Let's say it's 6.15p m and you're going home (alone of course), after an unusually hard day on the job. You're really tired, upset and frustrated. Suddenly you start experiencing severe pain in your hest that starts to adiate out into your arm and up
into your jaw. You are only about five miles from the hospital nearest to you home. Unfortunately you don't know if you'll be able to make it that far. You have been trained in CPR, but the guy that taught the course did not tell you how to perform it on yourself.
HOW TO SURVIVE A HEART ATTACK WHEN ALONE
Since many people are alone when they suffer a heart attack, without help,the person whose heart is beating improperly and who begins to feel faint, has only about 10 seconds left before losing consciousness. However,these victims can help themselves by coughing repeatedly and very vigorously. A deep breath should be taken before each cough, and the cough must be deep and prolonged, as when producing sputum from deep inside the chest. A breath and a cough must be repeated about every two seconds without let-up until help arrives, or until the heart is felt to be beating normally again. Deep breaths get oxygen into the lungs and coughing movements squeeze the heart and keep the blood circulating. The squeezing pressure on the heart also helps it regain normal rhythm. In this way, heart attack victims can get to a hospital. Tell as many other people as possible about this. It could save their lives!!
Friday, December 7, 2007
Facts about cold
You don’t catch cold because you’re chilled or exposed to a draft. Fact…or fiction
Fiction. We used to think that colds are more common in winter simply because people spend more time indoors, where they are exposed to each other’s germs. Cold weather was not believed to have anything to do with it. However, recent research suggests that when you are chilled, the blood vessels in your nose constrict and deliver less warm blood to its lining—which means fewer white blood cells to boost the immune system and fight disease. If you happen to be harboring a cold virus but don’t as yet have any symptoms, this decreased supply of white blood cells allows the virus to multiply and give you a full-blown cold.
Fiction. We used to think that colds are more common in winter simply because people spend more time indoors, where they are exposed to each other’s germs. Cold weather was not believed to have anything to do with it. However, recent research suggests that when you are chilled, the blood vessels in your nose constrict and deliver less warm blood to its lining—which means fewer white blood cells to boost the immune system and fight disease. If you happen to be harboring a cold virus but don’t as yet have any symptoms, this decreased supply of white blood cells allows the virus to multiply and give you a full-blown cold.
Tuesday, December 4, 2007
Medical facts
Medical researchers contend that no disease ever identified has been completely eradicated.
The attachment of the human skin to muscles is what causes dimples.
No one seems to know why people blush.
In 1972, a group of scientists reported that you could cure the common cold by freezing the big toe.
The number one cause of blindness in the United States is diabetes.
The adult human heart weighs about ten ounces.
People who laugh a lot are much healthier than those who don't. Dr. Lee Berk at the Loma Linda School of Public Health in California found that laughing lowers levels of stress hormones, and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds have it best - they laugh an average of 300 times a day. Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.
People who have a tough time handling the stress of money woes are twice as likely to develop severe gum disease, a new study finds.
Between 25% to 33% of the population sneeze when they are exposed to light.
Of the 206 bones in the average human adult's body, 106 are in the hands and feet. (54 in the hands and 52 in the feet)
In 1815 French chemist Michael Eugene Chevreul realized the first link between diabetes and sugar metabolism when he discovered that the urine of a diabetic was identical to grape sugar.
Approximately 16 Canadians have their appendices removed, when not required, every day.
Sumerians (from 5000 BC) thought that the liver made blood and the heart was the center of thought.
Men have more blood than women. Men have 1.5 gallons for men versus 0.875 gallons for women.
The first Band-Aid Brand Adhesive Bandages were three inches wide and eighteen inches long. You made your own bandage by cutting off as much as you needed.
The human brain stops growing at the age of 18.
In 1977, a 13 year old child found a tooth growing out of his left foot.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 18 million courses of antibiotics are prescribed for the common cold in the United States per year. Research shows that colds are caused by viruses. 50 million unnecessary antibiotics are prescribed for viral respiratory infections.
It takes an interaction of 72 different muscles to produce human speech.
