Researchers discover new tools in regular blood samples for developing precision therapies for lymphoma

Image: Leppä lab

In a recently completed study, researchers from the University of Helsinki and Helsinki University Hospital Comprehensive Cancer Center investigated the characteristics and clinical significance of circulating tumor DNA (ctDNA) found in the blood of patients with aggressive lymphoma. The study was carried out through Nordic collaboration.

Analyzed in the study were blood samples of lymphoma patients treated in a Nordic Lymphoma Group trial, which were collected before, at the mid-point of and after treatment.

Increasingly accurate diagnostics and more effective therapies

“The analysis of ctDNA in the blood samples revealed significant diagnostic features, not all of which were found in regular tumour biopsies,” says Professor Sirpa Leppä from the University of Helsinki and the HUS Comprehensive Cancer Center.

The researchers found that the concentration of ctDNA in blood before therapy varied considerably between patients and was comparable to the combined volume of the malignant tumors.

“Patients with the highest ctDNA levels at the time of lymphoma diagnosis had the poorest survival probability,” explains MD and PhD student Leo Meriranta.

At the same time, changes in ctDNA concentration during therapy reflected treatment responses in that the patients whose lymphoma was unaffected by the treatment were distinguished from other patients by the ctDNA analyses carried out using the follow-up blood samples.

Ultraviolet Light Can Clean N95 Masks for Reuse Without Hindering Performance

The N95 mask owes its remarkable filtering ability to its three-layer structure. While the fibers in the outer- and innermost layers block large particles such as water droplets, the middle is where much finer, charged fibers electrically attract and trap tiny, submicron aerosols.
Credits: SEM images by A. Vladar/NIST, animation by J. Wang/NIST

To combat COVID-19 amid supply shortages in 2020, health care facilities across the U.S. resorted to disinfecting personal protective equipment (PPE), such as N95 masks, for reuse with methods such as ultraviolet (UV) light. But questions lingered about the safety and efficacy of these methods and how best to implement them. 

Now, in perhaps the most rigorous examination of UV light’s effects on N95 masks yet, researchers at the National Institute of Standards and Technology (NIST) have shown that these masks can be disinfected with little impact on their form or function. In a new study published in the Journal of Research of the National Institute of Standards and Technology, the researchers, with help from federal and private partners, scrutinized UV-exposed N95 masks for traces of virus and looked for changes in the shape of their fibers, ability to filter out aerosols and other properties. 

The results represent a key step toward devising UV standards that could have far-reaching benefits in the future.

Enhancing the electromechanical behavior of a flexible polymer

Qiming Zhang, distinguished professor of electrical engineering, led a team of researchers to develop a robust piezoelectric material that can convert mechanical stress into electricity.
Credit: Tyler Henderson/Penn State

Piezoelectric materials convert mechanical stress into electricity, or vice versa, and can be useful in sensors, actuators and many other applications. But implementing piezoelectrics in polymers — materials composed of molecular chains and commonly used in plastics, drugs and more — can be difficult, according to Qiming Zhang, distinguished professor of electrical engineering.

Zhang and a Penn State-led team of interdisciplinary researchers developed a polymer with robust piezoelectric effectiveness, resulting in 60% more efficient electricity generation than previous iterations. They published their results today (Mar. 25) in Science. 

“Historically, the electromechanics coupling of polymers has been very low,” Zhang said. “We set out to improve this because the relative softness of polymers makes them excellent candidates for soft sensors and actuators in a variety of areas, including biosensing, sonar, artificial muscles and more.”

To create the material, the researchers deliberately implemented chemical impurities into the polymer. This process, known as doping, allows researchers to tune the properties of a material to generate desirable effects — provided they integrate the correct number of impurities. Adding too little of a dopant could prevent the desired effect from initiating, while adding too much could introduce unwanted traits that hamper the material’s function.  

