BioLumic, creators of the first ultraviolet (UV) crop yield enhancement system, today announced the close of $5 million in Series A financing. Led by top AgTech investors Finistere Ventures and Radicle Growth acceleration fund, with Rabobank’s recently launched Food and Agri Innovation Fund and existing investors from New Zealand also joining this round. “We actively …
A dying worm experiences rigor mortis early in the death process, rather than after the main event as it is for humans, according to a new study by an international team of scientists at UCL and Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. The study, published in the journal Cell Reports, is the first …
Harvard researchers describe a vaccine approach that uses an injectable scaffold loaded with a selection of tumor-expressed peptides. It is a path to a personalized anti-cancer vaccine. The strategy proved more effective at stimulating anti-tumor responses and, importantly, a tumor-specific immune memory in mouse models that kept the animals rejecting tumor cells at least half …
The mass desperation of the Venezuelan people coup is making military coup attempts in 2018 inevitable. Brian Wang at Nextbigfuture bases this prediction on Venezuela’s terrible economy, higher estimates of infant mortality, estimates of children starving to death and recent coup activity and recent civil unrest. Scientific basis of coup prediction Of about ten key …
DARPA’s new Epigenetic CHaracterization and Observation (ECHO) program aims to build a field-deployable platform technology that quickly reads someone’s epigenome and identifies signatures that indicate whether that person has ever—in his or her lifetime—been exposed to materials that could be associated with weapons of mass destruction (WMD). Above – The epigenome is biology’s record keeper. …
In the 2009 H1N1 pandemic alone, estimates suggest that around 5 to 7 million more people got the flu from someone who came to work sick, and that an additional 1,500 people died. It is also more costly in lost productivity and other costs to require people to work while sick Some employers have, of …
Continuous low doses of far ultraviolet C (far-UVC) light can kill airborne flu viruses without harming human tissues, according to a new study at the Center for Radiological Research at Columbia University Irving Medical Center (CUIMC). The findings suggest that use of overhead far-UVC light in hospitals, doctors’ offices, schools, airports, airplanes, and other public …
More than 100 million U.S. adults are now living with diabetes or prediabetes, according to a new report released today by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC). The report finds that as of 2015, 30.3 million Americans – 9.4 percent of the U.S. population –have diabetes. Another 84.1 million have prediabetes, a condition …
Paul Sharpe, a bioengineer at King’s College London, and his colleagues discovered a new way regenerate teeth in mice. They have made even more progress that edges this experimental procedure closer to human clinical trials. If the teeth regeneration treatment eventually becomes part of the dentist’s standard toolkit, then it would easily be one of …
Injecting minute amounts of two immune-stimulating agents directly into solid tumors in mice can eliminate all traces of cancer in the animals, including distant, untreated metastases, according to a study by researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. The approach works for many different types of cancers, including those that arise spontaneously, the study …
There were two biotech buyouts this week. Celgene bought CAR-T player Juno Therapeutics for $9 billion and Sanofi buying blood disorder biotech Bioverativ for $11 billion. Kite Pharmaceuticals, CAR-T company, got acquired late in 2017 by Gilead for $12 billion. Both Juno and Kite had been billed as CAR-T platform play. CAR-T acquisitions provide near-term …