The first known heart medicine was discovered in an English garden. In 1799, physician John Ferriar noted the effect of dried leaves of the common plant, digitalis purpurea, on heart action. Still used in heart medications, digitalis slows the pulse and increases the force of heart contractions and the amount of blood pumped per heartbeat.
Blood is red only in the arteries after it has left the heart and is full of oxygen. Blood is a purplish, blue color in the veins as it returns to the heart, thanks to having picked up carbon dioxide and other wastes from the body's cells. In fact, your blood is red throughout only half your body. When cut, of course, the blood always appears red because it is instantly exposed to oxygen outside the body.
Contrary to popular belief, hemophiliacs do NOT bleed to death from minor cuts. This rare disease, which affects only males (it is carried by females, but they don't exhibit symptoms), involves an impairment in blood clotting—not an absolute inability to clot. Hemophiliacs today may take clotting serums and often lead fairly normal lives.
During his or her lifetime, the average human will grow 590 miles of hair.
The average Human bladder can hold 13 ounces of liquid.
You lose enough dead skin cells in your lifetime to fill eight five-pound flour bags.
Your thumb is the same length as your nose.
The storage capacity of human brain exceeds 4 Terrabytes.
The Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland was a symbolic character for the hat makers in towns of the late 1800's. The large felt hats of the day had supports made out of lead. The lead caused an organic form of psychosis (brain damage) to develop in the hat makers causing them to be declared crazy.
Although your system cannot digest gum like other foods, it won't be stuck inside of you forever. It comes out with other waste your body can't use.
The substance that human blood resembles most closely in terms of chemical composition is sea water.
The attachment of the human skin to muscles is what causes dimples.
No one seems to know why people blush.
In 1972, a group of scientists reported that you could cure the common cold by freezing the big toe.
The number one cause of blindness in the United States is diabetes.
The adult human heart weighs about ten ounces.
People who laugh a lot are much healthier than those who don't. Dr. Lee Berk at the Loma Linda School of Public Health in California found that laughing lowers levels of stress hormones, and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds have it best - they laugh an average of 300 times a day. Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.
People who have a tough time handling the stress of money woes are twice as likely to develop severe gum disease, a new study finds.
Between 25% to 33% of the population sneeze when they are exposed to light.
Of the 206 bones in the average human adult's body, 106 are in the hands and feet. (54 in the hands and 52 in the feet)
In 1815 French chemist Michael Eugene Chevreul realized the first link between diabetes and sugar metabolism when he discovered that the urine of a diabetic was identical to grape sugar.
Approximately 16 Canadians have their appendices removed, when not required, every day.
Sumerians (from 5000 BC) thought that the liver made blood and the heart was the center of thought.
Men have more blood than women. Men have 1.5 gallons for men versus 0.875 gallons for women.
The first Band-Aid Brand Adhesive Bandages were three inches wide and eighteen inches long. You made your own bandage by cutting off as much as you needed.
The human brain stops growing at the age of 18.
In 1977, a 13 year old child found a tooth growing out of his left foot.
According to the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), 18 million courses of antibiotics are prescribed for the common cold in the United States per year. Research shows that colds are caused by viruses. 50 million unnecessary antibiotics are prescribed for viral respiratory infections.
It takes an interaction of 72 different muscles to produce human speech.
The first known heart medicine was discovered in an English garden. In 1799, physician John Ferriar noted the effect of dried leaves of the common plant, digitalis purpurea, on heart action. Still used in heart medications, digitalis slows the pulse and increases the force of heart contractions and the amount of blood pumped per heartbeat.
Blood is red only in the arteries after it has left the heart and is full of oxygen. Blood is a purplish, blue color in the veins as it returns to the heart, thanks to having picked up carbon dioxide and other wastes from the body's cells. In fact, your blood is red throughout only half your body. When cut, of course, the blood always appears red because it is instantly exposed to oxygen outside the body.
Contrary to popular belief, hemophiliacs do NOT bleed to death from minor cuts. This rare disease, which affects only males (it is carried by females, but they don't exhibit symptoms), involves an impairment in blood clotting—not an absolute inability to clot. Hemophiliacs today may take clotting serums and often lead fairly normal lives.
During his or her lifetime, the average human will grow 590 miles of hair.
The average Human bladder can hold 13 ounces of liquid.
