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Secrets behind sharp memory in ‘super-aged’ individuals revealed

March 24, 2010 By vani Leave a Comment

Washington, Mar 24 (ANI): The secret behind the super-sharp memory in elderly people—the so-called “super-aged” individuals—has now been unveiled.

Dr. Changiz Geula, and colleagues said that the “super-aged” individuals, actually somehow escaped formation of brain “tangles”, which consist of an abnormal form of a protein called “tau” that damages and eventually kills nerve cells.

Named for their snarled, knotted appearance under a microscope, tangles increase with advancing age and peak in people with Alzheimer”s disease.

“This discovery is very exciting. It is the first study of its kind and its implications are vast. We always assumed that the accumulation of tangles is a progressive phenomenon throughout the normal aging process. Healthy people develop moderate numbers of tangles, with the most severe cases linked to Alzheimer”s disease. But now we have evidence that some individuals are immune to tangle formation. The evidence also supports the notion that the presence of tangles may influence cognitive performance. Individuals with the fewest tangles perform at superior levels. Those with more appear to be normal for their age,” said Geula.

The findings are based on examination of the nine brains from super-aged individuals.

Subjects who volunteer for this study get a battery of memory and other tests and agree to donate their brains for examination after death. They are considered ”super- aged” because of their high performance on the tests.

The tests include memory exercises to evaluate their ability to recall facts after being told a story or their ability to remember a list of more than a dozen words and recall those words sometime later.

Geula said the new study is unique in its focus on what”s right with the brains of older people.

It looks for insights into what lifestyle, genetic, or other factors may protect super-aged individuals from the age-related memory loss that affects most other people.

The scientists found that super-aged people appear to fall into two subgroups— Those who are almost immune to tangle formation and those that have few tangles.

“One group of super-aged seems to dodge tangle formation. Their brains are virtually clean, which doesn”t happen in normal-aged individuals. The other group seems to get tangles but it”s less than or equal to the amount in the normal elderly. But for some reason, they seem to be protected against its effects,” explained Geula.

He said that the next step involves determining why one subgroup is immune to tangle formation and the other seems to be immune to its effects. Environment, lifestyle, and genetics may be key factors.

“Ultimately, chemistry is one of the keys to understanding what makes these tangles form. By understanding the specific anatomic, pathological, genetic, and molecular characteristics of high-performing brains, we may eventually be able to protect normal brains from age-related memory loss,” said Geula.

The study was presented at the 239th National Meeting of the American Chemical Society (ACS). (ANI)

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New discovery hints ancient Egypt and Israel had ties during Early Bronze Age

September 2, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Jerusalem, Sept 2 (ANI): The discovery of a rare, four-centimeter-long stone fragment at the point where the Jordan River exits Lake Kinneret, has suggested a link between ancient Egypt and Israel around 3,000 BCE during the Early Bronze Age.

According to a report in the Jerusalem Post, Tel Aviv University (TAU) and University College London archeologists found the fragment.

The piece, part of a carved stone plaque bearing archaic Egyptian signs, was the highlight of the second season of excavations at Tel Bet Yerah (Khirbet el-Kerak). he site lies along an ancient highway that connected Egypt to the wider world of the ancient Near East.

The dig, carried out within the Beit Yerah National Park, was completed there last week by a joint team headed by TAU’s Raphael Greenberg and David Wengrow from England.

Earlier discoveries, both in Egypt and at Bet Yerah, have indicated that there was direct interaction between the site – then one of the largest in the Jordan Valley – and the Egyptian royal court.

The new discovery suggests that these contacts were of far greater local significance than had been suspected.

The archeologists noted that the fragment, which depicts an arm and hand grasping a scepter and an early form of the ankh sign, was the first artifact of its type ever found in an archaeological site outside Egypt.

It has been attributed to the period of Egypt’s First Dynasty, at around 3000 BCE.

Finds of this nature are rare even within Egypt itself, and the signs are executed to a high quality, as good as those on royal cosmetic palettes and other monuments dating to the origins of Egyptian kingship.

