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RoundUp - 3rd Week of June 2024 

 

Fast Food Triggers Anxiety

 

Wolfing down that fast food might make you more anxious

Vidcast:   https://www.instagram.com/p/C8p4cnQubTL/

 

Bad news for the Big Mac and fries fans.  University of Colorado-Boulder physiologists report that a high fat diet, 45% of calories in fat, triggers anxiety, at least in their rodent subjects but very likely also in humans.  The extra fats appear to turn on genes that produce the neurotransmitter serotonin in the brainstem zone associated with stress and anxiety.  They also found that the fatty foods triggered that growth of gut bacterial populations associated with unhealthy feelings. Sooo….. want that positive mental attitude?  Lay off that fast food!

 

https://biolres.biomedcentral.com/articles/10.1186/s40659-024-00505-1

 

#fats #anxiety #fastfood

fats, anxiety. Fastfood

 

 

Nuts Help Weight Loss

 

Nuts may help you lose weight 

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8p58YXJZAk/

 

When you diet to take off those pounds, you want you food plan to work as effectively as possible.  When you deprive yourself of those foods you love, you want to do so for as short a period of time as necessary.  Enter Australian nutritionists who find that nuts do both.  Their meta-analysis of 7 on-point studies reveals adding nuts to diets with calorie restrictions led to increased weight loss in 4 of the 7 studies.  What’s the nut magic? Nuts contain fatty acids that burn other fats faster, slow stomach emptying so you feel full, and lower blood sugar levels.  The nuts that worked were peanuts, almonds, walnuts, and pistachios. 

 

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/nutrition-research-reviews/article/effects-of-energyrestricted-diets-with-or-without-nuts-on-weight-body-composition-and-glycaemic-control-in-adults-a-scoping-review/AC91A4A51BCB1EC6A710471F68469489

 

#nuts #dieting

nuts, dieting

 

 

What Are Stomach Butterflies?

•The butterflies in your stomach can dissolve food

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8p6v9qRXVP/

 

Study after study now show that there is a strong connection between your gut and your brain.  The latest evidence support that link come from psychologists  at Rome’s Sapienza University.  The researchers trigger strong emotions in their 30 subjects by showing them videos that triggered disgust, fear, and sadness and control clips that created happiness.  After viewing the negative short flicks, the subjects experienced surges in their stomach acids.  The more disturbing the videos, the greater the acid production and the lower the pH.   The bottom line:  when you feel those stomach butterflies or even frank acid indigestion, its probably time to watch less disturbing scenes snd pop some Tums in your mouth.

 

https://elifesciences.org/articles/85567

 

#anxiety #acid #indigestion #horror

anxiety, acid, indigestion, horror

 

 

Walking Helps Back Pain

•Low back pain?  Better get on the hoof

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8p7kl3Oupw/

 

So your lower back is killing you.  Eighty percent of Americans not only feel your pain but also have it.  Australian physical medicine researchers suggest that a regular walking program could help you.  In a randomized trial, they tested about 700 subjects with documented, significant back pain.  The treatment group received a supervised walking and education program over 6 months while the controls did not.  The data showed that the walkers remained free of recurrent back pain for twice as long as the controls and were 28% less likely to experience any further back pain.  So… don’t just whine and moan, “MY ACHING BACK!”  Get up and walk regularly.

 

https://www.thelancet.com/journals/lancet/article/PIIS0140-6736(24)00755-4/fulltext

 

#backpain #walking

backpain, walking

 

 

 

Self-Regulating Insulin

 

•Future insulin may be sensitive to blood sugar levels

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8p83oENKLZ/

 

The insulin of today must be injected in accordance with a diabetic person’s current and expected blood sugar levels.  The insulin molecules of the future may regulate themselves according to the amounts of sugar in the blood surrounding them permitting the injection of a constant amount of drug or supplying it using an implantable depot.  Chinese research pharmacologists have developed a “smart” glucose-responsive insulin or GRI that does just that.  Insulin is complexed with an inactivating polymer that releases it in the presence of glucose.  This insulin-of-the-future tested successfully in mice and small pigs.  Much work must still be done, but the this self-regulating insulin will make life easier for diabetics…..someday soon.

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41551-023-01138-7

https://www.nejm.org/doi/full/10.1056/NEJMcibr2400047

 

#insulin #glucoseresponsive #selfregulating

insulin, glucoseresponsive, selfregulating

 

 

 

High Tech Stool Test

 

•High tech stool test could save you a colonoscopy

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qpILUM7wd/

 

I’ve mentioned the FIT test in past reports.  The letters stand for fecal immunological test, a screening test that detects the presence of blood hemoglobin in stool.  The FIT is a Yes/No test, and if it’s YES, it’s time for a colonoscopy.  Now Taiwanese investigators report in JAMA that a sensitive fecal test that can sensitively and precisely report the actual concentration of hemoglobin in the stool and predict the likelihood of bowel cancer and mortality.  In their study of 3.5 million subjects, this personalized, precision stool blood test reduced the need for colonoscopy by 28% freeing more than one in four persons from that awful prep.