You lose enough dead skin cells in your lifetime to fill eight five-pound flour bags.
Your thumb is the same length as your nose.
The storage capacity of human brain exceeds 4 Terrabytes.
The Mad Hatter in Alice in Wonderland was a symbolic character for the hat makers in towns of the late 1800's. The large felt hats of the day had supports made out of lead. The lead caused an organic form of psychosis (brain damage) to develop in the hat makers causing them to be declared crazy.
Although your system cannot digest gum like other foods, it won't be stuck inside of you forever. It comes out with other waste your body can't use.
The substance that human blood resembles most closely in terms of chemical composition is sea water.
Beware the Dangers of Oxygen
There's a caustic substance common to our environment whose very presence turns iron into brittle rust, dramatically increases the risk of fire and explosion, and sometimes destroys the cells of the very organisms that depend on it for survival. This substance that makes up 21% of our atmosphere is Diatomic oxygen (O2), more widely know as just oxygen.
Of course, oxygen has its good points. Besides being necessary for respiration and the reliable combustion engine, it can be liquefied and used as rocket fuel. Oxygen is also widely used in the world of medicine as a means to imbue the body with a greater amount of the needed gas. But recent studies indicate that administering oxygen might be doing less good than hoped–and in fact be causing harm. No one is immune to the dangers of oxygen, but the people who might most suffer the ill effects are infants newly introduced to breathing, and those who are clinically dead.
There are a variety of injuries and ailments for which modern medicine dictates oxygen therapy. The common wisdom is that by filling the lungs with pure O2, one is pushing more of the vital gas into the blood, and thus to organs that are weakened and in need of support. It has also long been known that even at partial pressures, pure oxygen can be toxic–a fact with which scuba divers and astronauts are intimately familiar. Recent studies have indicated that the human body responds to pure oxygen, even at normal
Liquid Oxygen
When pure O2 is introduced to the lungs, autonomic reflex increases respiration. The increased rate of breathing means that a much larger load of carbon dioxide is released from the body, which causes the blood vessels to constrict. Despite the increased amount of available oxygen in the lungs, the circulatory system is hampered, and cannot deliver precious O2 as well as it could when breathing normal atmosphere.
Ronald Harper, a neurobiology professor at UCLA, conducted observations on a group of healthy teenagers breathing various gas mixes using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI). His findings showed that in some subjects the pure O2 caused the brain to go clinically bonkers. Brain structures such as the hippocampus, the insula, and the cingulate cortex all displayed an adverse reaction; they in turn spurred the hypothalamus, the body's main regulatory gland, into a fervor. The hypothalamus regulates a myriad of things, including heart rate, body temperature, and is the master of a variety of other glands. The introduction of pure oxygen prompts the hypothalamus to flood the body with a cocktail of hormones and neurotransmitters which serve to hamper heart rate, and further reduce the circulatory system's effectiveness. But Harper also found that by adding a mere 5% CO2, all the detrimental effects found in pure oxygen are negated.
There are circumstances, however, where even the proper mix of gases would prove inadequate. Modern medicine has long taught that after respiration stops, the brain can only survive for six minutes without oxygen before its cells begin to die in droves. In order to combat this, standard procedure has been to aggressively attempt to restore breathing and heartbeat immediately upon cessation. The base premise on which this protocol is designed may be in error.
Programmed cell death
Upon examining heart cells and neurons deprived of oxygen under a microscope, Dr Lance Becker of the University of Pennsylvania found there was no indication that the cells were dying after five or six minutes. In fact, they seemed to endure the state for up to an hour without adverse affect. Given this unexpected observation, the researchers were forced to investigate why human resuscitation becomes impossible after only a few minutes of clinical death. The answer they uncovered was that the body's cells were not dying of oxygen starvation; they were expiring due to reperfusion–the sudden reintroduction of oxygen to a dormant cell.
Inside the cells, the culprit seems to be in the mitochondria, which is the cell's power plant where sugar and oxygen are converted to usable energy. Mitochondria are also responsible for apoptosis–the organized, controlled self-destruction of a cell. Normally apoptosis occurs in situations such as the cell being damaged beyond repair, infected by a virus, an attempt to prevent cancer, or aiding in initial tissue development. The process effectively kills and dismantles the cell allowing the body's usual waste management functions to carry the cell's remains away. For reasons not entirely clear, reperfusion triggers apoptosis–the oxygen intended to save the cell actually causes cellular suicide.