This year’s excavations also provided new insights into contacts between the early town and the distant north, when large quantities of “Khirbet Kerak Ware” (a distinctive kind of red/black burnished pottery first found at Tel Bet Yerah) were found in association with portable ceramic hearths, some of them bearing decorations in the form of human features.

“The hearths are very similar to objects found in Anatolia and the southern Caucasus, and most were found in open spaces where there was other evidence for fire-related activities,” noted Greenberg.

“The people using this pottery appear to have been migrants or descendants of migrants, and its distribution on the site, as well as the study of other cultural aspects, such as what they ate and the way they organized their households, could tell us about their interaction with local people and their adaptation to new surroundings,” he added. (ANI)

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Novel device to wash away bedsores, chronic ulcers

August 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Aug 27 (ANI): Researchers at Tel Aviv University have developed a unique device, called Dermastream, which could heal bedsores and chronic ulcers in bedridden elderly and infirm.

When ill, such people are prone to painful and dangerous pressure ulcers, and diabetics are susceptible to wounds caused by a lack of blood flow to the extremities.

“The problem is chronic,” said Prof. Amihay Freeman of TAU’s Department of Molecular Microbiology and Biotechnology.

And thus, he developed Dermastream, that uses a solution to whisk away dead tissue, bathing the wound while keeping dangerous bacteria away.

The device provides an enzyme-based solution that flows continuously over the wound, offering an alternative treatment to combat a problem for which current treatments are costly and labour-intensive.

Freeman said that Dermastream has already passed clinical trials in Israeli hospitals and may be available in the U.S. within the next year.

Dermastream employs a special solution developed at Freeman’s TAU laboratory, thus offering a new approach to chronic wound care- a specialty known as “continuous streaming therapy.”

“Our basic idea is simple. We treat the wound by streaming a solution in a continuous manner. Traditional methods require wound scraping to remove necrotic tissue. That is expensive, painful and extremely uncomfortable to the patient.

And while active ingredients applied with bandages on a wound may work for a couple of hours, after that the wound fights back. The bacteria build up again, creating a tedious and long battle,” said Freeman.

Dermastream “flows” under a plastic cover that seals the wound, providing negative pressure that promotes faster healing.

The active biological ingredient, delivered in a hypertonic medium, works to heal hard-to-shake chronic wounds.

Freeman said that while traditional bandaging methods may take months to become fully effective, Dermastream can heal chronic wounds in weeks.

Dermastream is intended for use in hospitals, nursing homes, outpatient clinics and homecare.

Freeman has founded a company that is currently collaborating with a Veterans Association hospital in Tucson, AZ, to bring the technology to the U.S. market.

“My solution helps doctors regain control of the chronic wound, making management more efficient, and vastly improving the quality of their patients’ lives,” concluded Freeman. (ANI)

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MRI methods can show bone marrow stem cells’ viability as brain-repairing therapy

August 20, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, August 20 (ANI): Researchers at Tel Aviv University have offered new hope for people with incurable neurodegenerative diseases like Huntington’s, Alzheimer’s, and Parkinson’s by showing that the viability of stem cells created from a patient’s own bone marrow can be determined using MRI tracking methods.

Dr. Yoram Cohen, of TAU’s School of Chemistry, claims that he has been able to track the progress of the innovative cells called mesenchymal stem cells within the brain.

He says that initial studies indicate that it is possible to identify unhealthy or damaged tissues, migrate to them, and potentially repair or halt cell degeneration.

“By monitoring the motion of these cells, you get information about how viable they are, and how they can benefit the tissue. We have been able to prove that these stem cells travel within the brain, and only travel where they are needed. They read the chemical signalling of the tissue, which indicate areas of stress. And then they go and try to repair the situation,” he says.

During the study, Dr. Cohen and his colleagues tracked the activity of the live cells within the brain using the in-vivo MRI at the Strauss Centre for Computational Neuro-Imaging, with a view to establishing their viability as a therapy for neurodegenerative disease.

The researchers used magnetic iron oxide nanoparticles to label the stem cells, so that they could be identified as clear black dots on an MRI picture after being injected into the brain.

The stem cells were then injected into the brain of an animal that had an experimental model of Huntington’s disease, which suffered from a similar neuropathology as the one seen in human patients.

