Encouraging Health

Here’s a reason to raise a pint; scientists at Rice University have created beer that could extend your life.

BioBeer, as it’s called, has three genes spliced into special brewer’s yeast that produce resveratrol, the chemical in red wine that is thought to protect against diabetes, cancer, Alzheimer’s and other age-related conditions.

The only problem, from the students’ perspective, is that many of them aren’t old enough to legally consume their creation.

The eight graduate and undergraduate students created BioBeer as part of the upcoming International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition. The iGEM Jamboree, as the annual meeting is called, took place at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology November 8th and 9th. This year 85 teams from around the world signed up to bring the tools of the nascent field of synthetic biology to bear on a variety of problems large and small, including a bacterial vacuum cleaner or “bacuum cleaner” that can seek out and degrade harmful hydrocarbons in ground water and devices to remove arsenic from drinking water.
BioBeer, and the other iGEM projects, are “just the tip of the iceberg,” says Randy Rettburg, iGEM Director. Rettburg compares the development of synthetic biology to the creation of the computer. The value of the technology used to create BioBeer isn’t in creating specific applications; it’s the beginning of an entirely new kind of technology.

Extending human life
But don’t expect to swill this brew soon. The team would need to remove certain genetic markers in the yeast cells first. FDA approval might then be necessary as well, since the yeast could be classified as a genetically modified organism.

Filtering the beer would eliminate the yeast but remove the medical benefits as well. The yeast cells produce resverstrol inside the cells. The cells have to burst for the human body to access the resverstrol. The easiest way is to let the stomach do what it does best.

Once resverstrol enters the body it binds to the SIRT1 receptors, which are located inside mitochondria, the powerhouse of the cell. SIRT1 activity has been linked to combatting a variety of medical conditions, including diabetes and cancer. It may also play a role in the way calorie restriction diets have been shown to extend life in animal models.

Several drugs, including resverstrol itself and synthetic versions, like SRT1720, which is 1,000 times more powerful than resverstrol, are currently seeking FDA approval to treat diabetes by limiting weight gain and levels of cholesterol and insulin.

Two organ transplant patients in Indiana died after developing cancer that originated with their organ donor.

Two families in Indiana are suing the Indiana Organ Procurement Organization for giving their loved ones organs that were cancerous. Both patients, who received organs from the same donor, died after their transplants.

“The question is how could this happen, obviously, and the answer lies in what was actually done in the testing and evaluation to qualify this donor to be an acceptable organ donor,” Frederick Hovde, an attorney for one of the patient’s families, explained to The Indianapolis Star.

However, the Indiana Organ Procurement Organization says proper screening was performed on the donor organs. And experts say it’s not always easy to detect a disease that could be in its very early stages.

With more than 100,000 people in the United States waiting for organ transplants, Dr. Michael Nalesnik, vice chairman of the disease transmission advisory committee of the United Network for Organ Sharing, told The Indianapolis Star that doctors have to work quickly to ensure a donor organ is safe to use.

Earlier this year, PetSmart was sued after three people died from organ transplants. The organ donor had purchased a pet hamster that was infected with lymphocytic choriomeningitis virus (LCMV) from a PetSmart store in Rhode Island.

Nancy Magee, whose husband died after receiving a liver transplant from the donor, sued PetSmart for negligence. Magee claims the store should warn prospective hamster owners that the animals can carry the virus, and that it may be fatal to people with compromised immune systems.

According to The Indianapolis Star, more than 28,000 organ transplants occur annually. Dr. Nalesnik said disease transmission from donor to recipient happens in less than 1 percent of transplant cases.

If you hate waiting in the bathroom for a movement that’s oh-so-reluctant to happen, try changing your snacking habits.

Next time you get the munchies, smear a few celery sticks with a couple of tablespoons of peanut butter. Eating lots of water-rich foods (aka celery) and getting adequate magnesium (a la peanut butter) may help keep you regular.