Armed with this new information about how cells react to oxygen, it is clear that current emergency care is not altogether ideal, and new protocols are under investigation. Dr Becker proposes that induced hypothermia may slow cell degradation, and if a means can be found to safely reintroduce oxygen to tissues, a clinically dead person–who still has trillions of living cells–could be resuscitated after being an hour dead.
This glorious future is still on the horizon, but to imagine the practical application leads one to ponder the multitude of accidents and injuries that are currently fatal, but will one day be treatable. Emergency Medical Personnel could arrive on the scene, and inject the patient with a slurry of ice and salt that lowers the body temperature to about 92° F. In a hypothermic state, the patient is hauled to the hospital, where instead of frantically trying to restart the heart, doctors patch up the problem, prevent apoptosis , and then restart the heart. Though it won't save everyone, these findings may lead to a future where a person made up of perfectly good human cells is not written off as dead merely because their heart has stopped beating. The miracle of modern medicine, it seems, is on the cusp of determining the true distinction between dead and mostly dead.
Interesting facts
1. If you are right handed, you will tend to chew your food on your right side. If you are left handed, you will tend to chew your food on your left side.
2. If you stop getting thirsty, you need to drink more water. For when a human body is dehydrated, its thirst mechanism shuts off.
3. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying.
4. Your tongue is germ free only if it is pink. If it is white there is a thin film of bacteria on it.
5. The Mercedes-Benz motto is “Das Beste oder Nichts” meaning “the best or nothing”.
6. The Titanic was the first ship to use the SOS signal.
7. The pupil of the eye expands as much as 45 percent when a person looks at something pleasing.
8. The average person who stops smoking requires one hour less sleep a night.
9. Laughing lowers levels of stress hormones and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds laugh an average of 300 times a day. Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.
10. The roar that we hear when we place a seashell next to our ear is not the ocean, but rather the sound of blood surging through the veins in the ear.
11. Dalmatians are born without spots.
12. Bats always turn left when exiting a cave.
13. The ‘v’ in the name of a court case does not stand for ‘versus’, but for ‘and’ (in civil proceedings) or ‘against’ (in criminal proceedings).
14. Men’s shirts have the buttons on the right, but women’s shirts have the buttons on the left.
15. The owl is the only bird to drop its upper eyelid to wink. All other birds raise their lower eyelids.
16. The reason honey is so easy to digest is that it’s already been digested by a bee.
17. Roosters cannot crow if they cannot extend their necks.
18. The color blue has a calming effect. It causes the brain to release calming hormones.
19. Every time you sneeze some of your brain cells die.
20. Your left lung is smaller than your right lung to make room for your heart.
21. The verb “cleave” is the only English word with two synonyms which are antonyms of each other: adhere and separate.
22. When you blush, the lining of your stomach also turns red.
23. When hippos are upset, their sweat turns red.
24. The first Harley Davidson motorcycle was built in 1903, and used a tomato can for a carburetor.
25. The lion that roars in the MGM logo is named Volney.
26. Google is actually the common name for a number with a million zeros.
27. Switching letters is called spoonerism. For example, saying jag of Flapan, instead of flag of Japan.
28. It cost 7 million dollars to build the Titanic and 200 million to make a film about it.
29. The attachment of the human skin to muscles is what causes dimples.
30. There are 1,792 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower.
31. The sound you hear when you crack your knuckles is actually the sound of nitrogen gas bubbles bursting.
32. Human hair and fingernails continue to grow after death.
33. It takes about 20 seconds for a red blood cell to circle the whole body.
34. The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets.
35. Most soccer players run 7 miles in a game.
36. The only part of the body that has no blood supply is the cornea in the eye. It takes in oxygen directly from the air.
37. Every day 200 million couples make love, 400,000 babies are born, and 140,000 people die.
38. In most watch advertisements the time displayed on the watch is 10:10 because then the arms frame the brand of the watch (and make it look like it
is smiling).