On MRI, it was possible to watch the stem cells migrating towards the diseased area of the brain.

“Cells that go toward a certain position that needs to be rescued are the best indirect proof that they are live and viable. If they can migrate towards the target, they are alive and can read chemical signalling,” says Dr. Cohen.

He believes that the benefits of using differentiated mesenchymal cells (MSC) may be numerous.

“Bone marrow-derived MSCs bypass ethical and production complications, and in the long run, the cells are less likely to be rejected because they come from the patients themselves. This means you don’t need immunosuppressant therapy,” he says.

Dr. Cohen has revealed that the next step in his research will be to develop a real-life therapy for those suffering from neurodegenerative diseases.

A researcher article on his study has been published in the journal Stem Cells. (ANI)

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Novel implant coating technique created

June 30, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, June 30 (ANI): An electrochemical process for coating metal implants which vastly improves their functionality, longevity and integration into the body has been developed by a Tel Aviv University researcher.

Brainchild of Prof. Noam Eliaz of the TAU School of Mechanical Engineering, the new process could vastly improve the lives of people who have undergone complicated total joint replacement surgeries so they can better walk, run and ultimately avoid rejection of the implant by their bodies.

“The surface chemistry, structure and morphology of our new coatings resemble biological material,” explains Prof. Eliaz.

“We’ve been able to enhance the integration of the coating with the mineralized tissue of the body, allowing more peoples’ bodies to accept implants,” the expert added.

His new coating resulted in a 33 percent decrease in the level of materials failure, or delamination, in these implants.

Prof. Eliaz presented his findings to the 215th meeting of the Electrochemical Society in San Francisco in May 2009. (ANI)

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Soon, a breath mint made from coffee

June 27, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, June 25 (ANI): A coffee extract can inhibit the growth of bacteria that leads to bad breath, according to a new research from Tel Aviv University.

New laboratory tests have shown that the extract prevents malodorous bacteria from making their presence felt – or smelt.

“Everybody thinks that coffee causes bad breath and it’s often true, because coffee, which has a dehydrating effect in the mouth, becomes potent when mixed with milk, and can ferment into smelly substances,” says breath specialist Prof. Mel Rosenberg of TAU’s Sackler Faculty of Medicine.

But that is not always true. “Contrary to our expectations, we found some components in coffee that actually inhibit bad breath,” Rosenberg added.

In the laboratory, the researchers monitored the bacterial odour production of coffee in saliva.

In the study, three different brands of coffee were tested: the Israeli brand Elite coffee, Landwer Turkish coffee, and Taster’s Choice.

Rosenberg expected to demonstrate the malodour-causing effect of coffee in an in vitro saliva assay developed by Dr. Sarit Levitan in his laboratory. To his surprise, the extracts had the opposite effect.

“The lesson we learned here is one of humility. We expected coffee would cause bad breath, but there is something inside this magic brew that has the opposite effect,” Rosenberg.

Rosenberg would love to isolate the bacterial-inhibiting molecule in order to reap the biggest anti-bacterial benefits from coffee.

According to researchers, the new study could be the foundation for an entirely new class of mouthwash, breath mints and gum.

Purified coffee extract can be added to a breath mint to stop bacteria from forming, stopping bad breath at its source, instead of masking the smell with a mint flavour, the authors said.

The findings were presented to members of the International Society for Breath Odour Research in Germany. (ANI)

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Almaty hosts fashion week for Central Asian, Chinese designers

May 21, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Almaty (Kazakhstan), May 21 (ANI): Designers from Central Asia gathered in Kazakhstan’s Almaty city recently to showcase their designs and styles.

The event, which is now in its seventh year, also showcased Almaty as Central Asia’s cosmopolitan cultural center.

The event showcased ready-to wear collections for Autumn-Winter 2009-2010 and also featured designers from China and Europe.

There was a decidedly Kazakh flavour to the collection shown by local designer Zhadira Shakieva this year.

Shakieva said that she tried to combine the beauty of women with the Kazakh national character.

Chinese designer Vong Yu Tau showcased his latest designs in Almaty.