Keep It Moving
A lack of fiber in the diet is a common culprit in constipation. But not getting enough magnesium or not eating enough water-packed foods may have an impact, too. In fact, women in a recent study were most likely to suffer from constipation if they had low magnesium intake and didn’t eat many juicy foods (think watermelon, oranges, peaches, cucumbers, tomatoes).

Just Add Water
Although ample research has found that fiber improves or prevents constipation, this recent study didn’t. But the researchers think the women’s generally low intake of fiber to start with probably affected the results. So don’t ditch your high-fiber breads and cereals. Just remember that the key to making them work is to get plenty of water with them.

How Much Water Do You Really Need?

How can you make sure you’re getting enough water for optimal health? Should you rely on thirst alone, or is it best to abide by the eight-glasses-a-day rule?
The truth is, either approach will probably work just fine — for the most part. But your water and fluid needs can vary, depending on your activity level, the weather and environmental conditions, even the medications you may be taking.
Getting to know which situations are likely to increase your need for fluids can help you stay sufficiently hydrated. But don’t go overboard. There’s no point Bottled vs. Tap:
Which water is best?
in drinking more water than you need, just for the sake of it. At the very least, you’ll end up running to the bathroom every 10 minutes. At worst, you could put yourself at risk of a life-threatening condition called hyponatremia, or water intoxication.
Too Much of a Good Thing
Under normal circumstances, a healthy body can process large amounts of water as long as it also has plenty of electrolytes, in particular, sodium. But the combination of too much water and not enough sodium can cause problems. Those at highest risk of developing hyponatremia are: • Endurance athletes who lose large amounts of sodium through sweating and then flood their bodies with too much fluid as they try to rehydrate
• People with kidney problems
• People over 65 years old who take multiple medications or have health conditions that compromise the body’s ability to get rid of fluids or maintain adequate sodium levels

Although rare, hyponatremia can also occur as a result of unsafe crash dieting or binge beer-drinking.

U.S. workers’ lives are beginning to look a lot like they did 100 years ago when 14-hour days were the norm.

Medical and poll-based evidence indicates that we seriously need relief. Work-related stress can lead to sudden heart attacks, obesity, anxiety and depression. A World Health Organization and Harvard Medical School study last year put the United States at the top of the list of depressed (or otherwise mentally disordered) countries, while the Gallup Daily Happiness-Stress Index finds that the only consistent upswing in mood occur when Americans get some time off on the weekends or holidays.

As John de Graaf, executive director of the Seattle-based advocacy group Take Back Your Time, puts it, Americans are “time-starved and vacation-starved.”

Americans put in more hours at work than any other nation, surpassing even the workaholic Japanese. We average nine more weeks of labor per year than our working counterparts in Western Europe, who get at least 20 paid days of vacation each year.

Finland tops the list of vacation-supporting industrialized nations with 30 paid vacation days per year after the first year of work, plus 14 paid national holidays, according to a July 2007 report from the Center for Economic and Policy Research. (This is in addition to the possibility that the country might soon grant “love holidays” so that some couples can rekindle passions and have kids.)

Canada and Japan are near the bottom of that list, with a legal minimum of 10 vacation days, while the United States has the dubious distinction of being the only industrialized nation that does not have a mandatory minimum of vacation time. In fact, out of the world’s 195 independent countries, 137 have some kind of vacation/annual leave legislation in place.

Each year, de Graaf and his U.S. and Canadian colleagues work to get the word out about their annual celebration, Take Back Your Time Day, which occurs Oct. 24.

Scientists have engineered an immune cell that can find and attack HIV, even when it mutates.

Courtesy Lindsey Chapman: Scientists from the United States and Britain have genetically engineered a human immune cell to attack HIV (human immunodeficiency virus), even when it mutates to disguise itself.

Not only can “killer T-cells” determine when other cells had been infected with HIV, but they also slowed the spread of HIV in a lab dish, according to Reuters.

HIV is a tricky virus because it can disguise itself to hide from immune cells. Scientists reported, however, that it took fewer engineered T-cells a shorter amount of time to find and control HIV than a natural T-cell.