39. Colgate faced big obstacle marketing toothpaste in Spanish speaking countries. Colgate translates into the command “go hang yourself.”
40. The only 2 animals that can see behind itself without turning its head are the rabbit and the parrot.
41. Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
42. The average person laughs 13 times a day.
43. Do you know the names of the three wise monkeys? They are:Mizaru(See no evil), Mikazaru(Hear no evil), and Mazaru(Speak no evil)
44. Women blink nearly twice as much as men.
45. German Shepherds bite humans more than any other breed of dog.
46. Large kangaroos cover more than 30 feet with each jump.
47. Whip makes a cracking sound because its tip moves faster than the speed of sound.
48. Two animal rights protesters were protesting at the cruelty of sending pigs to a slaughterhouse in Bonn. Suddenly the pigs, all two thousand of them, escaped through a broken fence and stampeded, trampling the two hapless protesters to death.
49. If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural cause.
50. The human heart creates enough pressure while pumping to squirt blood 30 feet!!
2. If you stop getting thirsty, you need to drink more water. For when a human body is dehydrated, its thirst mechanism shuts off.
3. Chewing gum while peeling onions will keep you from crying.
4. Your tongue is germ free only if it is pink. If it is white there is a thin film of bacteria on it.
5. The Mercedes-Benz motto is “Das Beste oder Nichts” meaning “the best or nothing”.
6. The Titanic was the first ship to use the SOS signal.
7. The pupil of the eye expands as much as 45 percent when a person looks at something pleasing.
8. The average person who stops smoking requires one hour less sleep a night.
9. Laughing lowers levels of stress hormones and strengthens the immune system. Six-year-olds laugh an average of 300 times a day. Adults only laugh 15 to 100 times a day.
10. The roar that we hear when we place a seashell next to our ear is not the ocean, but rather the sound of blood surging through the veins in the ear.
11. Dalmatians are born without spots.
12. Bats always turn left when exiting a cave.
13. The ‘v’ in the name of a court case does not stand for ‘versus’, but for ‘and’ (in civil proceedings) or ‘against’ (in criminal proceedings).
14. Men’s shirts have the buttons on the right, but women’s shirts have the buttons on the left.
15. The owl is the only bird to drop its upper eyelid to wink. All other birds raise their lower eyelids.
16. The reason honey is so easy to digest is that it’s already been digested by a bee.
17. Roosters cannot crow if they cannot extend their necks.
18. The color blue has a calming effect. It causes the brain to release calming hormones.
19. Every time you sneeze some of your brain cells die.
20. Your left lung is smaller than your right lung to make room for your heart.
21. The verb “cleave” is the only English word with two synonyms which are antonyms of each other: adhere and separate.
22. When you blush, the lining of your stomach also turns red.
23. When hippos are upset, their sweat turns red.
24. The first Harley Davidson motorcycle was built in 1903, and used a tomato can for a carburetor.
25. The lion that roars in the MGM logo is named Volney.
26. Google is actually the common name for a number with a million zeros.
27. Switching letters is called spoonerism. For example, saying jag of Flapan, instead of flag of Japan.
28. It cost 7 million dollars to build the Titanic and 200 million to make a film about it.
29. The attachment of the human skin to muscles is what causes dimples.
30. There are 1,792 steps to the top of the Eiffel Tower.
31. The sound you hear when you crack your knuckles is actually the sound of nitrogen gas bubbles bursting.
32. Human hair and fingernails continue to grow after death.
33. It takes about 20 seconds for a red blood cell to circle the whole body.
34. The plastic things on the end of shoelaces are called aglets.
35. Most soccer players run 7 miles in a game.
36. The only part of the body that has no blood supply is the cornea in the eye. It takes in oxygen directly from the air.
37. Every day 200 million couples make love, 400,000 babies are born, and 140,000 people die.
38. In most watch advertisements the time displayed on the watch is 10:10 because then the arms frame the brand of the watch (and make it look like it
is smiling).
39. Colgate faced big obstacle marketing toothpaste in Spanish speaking countries. Colgate translates into the command “go hang yourself.”
