather said. Stress can produce high-arousal emotional information, and thus sleep may be needed earlier than usual.

How To Handle Sleepiness When Youre Stressed

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First and foremost, if youre unsure whether your sleepiness is normal, you should get it checked out by a doctor.

Routine blood tests collected at a doctors visit are very important if you are experiencing chronic symptoms of insomnia, Conroy said. Abnormal levels of hormones, like thyroid-stimulating hormone, can affect how we feel during our waking hours.

Conroy also said to pay attention to your diet and fitness regimen. Skipping workouts and loading up on high-sugar or high-carb meals may make you sleepy or lead to an energy crash.

Make sure you are drinking enough water, and have a regular exercise routine, Conroy said.

You can also eliminate fatigue when youre stressed by pacing your activities during your waking hours.

Dont overdo it or underdo it, Conroy said. Engage in some form of relaxation, and paying attention to avoid unhelpful thought patterns. Thinking, Im never going to finish this, or, I am way too busy to take time out for myself is going to keep you in the same, tired cycle.

Prather said that you should make sure to carve out some me time no matter how many deadlines you have, or how big the project.

Stressors can feel all-consuming, but they dont have to be, Prather said. Scheduling things that you enjoy, like yoga or getting out in nature, can be really revitalizing and stress-reducing.

Yes: That midday break might help you go longer and be sharper. Prather said theres no sense ignoring how your body is feeling, as it wont go away by continuing to push yourself. Rest. Then, get back to it.

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Why You Struggle To Stay Awake When You're Stressed - HuffPost

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The Health Promotion Office is offering free light therapy sessions to help Central Michigan University students combat the effects of Seasonal Affective Disorder.

Seasonal Affective Disorder (SAD) is a type of depression that occurs each year around the same time, usually starting in fall or winter and ending in spring or early summer, according to the Cleveland Clinic. Symptoms include fatigue, difficulty concentrating, weight gain and an increased desire to be alone.

Light therapy has been proven to help battle symptoms of SAD. According to Healthline, sunlight has beneficial effects on our body and mood. Exposure to sunlight increases the brain's release of a hormone called serotonin. Serotonin is responsible for making us feel awake and energetic. When we dont have enough serotonin, thats when we start to feel the symptoms of depression.

The Health Promotion Office offers 30-minute light therapy sessions in which the patient is exposed to a light source simulating sunlight. The student can read, do homework, play on their phone, anything theyd like during these sessions.

Regular office lighting found in classrooms is around 500 lux (unit of illuminance) and an overcast day is about 2,000 lux. The lamp used in the light therapy sessions contains about 10,000 lux, the same amount of lux as a bright sunny day.

The main objective is to expose the eyes to the sunlight, said Lori Wangberg, Director of the Health Promotion Office, The eyes are the receptors to the brain."

Wangberg said Ultraviolet rays are filtered out by a protective screen, so there will be no damage to the eyes or skin from the light.

It is safe to use every day," she said.

Wangberg said SAD doesnt affect everyone in the same way. Some students might need multiple sessions each week to start feeling better, while others may notice a difference after just one session.

Around the month of November is when Wangberg sees the most students coming in for sessions. She tries to keep her office person-centered," meaning the students get to control how often they come in for their sessions.

Wangberg also partners with the Counseling Center. If a student decides that light therapy may not be working for them, she can still give them the resources or connections that they need.

For more information, or to schedule an appointment, call the CMU Health Promotion Office in Foust 205 at (989) 774-4446.

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Health Promotion Office offering sunlight therapy to students - Central Michigan Life

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The popular weight-loss trend ofintermittent fastingisnt going anywhere and has only continued to gain steam, with celebrities likeKourtney Kardashian,Hugh JackmanandChris Prattextolling its virtues. The latest stars to jump on the fasting bandwagon areJenna Bush Hager and Hoda Kotb, who decided to try intermittent fasting together (and publicly weighed themselves on camera on Today with Hoda and Jenna).

So what, exactly, is intermittent fasting? Intermittent fasting is a weight loss or weight control strategy where youre cycling between periods of eating and fasting,Sarah Adler, PhD, a psychologist with the Stanford Eating Disorder and Weight Control Clinic, tells Yahoo Lifestyle.