“In the face of our engineered assassin cells, the virus will either die or be forced to change its disguises again, weakening itself along the way,” Andy Sewell of Britain’s Cardiff University told The BBC. “We’d prefer the first option but I suspect we’ll see the latter. Even if we do only cripple the virus, this will still be a good outcome, as it is likely to become a much slower target and be easier to pick off.”

T-cell treatment testing in HIV patients could start as early as next year.

Earlier this year, scientists published information about whether it is possible to make people immune to HIV through new gene-editing techniques.

CCR5 is a protein on the surface of T-cells that the HIV uses to pull itself inside a human cell. A research team from the University of Pennsylvania announced that it had developed a method to clip the protein out of some T-cells. The method was tested on mice, not humans, “so it should be a source of guarded optimism, because it’s not certain the technique would work in humans,” Wired reported.

Bottled water contains disinfection byproducts, fertilizer residue, and pain medication

The bottled water industry promotes an image of purity, but comprehensive testing by the Environmental Working Group (EWG) reveals a surprising array of chemical contaminants in every bottled water brand analyzed, including toxic byproducts of chlorination in Walmart’s Sam’s Choice and Giant Supermarket’s Acadia brands, at levels no different than routinely found in tap water. Several Sam’s Choice samples purchased in California exceeded legal limits for bottled water contaminants in that state. Cancer-causing contaminants in bottled water purchased in 5 states (North Carolina, California, Virginia, Delaware and Maryland) and the District of Columbia substantially exceeded the voluntary standards established by the bottled water industry.

Unlike tap water, where consumers are provided with test results every year, the bottled water industry does not disclose the results of any contaminant testing that it conducts. Instead, the industry hides behind the claim that bottled water is held to the same safety standards as tap water. But with promotional campaigns saturated with images of mountain springs, and prices 1,900 times the price of tap water, consumers are clearly led to believe that they are buying a product that has been purified to a level beyond the water that comes out of the garden hose.

To the contrary, our tests strongly indicate that the purity of bottled water cannot be trusted. Given the industry’s refusal to make available data to support their claims of superiority, consumer confidence in the purity of bottled water is simply not justified.

Laboratory tests conducted for EWG at one of the country’s leading water quality laboratories found that 10 popular brands of bottled water, purchased from grocery stores and other retailers in 9 states and the District of Columbia, contained 38 chemical pollutants altogether, with an average of 8 contaminants in each brand. More than one-third of the chemicals found are not regulated in bottled water. In the Sam’s Choice and Acadia brands levels of some chemicals exceeded legal limits in California as well as industry-sponsored voluntary safety standards. Four brands were also contaminated with bacteria.

BY MELISSA NEWMAN

EVERY YEAR, AMID the excitement of Halloween-related fun, conversations commonly turn toward scary and unnerving talk of the mysterious world of paranormal and supernatural phenomena.
Unlike the entertaining “safe scares” that Halloween brings, for those who encounter “real paranormal phenomena,” the encounters can be truly terrifying and even life-changing. And while these otherworldly phenomena have been a part of the human experience since the dawn of humankind – and, incidentally, is where Halloween originates – not even western society’s modern-day cynical culture of scientific analysis could dismiss and suppress the existence of these elusive phenomena. On the contrary, whether you are a believer or a hardened skeptic, an avalanche of experiences involving paranormal and supernatural phenomena continues to be reported worldwide.

According to several polls and surveys conducted around the world, belief in the paranormal and supernatural is at an all time high and shows no evidence of decline. In the U.S. alone, a recent Gallop poll showed that 75% of Americans have some sort of paranormal belief; a Harris poll showed that half of Americans believe in ghosts; a CBS poll showed that one in five Americans have seen or physically encountered a ghost; and still another survey taken from more than 400 college students with the highest GPAs found seniors and grad students more likely to believe in the paranormal then their “uneducated” freshman counterparts. Paranormal beliefs include such phenomena as extraterrestrial and UFO close encounters, all types of psychic phenomena, miracles and demonic possession, ghosts and poltergeists, witchcraft and metaphysics, and encounters with extraordinary life forms, including Bigfoot and the notorious chupacabra.