40. The only 2 animals that can see behind itself without turning its head are the rabbit and the parrot.
41. Intelligent people have more zinc and copper in their hair.
42. The average person laughs 13 times a day.
43. Do you know the names of the three wise monkeys? They are:Mizaru(See no evil), Mikazaru(Hear no evil), and Mazaru(Speak no evil)
44. Women blink nearly twice as much as men.
45. German Shepherds bite humans more than any other breed of dog.
46. Large kangaroos cover more than 30 feet with each jump.
47. Whip makes a cracking sound because its tip moves faster than the speed of sound.
48. Two animal rights protesters were protesting at the cruelty of sending pigs to a slaughterhouse in Bonn. Suddenly the pigs, all two thousand of them, escaped through a broken fence and stampeded, trampling the two hapless protesters to death.
49. If a statue in the park of a person on a horse has both front legs in the air, the person died in battle; if the horse has one front leg in the air, the person died as a result of wounds received in battle; if the horse has all four legs on the ground, the person died of natural cause.
50. The human heart creates enough pressure while pumping to squirt blood 30 feet!!
Monday, December 3, 2007
Skin Aging Reversed in Lab Test (Technique Works in Mice, but Is It Safe for People?)
Researchers say they've turned back the clock on aging skin -- in mice, at least -- and may be one step closer to unlocking the aging process.
"The implication is that the aging process is plastic and potentially amenable to intervention," Stanford University assistant professor of dermatology Howard Chang, MD, PhD, says in a news release.
But don't kiss your wrinkles good-bye just yet. The technique hasn't been tested in people and its long-term effects aren't known.
Here's how the experiment worked.
First, Chang's team did some genetic detective work. They analyzed human tissue samples, looking for signs of gene activity related to aging.
A protein called NF-kB was "strongly associated with aging," write the researchers. That protein appeared to control several age-related genes.
Then, Chang and colleagues turned their attention to elderly mice. For two weeks, the researchers slathered a chemical that blocks NF-kB activity in the mice's skin.
Those mice developed younger-looking skin that was about as thick as the skin of a newborn mouse.
"We found a pretty striking reversal to that of the young skin," says Chang.
He adds that "the findings suggest that aging is not just a result of wear and tear, but is also the consequence of a continually active genetic program that might be blocked for improving human health."
But the study was short, and it's not clear if blocking NF-kB is safe for mice, let alone people.
"The implication is that the aging process is plastic and potentially amenable to intervention," Stanford University assistant professor of dermatology Howard Chang, MD, PhD, says in a news release.
But don't kiss your wrinkles good-bye just yet. The technique hasn't been tested in people and its long-term effects aren't known.
Here's how the experiment worked.
First, Chang's team did some genetic detective work. They analyzed human tissue samples, looking for signs of gene activity related to aging.
A protein called NF-kB was "strongly associated with aging," write the researchers. That protein appeared to control several age-related genes.
Then, Chang and colleagues turned their attention to elderly mice. For two weeks, the researchers slathered a chemical that blocks NF-kB activity in the mice's skin.
Those mice developed younger-looking skin that was about as thick as the skin of a newborn mouse.
"We found a pretty striking reversal to that of the young skin," says Chang.
He adds that "the findings suggest that aging is not just a result of wear and tear, but is also the consequence of a continually active genetic program that might be blocked for improving human health."
But the study was short, and it's not clear if blocking NF-kB is safe for mice, let alone people.
Electronic Microbicide..!!
'Superbug' breakthrough claim
Clinical trials found that the device eradicated MRSA
A company which makes a device to treat conditions like foot ulcers says it has discovered by accident that the device can also kill the MRSA 'superbug'.
MRSA (Methecillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) causes an estimated 2,000 deaths in UK hospitals each year.
Dentron, based at Efailwen in Carmarthenshire, had received £45,000 in financial backing from the Welsh Development Agency, to try to develop a bigger version of its electronic antibiotic, called a biogun
"We actually failed in that," said managing director Jonathan Copus.
"But what we came up with is of far more importance - a way of conquering the MRSA superbug."
Laboratory trials at the Princess of Wales Hospital in Bridgend and then a clinical study at a foot clinic at Manchester Royal Infirmary found that the biogun eradicated the MRSA bug in some diabetic foot ulcers.