Breakthrough application of moisture-trapping film

 

The team comprises Asst Prof Tan Swee Ching (front right), doctoral student Ms Yang Jiachen (third from right) and researchers from HTX.
Credit: National University of Singapore

A team of researchers from the National University of Singapore (NUS) has developed a novel super-hygroscopic material that enhances sweat evaporation within a personal protective suit, to create a cooling effect for better thermal comfort for users such as healthcare workers and other frontline officers. This invention was validated through laboratory tests conducted in collaboration with researchers from HTX (Home Team Science & Technology Agency) in Singapore.

The new desiccant film, which is biocompatible and non-toxic, has a fast absorption rate, high absorption capacity and excellent mechanical properties. This means that the material is very robust and durable for practical applications such as for protective suits worn by healthcare workers. It is also affordable, light-weight, easy to fabricate and reusable.

“Under room temperature of about 35 deg. C, a healthcare worker who doesn't wear a protective suit for one hour typically experiences a heat index of about 64 deg. C. This causes discomfort and prolong thermal strain can result in heat stroke and even death. Our novel composite moisture-trapping film achieves a cooling effect within the protective suit via evaporative cooling – by increasing sweat evaporation from the skin,” explained research team leader Assistant Professor Tan Swee Ching, who is from the Department of Materials Science and Engineering under the NUS College of Design and Engineering.

Molecular key may unlock new treatments for neurodegenerative disorders

Structure of SARM1 in complex with inhibitor.
Credit: Thomas Ve

Researchers have worked out how to successfully switch off a key pathway of nerve fiber breakdown in debilitating neurodegenerative disorders such as Parkinson’s disease, traumatic brain injury and glaucoma.

The study, led by Griffith University’s Institute for Glycomics and Disarm® Therapeutics, a wholly owned subsidiary of pharmaceutical company Eli Lilly, reveals the structural processes behind activation and inhibition of SARM1, a key molecule in the destruction of nerve fibers.

“As a trigger for nerve fiber degeneration, understanding how the enzyme SARM1 works may help us treat several neurodegenerative conditions,” said Dr Thomas Ve from the Institute for Glycomics.

“In this study we show the molecular interactions that can switch SARM1 on and off. This gives us a clear avenue for the design of new drug therapeutics.”

In neurodegenerative conditions like peripheral neuropathy, Parkinson’s disease, amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), traumatic brain injury and glaucoma, when the nerve fibers are damaged, SARM1 is activated.

“This sparks a cascade of molecular processes that leads to the self-destruction of the nerve cell’s axon, the cable that carries electric impulse away from the body of the nerve cell to the next,’’ Dr Ve said.

Missing buil­ding block for quan­tum optimi­zation develo­ped

From left to right: Kilian Ender, Clemens Dlaska, Wolfgang Lechner, Rick van Bijnen, Andreas Kruckenhauser, Glen Bigan Mbeng
Credit: Uni Innsbruck

Optimization challenges in logistics or finance are among the first possible applications of quantum machines. Physicists from Innsbruck, Austria, have now developed a method that enables optimization problems to be investigated on quantum hardware that already exists today. For this purpose, they have developed a special quantum gate.

The development of quantum computers is being pursued worldwide, and there are various concepts of how computing using the properties of the quantum world can be implemented. Many of these have already advanced experimentally into areas that can no longer be emulated on classical computers. But the technologies have not yet reached the point where they can be used to solve larger computational problems. Therefore, researchers are currently looking for applications that can be implemented on existing platforms. "We are looking for tasks that we can compute on existing hardware," says Rick van Bijnen of the Institute of Quantum Optics and Quantum Information at the Austrian Academy of Sciences in Innsbruck. A team around Van Bijnen and the Lechner research group is now proposing a method to solve optimization problems using neutral atoms.

Can a poisonous sea snail replace morphine?

Bea Ramiro from Department of Biomedical Sciences at Copenhagen University began to study the sea snail species Conus rolani more or less by chance. Together with two fishermen she was collecting material in the waters off the Philippine Island of Cebu in 2018.