HALLOWEEN ORIGINS

Whether one is a believer or a skeptic, Halloween in the U.S. might be the one time of the year that both stand united in simply having a good time in the shadow of such reported phenomena. The origins of Halloween itself lay in supernatural beliefs and an ancient Celtic festival that dates back some 2,000 years. Originally called Samhain (pronounced sow-in), the festival originated amidst the region now known as the United Kingdom and celebrated the one night each year that the boundary between the worlds of the living and the dead became indistinguishable. On this night, the Celts believed that the ghosts of the dead returned to Earth for good or for bad and allowed Druid priests to additionally interact with them for the wellbeing of them all.

Over the course of hundreds of years, early Christianity would attempt to suppress and replace the Celtic festival with All Saints’ Day, which was celebrated on November 1, a holy day of obligation to honor saints and martyrs in the Christian faith. The celebration was also called All-hallows or All-hallowmas (from Middle English Alholowmesse meaning All Saints’ Day) and the night before it, the night of Samhain, began to be called All-hallows Eve and, eventually, Halloween. But even the powerful influence of the church was unable to squelch the supernatural festival, and Halloween endured and flourished over the centuries to become the sensationalistic celebration it is today in the U.S.

While Halloween is still mostly an American commercial phenomenon, little by little every year, evidence that the spooky holiday is being embraced globally is being seen more and more. UNICEF itself has a special “Trick-or-Treat for UNICEF” program aimed to empower kids, not just in the U.S., but in other countries as well, by trick-or-treating for donations to help their counter-parts in need all over the world. The reluctance to embrace Halloween in other countries has been primarily due to the seriousness that the supernatural and paranormal is taken in other cultures. While the western world can make light of beliefs, both religious and metaphysical, other old-world cultures are very sensitive to and deeply immersed in their beliefs and find such playfulness like the Amercanized version of Halloween to be considered as taboo and, in some cultures, even sacrilegious.

Enjoy your Halloween!

Aradigm Corporation (OTCBB: ARDM) (”Aradigm”) today announced it is presenting data from its Phase 2 study of inhaled liposomal ciprofloxacin (ARD-3100) in cystic fibrosis (CF) patients at the 22nd Annual North American Cystic Fibrosis (NACF) conference in Orlando, Florida.

Completed in June
2008, the study was an open-label, two week efficacy and safety trial of once daily inhaled liposomal ciprofloxacin in 22 CF patients conducted at leading CF centers in Australia and New Zealand.

The primary efficacy endpoint in the study was the change from baseline in the sputum Pseudomonas Aeruginosa colony forming units (CFU), an objective measure of the reduction in pulmonary bacterial load. Data analysis in 21 patients who completed the study, demonstrated that the Pseudomonas CFU decreased by a mean 1.43 log over the 14-day treatment period (p less than 0.0001). Evaluation one week after study treatment was discontinued showed that the Pseudomonas bacterial density in the lung was still reduced by 1.02 log CFU from the baseline without additional antibiotic use. Pulmonary function testing as measured by the forced expiratory volume in one second (FEV1) showed a significant mean increase of 6.86 % from baseline after 14 days of treatment (p=0.04). The study drug was well tolerated, and there were no serious adverse events reported during the trial.

Ciprofloxacin is a widely prescribed antibiotic to treat infections of the lung frequently experienced by cystic fibrosis patients. It is often preferred because of its broad-spectrum anti-bacterial action. The available oral and intravenous formulations of the drug are used to treat episodes of acute exacerbations of lung infections in CF. Aradigm’s once-a-day novel inhaled formulation of ciprofloxacin delivered in liposomes is to be used for chronic maintenance therapy as it is expected to achieve higher antibiotic concentration at the site of infection and relatively low systemic antibiotic concentrations to minimize side-effects.