"It was very successful in getting rid of ulcers with an average diameter of 19mm, although it was less successful with larger ones," said Mr Copus.
"Now the challenge is to find a more efficient delivery system so that larger areas can be treated more effectively."
The biogun, which Mr Copus says is the world's first and only electronic antibiotic, has been available for professionals to buy since 1996. It works by destroying micro-organisms on surfaces such as skin, flesh and dentine with a concentrated stream of electrically-charged air particles.
The device has the approval of the government agency the Medicines and Health Care Products Agency. But further tests will now to be done to see how its uses in killing the MRSA bug can be extended, said Mr Copus.
*******
A MANCHESTER doctor is gunning for a super bug that has killed hundreds of hospital patients.
For years the bug, known as the 'staph' bacteria or MRSA, has been the scourge of hospital wards often attacking the young, the old and weak.
It is often resistant to anti-biotics. It can cause serious skin diseases especially around surgical wounds and pneumonia. Often it gets such a grip on its victim that they die.
But Manchester Royal Infirmary consultant physician Dr Rayaz Malik believes he has discovered a simple and cheap weapon to zap the 'staph' bacteria.
Weapon is the appropriate word because Dr Malik (pictured right treating a patient) has adapted a medical gun invented by ex-priest Jonathan Copus who used it to treat fungal infections.
Dr Malik found that the pen shaped device wiped out all traces of the lethal bug in nearly two-third of his patients. He and other medics now plan to make a full-scale study to make sure the £1000 biogun really works. The gun eradicated MRSA symptoms with just two hits in a test on 15 patients.
It works by shooting a stream of electrons to the infected areas. The electrons mimic the body's natural defences and creates oxygen oxide, the molecule that kills the bacteria.
Dr Malik said: "With patients with larger infections, the treatment can take longer but with smaller areas of infections, patients just need two treatments and they are cured.
Clinical trials found that the device eradicated MRSA
A company which makes a device to treat conditions like foot ulcers says it has discovered by accident that the device can also kill the MRSA 'superbug'.
MRSA (Methecillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus) causes an estimated 2,000 deaths in UK hospitals each year.
Dentron, based at Efailwen in Carmarthenshire, had received £45,000 in financial backing from the Welsh Development Agency, to try to develop a bigger version of its electronic antibiotic, called a biogun
"We actually failed in that," said managing director Jonathan Copus.
"But what we came up with is of far more importance - a way of conquering the MRSA superbug."
Laboratory trials at the Princess of Wales Hospital in Bridgend and then a clinical study at a foot clinic at Manchester Royal Infirmary found that the biogun eradicated the MRSA bug in some diabetic foot ulcers.
"It was very successful in getting rid of ulcers with an average diameter of 19mm, although it was less successful with larger ones," said Mr Copus.
"Now the challenge is to find a more efficient delivery system so that larger areas can be treated more effectively."
The biogun, which Mr Copus says is the world's first and only electronic antibiotic, has been available for professionals to buy since 1996. It works by destroying micro-organisms on surfaces such as skin, flesh and dentine with a concentrated stream of electrically-charged air particles.
The device has the approval of the government agency the Medicines and Health Care Products Agency. But further tests will now to be done to see how its uses in killing the MRSA bug can be extended, said Mr Copus.
*******
A MANCHESTER doctor is gunning for a super bug that has killed hundreds of hospital patients.
For years the bug, known as the 'staph' bacteria or MRSA, has been the scourge of hospital wards often attacking the young, the old and weak.
It is often resistant to anti-biotics. It can cause serious skin diseases especially around surgical wounds and pneumonia. Often it gets such a grip on its victim that they die.
But Manchester Royal Infirmary consultant physician Dr Rayaz Malik believes he has discovered a simple and cheap weapon to zap the 'staph' bacteria.
Weapon is the appropriate word because Dr Malik (pictured right treating a patient) has adapted a medical gun invented by ex-priest Jonathan Copus who used it to treat fungal infections.
Dr Malik found that the pen shaped device wiped out all traces of the lethal bug in nearly two-third of his patients. He and other medics now plan to make a full-scale study to make sure the £1000 biogun really works. The gun eradicated MRSA symptoms with just two hits in a test on 15 patients.
