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Game on! Researchers use online crowd-sourcing to diagnose malaria - 0 views

  • Online crowd-sourcing — in which a task is presented to the public, who respond, for free, with various solutions and suggestions — has been used to evaluate potential consumer products, develop software algorithms and solve vexing research-and-development challenges. But diagnosing infectious diseases
  • crowd-sourced online gaming system in which players distinguish malaria-infected red blood cells from healthy ones by viewing digital images obtained from microscopes.
  • recognize infectious diseases with the accuracy of trained pathologists
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  • UCLA Henry Samueli School of Engineering and Applied Science
  • Working on the assumption that large groups of public non-experts can be trained to recognize infectious diseases with the accuracy of trained pathologists
  • School of Medicine at UCLA
  • found that a small group of non-experts playing the game (mostly undergraduate student volunteers) was collectively able to diagnosis malaria-infected red blood cells with an accuracy that was within 1.25 percent of the diagnostic decisions made by a trained medical professional.
  • The game, which can be accessed on cell phones and personal computers, can be played by anyone around the world, including children
  • if you carefully combine the decisions of people — even non-experts — they become very competitive
  • if you just look at one person's response, it may be OK, but that one person will inevitably make some mistakes. But if you combine 10 to 20, maybe 50 non-expert gamers together, you improve your accuracy greatly in terms of analysis
  • could potentially help overcome limitations in the diagnosis of malaria
  • current gold standard for malaria diagnosis involves a trained pathologist using a conventional light microscope to view images of cells and count the number of malaria-causing parasites
  • process is very time-consuming, and given the large number of cases in resource-poor countries, the sheer volume presents a big challenge
  • significant portion of cases reported in sub-Sahara Africa are actually false positives, leading to unnecessary and costly treatments and hospitalizations
  • t the same platform could be applied to combine the decisions of minimally trained health care workers to significantly boost the accuracy of diagnosis, which is especially promising for telepathology, among other telemedicine field
  • By training hundreds, and perhaps thousands, of members of the public to identify malaria through UCLA's crowd-sourced game, a much greater number of diagnoses could be made more quickly — at no cost and with a high degree of collective accurac
  • research group created an automated algorithm for diagnosing the same images using computer vision, as well as a novel hybrid platform for combining human and machine resources toward efficient, accurate and remote diagnosis of malaria.
  • Before playing the game, each player is given a brief online tutorial and an explanation of what malaria-infected red blood cells typically look like using sample images
  • one of the major challenges will be the skepticism of traditional microscopists, pathologists and clinical laboratory personnel, not to mention malaria experts, who will initially view with suspicion a gaming approach in malaria diagnostics
Mars Base

Scientists discover molecular secrets of 2,000-year-old Chinese herbal remedy - 0 views

  • For roughly two thousand years, Chinese herbalists have treated Malaria using a root extract, commonly known as Chang Shan
  • Now, researchers from the Harvard School of Dental Medicine have discovered the molecular secrets behind this herbal extract's power.
  • recent studies suggest that halofuginone, a compound derived from this extract's bioactive ingredient, could be used to treat many autoimmune disorders
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  • halofuginone (HF) triggers a stress-response pathway that blocks the development of a harmful class of immune cells
  • prevents the autoimmune response without dampening immunity altogether
  • This compound could inspire novel therapeutic approaches to a variety of autoimmune disorders."
  • exciting example of how solving the molecular mechanism of traditional herbal medicine can lead both to new insights into physiological regulation and to novel approaches to the treatment of disease
  • Prior research had shown that HF reduced scarring in tissue, scleroderma (a tightening of the skin), multiple sclerosis, scar formation and even cancer progression.
  • Recognized only since 2006, Th17 cells are "bad actors," implicated in many autoimmune diseases such as inflammatory bowel disease, rheumatoid arthritis, multiple sclerosis and psoriasis
  • minute doses of HF reduced multiple sclerosis in a mouse model
  • Further analysis showed that HF was somehow turning on genes involved in a newly discovered pathway called the amino acid response pathway, or AAR
  • evidence that it extends lifespan and delays age-related inflammatory diseases in animal studies on caloric restriction
  • during a power outage we conserve what little juice we have left on our devices, foregoing chats in favor of emergency calls," said Whitman. "Cells use similar logic
  • Researchers do not yet fully understand the role that amino acid limitation plays in
  • researchers were able to home in on a single amino acid, called proline, and discovered that HF targeted and inhibited a particular enzyme (tRNA synthetase EPRS) responsible for incorporating proline into proteins that normally contain it.
  • proline also reversed other therapeutic effects of HF, inhibiting its effectiveness against the malaria parasite as well as certain cellular processes linked to tissue scarring
Mars Base

Common Lab Dye Found to Interrupt Formation of Huntington's Disease Proteins: Scientifi... - 0 views

  • methylene blue, gets a mention in medical literature as early as 1897 and was used to treat, at one time or another, ailments ranging from malaria to cyanide poisoning
  • never formally approved it as a therapy for any illnesses.
  • Because of existing knowledge of methylene blue and the fact that it’s not harmful to humans, I would hope that progress toward clinical trials could go relatively quickly," says 
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  • a neurobiologist at University of California–Irvine
  • Huntington’s disease occurs when the C-A-G sequence of DNA base pairs repeat too often on the HTT gene, resulting in an abnormally long version of the huntingtin protein, that therefore folds incorrectly and forms clumps in the brain
  • usually begins to affect people in their 30s and 40s, causing movement problems and early death
  • No drug is currently available to stop the disease from progressing
  • For their experiment, researchers fed methylene blue mixed with food for a week to Drosophila flies
  • brains showed that protein clumps had been reduced by 87 percent compared with a control group
  • given methylene blue
  • underwent several tests to assess mobility
  • At two months of age, the treated mice showed abnormal clasping of their hind claws only 20 percent of the time
  • untreated counterparts clasped at a 60 percent rate
  • the number of mice used was not sufficient to provide statistically significant results and the difference in the test quickly dropped off at nine weeks of age
  • the data as hopeful, because even a delay in Huntington’s symptoms would be very helpful
  • more research is needed
  • Methylene blue would absolutely require further testing in mouse models and would need safety and efficacy trial before it could be used for humans."
  • This study shows promise pre-clinically and follow-up studies are needed in a more representative mouse model that expresses the full-length Huntingtin protein
Mars Base

Lyme Disease Bacteria Found in 15-Million-Year-Old Amber | Paleontology | Sci-News.com - 0 views

  • In 30 years of studying diseases revealed in the fossil record, the scientist has documented the ancient presence of such diseases as malaria, leishmania, and others.
  • Lyme disease
  • can cause problems with joints, the heart and central nervous system
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  • This is the oldest fossil evidence of ticks associated with such bacteria.
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