There are several ways to do intermittent fasting, but it typically involves choosing a specific window of time in which you can consume food or caloric drinks. It can be as simple as skipping breakfast and eating at noon or finishing your last meal earlier, says Adler.

One popular method is 16:8, where people fast for 16 hours and only eat during an 8-hour window, such as noon to 8 p.m. While fasting for 16 hours does sound like a lot, keep in mind that includes (hopefully) 8 hours ofsleep. Theres also the 5:2 method whichJimmy Kimmelfollows where people eat restricted calories (such as 500-600 calories per day) for two nonconsecutive days and then eat normally for the other five days.

For many who are able to stick with it, intermittent fasting is the magic bullet forweight loss. Ive seen a lot of people who have struggled with weight loss and have done intermittent fasting, and it seems to be the magic bullet for them,Liz Weinandy, a registered dietitian at The Ohio State University Wexner Medical Center, tells Yahoo Lifestyle. Its because people are not eating as much.

Theyre also eliminating late-night eating, which can include less-than-healthy options like chips and ice cream. Once they stop eating after dinner, that alone helps a lot of people start to lose weight, says Weinandy. For a lot of people, theyre not eating those extra 300 or 400 calories.

Intermittent fasting can also have a diuretic effect when the body gets rid of excess water which leads to some fluid weight loss as well, according to Weinandy.

However, its worth noting that some researchers say theres not enough scientific evidence on the long-term weight loss effects of intermittent fasting. The research based on the efficacy of intermittent fasting is fairly limited in humans, so most is anecdotal, says Adler. In addition, a 2018 Germanstudy described as the largest investigation on intermittent fasting to date involving 150 overweight and obese people on either intermittent fasting or conventional calorie-restricting diets, who were examined over the course of a year, found that intermittent fasting wasnt any more effective at weight loss than calorie restriction.

That said, intermittent fast has other health benefits. Insulin levels go down, says Weinandy, because if youre not taking in any food, especially carbohydrates, our blood sugar isnt going up.

Adler explains that when you eat carbs, for example, the body breaks it down and converts it into sugar (glucose). But if you eat more than your body can use for energy, the sugar gets stored in fat cells."Insulin brings sugar into fat cells and keeps it there," says Adler. "Between meals, our insulin levels go down and our fat cells release the stored sugar to use as energy. Intermittent fasting allows for insulin levels to drop so that [stored sugar] gets burned off."

There are other positive metabolic effects, including an increase inhuman growth hormone. Its important for muscle maintenance, especially as we get older, says Weinandy. Intermittent fasting also appears to help on a cellular level torepair DNA, says Weinandy, by triggering autophagy the bodys way of cleaning out damaged cells to then generate new, healthy ones.

However, not all types of intermittent fasting are created equal. Research around intermittent fasting that shows health benefits are really limited to a very specific kind of intermittent fasting basically, the 16:8 method, points out Adler. The health benefits have not been shown to be associated with other forms of intermittent fasting, like the 5:2 method.

Most side effects are fairly minimal, notes Adler. When people first start intermittent fasting, some may experience mild headaches or lightheadedness. In some cases, people who are not following the 16:8 method may find themselves overeating at other meals. With intermittent fasting, 16:8 has been shown to reduce overeating in other meals, says Adler. Outside of that is when youre getting overeating, increased hunger, and loss of energy.

The eating method also isnt right for everyone, says Weinandy. For example, some may find that skipping breakfast in the morning isnt sustainable. In that case, not snacking after dinner, such as cutting off food by 8pm (or earlier in the evening), may work better for them. Dont go hot and heavy into it, suggests Weinandy. Gradually stop eating after dinner.

Adds Adler: "People need to use an approach that works for them and is sustainable for them.

In general, its considered pretty safe for the majority of people, says Weinandy. But women who arepregnantor are trying to get pregnant, as well as women who arebreastfeeding, should not attempt to do intermittent fasting. Also, Anyone who has a history of eating disorders should not be intermittent fasting, notes Adler. People with heart conditions and diabetes who are interested in trying the method should be monitored by a physician, who is knowledgeable about metabolic conditions.

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What you need to know about intermittent fasting and who should avoid it - Yahoo Lifestyle

Recommendation and review posted by Bethany Smith