Details of the poster presentations by Aradigm’s Chief Medical Officer, Tunde Otulana, M.D., and Medical Director, Paul Bruinenberg, M.D., are as follows:

Poster # 401. THE EFFECT OF ONCE-A-DAY INHALED LIPOSOMAL CIPROFLOXACIN HYDROCHLORIDE ON SPUTUM BACTERIAL DENSITY IN CYSTIC FIBROSIS PATIENTS WITH CHRONIC PULMONARY P. AERUGINOSA COLONIZATION.

Poster Session I, Thursday, Oct 23rd, 2008

Poster Session III, Friday, Oct 24th, 2008

In addition to the data in cystic fibrosis patients being presented at this conference, Aradigm is also currently conducting a Phase 2 study of its inhaled liposomal ciprofloxacin in adults with non-CF bronchiectasis. Data from that study is expected to be released in the first quarter of 2009.

About The North American Cystic Fibrosis (NACF) conference

The North American Cystic Fibrosis (NACF) conference is the leading scientific meeting organized by the Cystic Fibrosis Foundation (CFF) where thousands of CF physicians, researchers and allied health professionals from the Cystic Fibrosis community around the world gather to learn from each other and build collaborations.

courtesy of Adrienne Dellwo of About.com: On it’s face, it might sound silly to ask if aspects of your health have improved since you became chronically ill with fibromyalgia (FMS) or chronic fatigue syndrome (CFS or ME/CFS). Some of us, though, have noticed that, while we feel worse overall, some things from before have actually improved.

Some people used to get lots of headaches and periodic migraines. Typically these are symptoms of FMS or ME/CFS, especially when they’re of a new pattern, type, or severity. Well, oddly enough, there is a new pattern, type, or severity is to rarely have a headache at all, and to stop getting migraines (at least, for the past 2.5 years.)

I’ve also noticed that I don’t seem to get the colds and other common bugs that get passed around like I used to. I attributed that to all the supplements I’m taking, but a recent discussion thread in my Fibromyalgia & Chronic Fatigue Syndrome community forum made me wonder. (Thanks to Liz for starting this one!) Do the changes in our immune system make us more resistant to some things, while making us less resistant to others?

In the thread, Liz mentions Dr. Paul Cheney’s theory of ME/CFS’s effect on the immune system, and it’s a really interesting one. You’ll find it here: Dr. Cheney: Balance the Immune System (Th1/Th2).

Of course, we don’t know whether the FMS immune system is the same as the ME/CFS immune system, but we also don’t know that they’re different. I thought it was really interesting that Liz and I noticed a similar improvement in certain immunities, when she has ME/CFS and I have FMS.

Do you get sick less often than you did before FMS or ME/CFS? Or is it more often, or about the same? What about things like my headaches, that aren’t immune-system related — any changes there?

Despite doubts surrounding HPV vaccine Gardasil’s medical and cost benefits, Merck wants to market the drug to women over the age of 26

A recent study reported that vaccinating older women against the human papillomavirus (HPV) can be effective in significantly reducing the rate of cervical cancer, prompting pharmaceutical company Merck & Co. to seek to expand marketing of its drug to an older demographic.

Using a mathematical model, researchers at the University of Alabama concluded that vaccinating women by ages 12 through 45 could cut cervical cancer rates up to 55 percent for 45-year-old women. The mathematical model assumed a 100 percent vaccination rate against HPV, which causes most cases of cervical cancer.

Gardasil, a vaccination developed by Merck, protects against HPV strains 16 and 18, which lead to approximately 70 percent of all cervical cancer cases. The virus also protects against HPV types 6 and 11, which cause genital warts.

The vaccination has been approved by the FDA for women ages 9 through 26 but doesn’t protect anyone who has already been infected with HPV. “The thinking has been that girls must be vaccinated before they are sexually active, because HPV is so common,” reported Reuters.

But Merck now wants to target an older market after the number of Gardasil vaccinations went down nearly 35 percent in July and August. Merck seeks to garner sales from women who have not typically used the vaccine. According to Bev Lybrand, Merck’s senior vice president of vaccines, “We see tremendous opportunity. We have a number of programs under way to get after these women.”

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