At the time, researchers knew that poison from the sea snail species Conus magus could be used as a painkiller. It can replace morphine and opioids, and some patients experience fewer side effects. Therefore, Bea Ramiro hoped she could find a new sea snail species whose poison had a similar or possibly even better effect.

In order to study sea snails, Bea Ramiro had to collect a lot of snails of the same species. And once the fishermen had reeled in the net and the snails had been divided into groups according to species, she only had enough snails of the species Conus rolani to do a proper study.

Today, Bea Ramiro is glad that this large, white and brown snail six to seven centimeters long was the only species left.

Because a new study from the University of Copenhagen published in Science Advances to which she has contributed shows that poison from Conus rolani can function as a painkiller. The researchers have learned that a particular substance from the poison can block out pain in mice for an even longer time than morphine.

Blow flies can be used to detect use of chemical weapons and other pollutants

Blow flies are common across many environments.
Photo by Fir0002/Flagstaffotos

Researchers at the School of Science at IUPUI have found that blow flies can be used as chemical sensors, with a particular focus on the detection of chemical warfare agents.

Despite widespread bans, chemical weapons have been deployed in recent conflicts such as the Syrian civil war, and some experts fear they may be used in the war in Ukraine. An IUPUI study shows that blow flies could be used as a safer alternative for investigating the use of these weapons -- as well as other chemicals in the environment -- keeping humans out of potentially dangerous situations.

The work appears in the journal Environmental Science and Technology. The research was funded through a contract from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency.

Straws, crystals and the quest for new subatomic physics

Several of the Mu2e tracker planes, featuring thin mylar straws, are assembled in a cleanroom at Fermilab. The full tracker will contain 21,600 straws to measure the paths, energies and momentums of electrons with high precision.
Photo: Ryan Postel, Fermilab

Scientists build complex machines to better understand the particles that make up our universe — and sometimes, they use materials you might not expect. One example? The upcoming Mu2e experiment at the U.S. Department of Energy’s Fermi National Accelerator Laboratory will incorporate thousands of straws made by a drinking straw company.

But these aren’t your average soda straws. Mu2e will use special mylar straws, with walls thinner than a human hair, to search for a never-before-seen transformation of subatomic particles called muons.

Teams from this international collaboration are currently constructing the Mu2e particle detector at Fermilab and aim to start taking physics data by 2026. If they find the rare, sought-after signal, it will be a sign of new physics beyond the tried and tested Standard Model of particle physics. It would help pave the way to answer open questions about the fundamental nature of elementary particles and forces that physicists have had for many years.

The wild years of our Milky Way galaxy

The architectural galaxy: our Milky Way consists of different components. Max Planck researchers have now reconstructed the history of thick and thin discs in particular.
Credit: Stefan Payne-Wardenaar / MPIA

A very long time ago, our Milky Way had a truly eventful life: between about 13 and 8 billion years ago, it lived hard and fast, merging with other galaxies and consuming a lot of hydrogen to form stars. With the help of a new data set, Maosheng Xiang and Hans-Walter Rix from the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg have reconstructed the turbulent teenage years of our home galaxy. To do this, the researchers had to precisely determine the ages of 250,000 Milky Way stars.

Understanding the formation history and evolution of our home galaxy is a major goal for astronomy and astrophysics, and one where a flood of high-quality “big data” over the past years has led to impressive progress. The new study by Xiang and Rix constitutes a big step forward by putting much more precise dates onto the different phases of early Milky Way history. This was made possible by a unique analysis that managed to determine the ages of 250,000 stars.

A rough sketch of Milky Way history

In our current understanding, our home galaxy went through several phases. During the “baby phase” (not an official astronomy term), small, gas-rich progenitor galaxies merged to form a conglomerate that subsequently grew into our Milky Way. As those galaxies did not collide head-on, they imparted a spin on the resulting structure, presumably flattening its out into what we now see as the so-called thick disk of our Milky Way: gas and stars in a flat pancake, 100,000 light-years in diameter and 6000 light-years thick.