He described Kazakhstan as an important trading partner for China, and added that the fashion business is no exception.

Most models on the catwalk came from Central Asia – Kazakhstan, Kyrgyzstan and Uzbekistan. Three days of catwalks were arranged, as well as beauty therapy master classes and a regional stylists’ competition.

Castings were held earlier at the Hotel Kazakhstan to select the models that will make it onto the catwalk. Around 500 models from Central Asian countries came for the selection procedure.

This year’s Fashion Week theme was “Litzedeiki”, which translated loosely means ‘female deceitfulness’. (ANI)

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Introducing ‘congestion pricing’ at airports could help avoid delays

April 24, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Apr 23 (ANI): London’s “congestion pricing”-the fee motorists pay to drive into certain parts of the city during peak traffic hours- could solve the problem of flight delays, says an economist at Tel Aviv University.

Dr. Itai Ater, from TAU’s Faculty of Management, is suggesting that introducing “congestion pricing” at airports could save travellers time and airlines money.

“What I propose is a policy to reduce the amount of delays in the airline industry,” said Ater.

In his opinion, airlines that want to use an airport’s runways during the busiest times of the day should pay an additional fee.

And such premium access fee to the runway could reduce airport congestion – and the inevitable delays, as well as the risks, linked with crowded skies.

His suggestions are aimed to save airlines from future catastrophes as airports, and skies, get busier.

He said: “Airport congestion is a big problem in the U.S. and around the world. The estimated annual costs of delays are $10 billion. When there are delays on take off or landing, a cascading effect is created, with lots of associated problems, risks and financial costs.”

Ater, who evaluated flight records from America’s busiest airports for his doctoral thesis at Stanford University, said that some airlines would prefer not to pay the charge and operate during non-congested periods.

As a result, overall congestion would drop.

Currently, airlines at most airports pay for runway use depending on the weight of the aircraft, except for a few such as Chicago O’Hare, where airports use pre-determined slots to determine charges and time of operation.

Ater has warned that not all airports can benefit from his plan.

“At airports where there is a monopoly or almost a monopoly by a single airline, charging a tariff during peak hours has less meaning. In these airports, like those in Atlanta, Charlotte, or Detroit, we already find fewer delays. So why intervene? Individual airlines that dominate an airport do a better job of organizing flights more intelligently and efficiently to reduce the level of delays,” he said.

He will present his advice at the National Bureau of Economic Research conference in Boston this May. (ANI)

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Introducing ‘congestion pricing’ at airports could help avoid delays

April 24, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Dr. Itai Ater, from TAU’s Faculty of Management, is suggesting that introducing “congestion pricing” at airports could save travellers time and airlines money.

“What I propose is a policy to reduce the amount of delays in the airline industry,” said Ater.

In his opinion, airlines that want to use an airport’s runways during the busiest times of the day should pay an additional fee.

And such premium access fee to the runway could reduce airport congestion – and the inevitable delays, as well as the risks, linked with crowded skies.

His suggestions are aimed to save airlines from future catastrophes as airports, and skies, get busier.

As a result, overall congestion would drop.

Ater has warned that not all airports can benefit from his plan.

He will present his advice at the National Bureau of Economic Research conference in Boston this May. (ANI)

Curing Alzheimer’s disease would need combination therapy

March 18, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, March 18 (ANI): Researchers at the University of Illinois at Chicago College of Medicine say that a potential cure for Alzheimer’s disease may require a combination therapy, which will target the malformations of the proteins that characterise this condition.

Alzheimer’s disease is characterized by two distinctive protein malformations: amyloid plaques, which are sticky deposits made up of a short protein called amyloid beta, and tau tangles, which are made of short filaments of the tau protein.

Referring to a previous study, the researchers highlight the fact that tau tangles work together with amyloid beta to create a perfect storm that destroys neural function and memory.

They, however, insist that no study to date has been able to show as to how amyloid beta and the tau tangles wreak their damage on the nervous system.

Scott Brady, professor and head of anatomy and cell biology at the UIC College of Medicine, points out that when short assemblies of amyloid, rather than the long-chain plaques, get inside neurons, they interfere with the cells’ transport system.