 

https://jamanetwork.com/journals/jamaoncology/fullarticle/2818569

#fit #hemoglobin #blood #fecal #colonoscopy

 

#colon #cancer #blood #test #colonoscopy

colon, cancer, blood, test, colonoscopy

 

 

3D Tissue Biopsies

 

•3D biopsies could detect cancer earlier

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qqE3Bp96U/

 

Johns Hopkins pathologists have developed a novel three dimensional tissue biopsy method.  Conventional biopsies are two dimensional, but the Hopkins researchers computer-aggregated the images from hundreds of sequential tissue layers to produce a 3D picture of tissues.  This technique is similar to that utilized in CT and MR scans.  Using this technique, they studied pancreatic biopsies and discovered interconnected networks of almost imperceptible precancerous lesion networks called pancreatic intraepithelial neoplasias that can grow into lethal pancreatic cancer.  This technique must be refined before its ready for the clinic, but it promises more precise diagnoses and earlier, more effective cancer treatment.

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41586-024-07359-3

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S2666634022004901

 

#3D #pathology #cancer 

3D, pathology, cancer 

 

 

Gene Typing Brain Cancer From Spinal Fluid

 

•Testing cerebral spinal fluid, CSF, for brain cancer genes avoids brain biopsies

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qqy5zN10a/

 

Modern cancer chemo- and immunotherapy requires genetic analysis of a patient’s cancer cells and is called precision or personalized therapy.  In the case of brain cancer, open biopsies to obtain tissue for gene testing is invasive and time-consuming.  Harvard neurosurgeons at the Mass General Hospital have perfected a technique for rapid genetic analysis of brain tumors using cerebral spinal fluid material harvested using non-invasive lumbar punctures.  The technique worked effectively in a pilot study that  sampled material from gliomas and brain lymphomas.  Genetic mapping was successful in 42% of cases cutting the time necessary to formulate precision, individualized cancer treatment from 12 to 3 days.  That’s impressive and hopefully will save many patients from having their skulls tapped.

 

https://ashpublications.org/blood/article/doi/10.1182/blood.2024023832/516189/Rapid-Tumor-DNA-Analysis-of-Cerebrospinal-Fluid

 

#braincancer #CSF #lumbarpuncture #precision

braincancer, CSF, lumbarpuncture , precision

 

 

Blood Tests Pinpoint Cancer Status

 

•Sensitive blood biopsy detects cancer and its recurrences earlier

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qrkwgAyZS/

 

Using spinal fluid and blood, liquid biopsies are under rapid development to improve cancer therapy.  Geneticists at New York’s Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center have perfected an ultra-sensitive, machine-learning liquid biopsy technique for detecting and analyzing cancer DNA circulating in blood.  The system enhances and amplifies the information obtainable from tiny concentrations of circulating genetic material. This permits advanced warning and quantitation of a cancer’s metastatic spread, measurement of its eradication with therapy, and a timely signal of its unfortunate recurrence.

 

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41591-024-03040-4

 

#fluidbiopsy #genetics #cancer

fluidbiopsy, genetics, cancer

 

 

Labwork From Sweat

 

•Instead of a blood stick use your sweat

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qsViRRAge/

 

If you sweat having to go to the lab for a blood draw, that sweat may come in handy.  Bioengineers at the Washington State University have successfully 3D printed a flexible patch with multiple micro channels that facilitate unique single-atom catalyst-based colorimetric bioassays for up to 3 biomarkers found in both blood and sweat such as glucose, lactate, and uric acid.  The color changes that occur as levels of these molecules vary are amplified to deliver accurate blood levels of them.  Glucose measurements are critical for diabetics, uric acid levels help monitor gout as well as kidney and heart issues, while lactate levels quantitate intensity of aerobic exercise.

 

https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acssensors.4c00528#

 

#sweat #glucose #uricacid #lactate #diabetes #gout #exercise

sweat, glucose, uricacid, lactate, diabetes, gout, exercise

 

 

Alzheimer’s Nasal Spray

 

•A nose spray could reverse early Alzheimer’s 

Vidcast:  https://www.instagram.com/p/C8qtL3vNsA-/

 

Alzheimer’s dementia develops as brain cells, neurons, progressively lose the ability to communicate.  That occurs when a complex reaction involving the tau protein depletes the micro-bubbles, technically synaptic vesicles, that carry the neurotransmitters necessary for cell to cell communication.  Now Japanese neurobiologists have discovered a peptide molecule PHDP5 that prevents tau from draining the synaptic vesicle supply.  To deliver this Alzheimer’s neutralizing peptide to the brain, the researchers modified it and packaged it into a nasal spray so it penetrates the thin blood-brain barrier at the roof of the nose.  Using this PHDP5-nasal spray, Alzheimer’s like dementia has been reversed in mice.  The treatment works best for early Alzheimer’s.  It can’t cure the disease, but it delays or halts the cognitive decline.  That is significant and hopefully will hit the clinic…..someday soon.

 

https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0006899324002415?via=ihub

 

#alzheimers #dementia #phdp5 #nasalspray

alzheimers, dementia, phdp5, nasalspray

 

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