This, according to him, limits their ability to send vital proteins and vesicles to where they are needed within the cell, and interferes with the synaptic connections to other nerve cells.

Brady says that the new study has shown that the short assemblies of amyloid activate a transport-regulatory enzyme called CK2, which causes the motor protein to drop its cargo.

His team have also found that inhibition of CK2 is sufficient to prevent the effects of amyloid on transport.

An earlier study by the same researchers showed that tau tangles halt transport to the neuron periphery through other regulatory enzymes, by causing the motor protein to release the microtubule track.

The new study shows that the CK2 activated by amyloid also works as a primer for one of the enzymes activated by tau tangles, GSK3.

“Now we have the perfect storm. Both amyloid and tau tangles cause problems. But when you put them together, you exacerbate the problems, creating the cascade of events that cause Alzheimer’s loss of neural connections,” said Brady.

“It makes sense of why both have to be present to have Alzheimer’s.

“It is also telling us that treating one is not going to be sufficient. We’re going to have to think in terms of combination therapies that will allow us to address many targets at once. This may explain why attempts to manipulate one or the other haven’t been successful in patients,” he added.

A research article on the current study appears in the online edition of Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences. (ANI)

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Now, biomarker test to diagnose or rule out Alzheimer’s disease

March 17, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Mar 17 (ANI): In a breakthrough study, researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine have pioneered a biomarker test that can confirm or rule out Alzheimer’s disease.

The test measures cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) concentrations of two of the disease’s biochemical hallmarks – amyloid beta42 peptide and tau protein.

With this information in hand, the scientists also predict whether a person’s mild cognitive impairment would convert to Alzheimer’s disease over time.

The research team, led by Dr. Leslie M. Shaw, Co-Director of the Penn Alzheimer’s Disease Neuroimaging Initiative (ADNI) Biomarker Core, could detect this devastating disease at the earliest stages, before dementia symptoms appeared and widespread irreversible damage occurred.

By improving upon a previously suggested pathological CSF biomarker signature, the researchers found evidence of neuron degeneration – marked by an increase in CSF concentration of tau proteins – and plaque deposition, indicated by a decrease in amyloid beta42 concentration.

Also, people with two copies of the genetic risk factor for Alzheimer’s disease, APOE e4 , had the lowest concentrations of amyloid beta42, compared to those with one or no copies.

“With this test, we can reliably detect and track the progression of Alzheimer’s disease,” said Shaw.

He added: “Validated biomarker tests will improve the focus of Alzheimer’s clinical trials, enrolling patients at earlier stages of the disease to find treatments that can at least delay -and perhaps stop- neurodegeneration. In addition, prevention trials can test methods to delay or block mild cognitive impairment from converting to full-blown Alzheimer’s.”

Currently, researchers are conducting further validation studies of the research test system.

Additional work is needed to develop additional biomarkers, as well as identify more genetic risk factors that will help distinguish Alzheimer’s from other neurodegenerative diseases characterized by cognitive impairments.

The study appears in the online edition of the Annals of Neurology. (ANI)

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Now, tiny “lab-on-a-chip” to detect pollutants, disease and biological weapons

February 18, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, Feb 18 (ANI): Taking a huge leap in the detection of pollutants, Tel Aviv University researchers have developed a highly accurate nano-scale biomonitoring laboratory to keep water safe from pollution and bioterrorist threats.

Developed by a team led by Prof. Yosi Shacham-Diamand, vice-dean of TAU’s Faculty of Engineering, the “lab on a chip” is a breakthrough because it has combined biology with the cutting-edge capabilities of nanotechnology.

The nanolab complete with a microscopic workbench can measure water quality in real time.

“We’ve developed a platform – essentially a micro-sized, quarter-inch square ‘lab’ – employing genetically engineered bacteria that light up when presented with a stressor in water,” said Prof. Shacham-Diamand.

Equipment on the little chip can work to help detect very tiny light levels produced by the bacteria.

Shacham-Diamand also said that instead of using animals to help detect threats to a water supply, “our system is based on a plastic chip that is more humane, much faster, more sensitive and much cheaper.”

“Basically, ours is an innovative advance in the ‘lab on a chip’ system. It’s an ingenious nano-scale platform designed to get information out of biological events. Our solution can monitor water with never-before-achieved levels of accuracy. But as a platform, it can also be used for unlimited purposes, such as investigating stem cell therapies or treating cancer.”

The nanolabs can be used to evaluate several biological processes with practical applications, such as microbes in water, stem cells, or breast cancer development.

Now, researchers are joining hands with other Israeli scientists for building and commercialising its water-testing mini-labs to measure and monitor how genetically engineered bacteria respond to pollution such as E. coli in water.

Also, the researchers are exploring other uses of the method-the new lab-on-a-chip could become a defensive weapon that protects America from biological warfare.

Shacham-Diamand said that his system could be also modified to react to chemical threats and pollution and could also be updated as new threats are detected.

The study was recently published in the journal Nano Letters. (ANI)

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Scientists identify protein that may help understand Alzheimer’s disease

February 7, 2009 By admin Leave a Comment

Washington, February 6 (ANI): Scientists at UC Santa Barbara say that a protein called BAG2 offers a chance to better understand Alzheimer’s disease, and identify new drug targets.

In a study paper published in the Journal of Neuroscience, the researchers have revealed that they will soon begin experiments to find out how these proteins work with mice.

The scientists have also described important activities of BAG2 in cleaning up brain cells in the paper.

The protein tau is normally found in brain cells, but it has yet to be determined why it clumps into tangles in people with Alzheimer’s disease.

Senior author Kenneth S. Kosik, co-director of UCSB’s Neuroscience Research Institute, and Harriman Chair in Neuroscience, have been involved in the study of neurons that develop neurofibrillary tangles, one of the hallmarks of the disease, since he was a postdoctoral fellow.

“Early on in my career, we were one of several labs to discover that tau was in the neurofibrillary tangles,” said Kosik.

The researchers have revealed that they recently started studying BAG2 to understand how it might be involved in the removal of tangled tau.

“It turns out that when you put this protein into the cell, it clears away the damaged tau very nicely,” said Kosik.

The team have thus far noticed that BAG2 does not clear away all the tau. It instead goes for the damaged tau protein and removes it, they add. hen tau accumulates in a neurofibrillary tangle, the cell can’t get rid of it.

“All cells including neurons have an elaborate, sophisticated, elegant system for disposing of proteins. Proteins have a certain turnover; sometimes they get damaged. The cell has its own trash can called the proteosome, and damaged proteins are deposited there,” said Kosik.

“We’ve done this experiment many ways. We’ve discovered a bit about how BAG2 works. We’ve turned it on to remove tau. We’ve turned it off to increase tau. We’ve really done a lot of manipulations using cell culture. So BAG2 is a new player, a new protein that may be a good target for study in the research of Alzheimer’s disease.

“There is nothing about a drug or a treatment in any of these findings; however, the first step in fighting any illness is finding what you want to target the drug to. This is a protein that is involved in neurofibrillary tangles, so now we have a new target for drug discovery. This is not a drug or a treatment, just a new target. The new target is BAG2.” Kosik is looking forward to studying BAG2 in mice,” added Kosik.

The researcher says that calls contain all these proteins, but they can go awry. Their levels can be off, or they may malfunction in another way. The same normal protein can begin to malfunction.

“It may be that BAG2 is not doing its job right; it may be that BAG2 is overwhelmed, because sometimes tau is building up, and there is not enough BAG2 there. We cannot conclude from this that BAG2 is the fundamental problem in the disease state. It is only a possible target that can help us find our way out of the disease,” said Kosik. (ANI)

Filed Under: Health News Tagged With: alzheimer, ANI, author, bag, bit, brain, cannot, career, cell, chair, chance, culture, discovery, disease, drug, experiment, February, fellow, Harriman, hen, illness, institute, job, journal, Kenneth S. Kosik, lot, malfunction, neuroscience, nothing, paper, player, postdoctoral, problem, protein, proteosome, removal, Research, researcher, right, Santa Barbara, Senior, state, step, study, system, tangle, target, tau, team, trash, treatment, turnover, UCSB, Washington, way

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