It works by shooting a stream of electrons to the infected areas. The electrons mimic the body's natural defences and creates oxygen oxide, the molecule that kills the bacteria.
Dr Malik said: "With patients with larger infections, the treatment can take longer but with smaller areas of infections, patients just need two treatments and they are cured.
Five years later, stem cells still tantalize
In early November of 1998, when human embryonic stem cells were introduced to the world, the possibilities seemed astonishing.
"It is not too unrealistic to say that this research has the potential to revolutionize the practice of medicine and improve the quality and length of life," then-National Institutes of Health Director Harold Varmus told a Senate hearing less than a month after Wisconsin biologist James Thomson reported his stem cell feat in the journal Science.
Varmus went on: "There is almost no realm of medicine that might not be touched by this innovation."
Today, five years after the shy University of Wisconsin-Madison scientist published his succinct but earthshaking paper showing that stem cells—ephemeral, blank slate cells that occur at the earliest stages of human development—could be isolated, cultured and grown in apparently limitless quantities, enthusiasm is tempered.
The public cheerleading of Varmus and others, without a doubt, helped make stem cells a household word and set a high (and unrealistic) expectation that therapies for a host of debilitating cell-based diseases were just around the corner.
There is no doubt among biologists that embryonic stem cells have vast potential. There are no other cells that can perform the same biological feats as embryonic stem cells. They can morph into any one of the 220 types of cells and tissues in the human body. Nurtured in their undifferentiated state, they can proliferate endlessly in culture, and provide a vast supply of cells for research and, someday, therapy. And perhaps most importantly of all, they provide our only window to the earliest stages of human development and, after differentiation, access to more specialized cells that could vastly improve our understanding of the onset of cell-based diseases, and perhaps ways to prevent them.
But as Thomson himself emphasized in 1998, their glitziest application in the clinic—the tantalizing potential of transforming transplant medicine by creating large quantities of cells to treat debilitating diseases such as Parkinson's, diabetes and ALS—would be a decade in the future under the best of circumstances.
"We went through this period of extreme hype and high expectations," recalls Carl Gulbrandsen, managing director of the Wisconsin Alumni Research Foundation (WARF), the private, not-for-profit foundation that holds Wisconsin's patents to stem cell technology. "Things seem to have settled down, but people still expect a lot, and we're still in a tight political environment."
Indeed, the politics of stem cells from the outset have been as far reaching as the technology itself promises to be. Extending from the Oval Office, where stem cells became the dominant domestic issue of the first eight months of the Bush Administration, to the other end of State Street, where a few state legislators remain determined to criminalize the research, the political dimensions of stem cell science have framed a national debate and influenced many aspects of how the research is done and funded.
According to Gulbrandsen, the administration's decision to permit federal funds to be used for research on at least some stem cells lines—a decision heavily influenced by former Wisconsin governor and current Health and Human Services Secretary Tommy Thompson—was a turning point in the debate.
"Bush's decision was a landmark decision," Gulbrandsen says. "A lot of people don't like it, but it was an ingenious political solution. That decision wouldn't have occurred without Tommy Thompson there."
Although wading through a political quagmire was difficult and sometimes painful for the retiring biologist Thomson, it was a necessary exercise.
"The first year or two (after first isolating the cells) were pretty much wasted due to politics," says Thomson. "But since then we've done pretty well" in the lab.
The early flood of publicity, breathless in its descriptions of the medical and research potential of stem cells, Thomson feared, would set unrealistic expectations in the public mind. Lost in the glowing words, he says, are the hard and painstaking realities of basic science.
"It's a new field. It takes time to grow," notes Thomson. "Look at the first five years of mouse embryonic stem cells. It took a while to get going. It is natural that these things take time."
The field would grow much faster, Gulbrandsen argues, if politics did not remain a prevailing force on stem cell science: "Bush's decision was pivotal, but the field is still stuck in the quagmire, and that is evident in the level of research funding by NIH for human embryonic stem cells. Since Bush's decision, NIH has funded approximately $170 million of adult stem cell research, but only $10 million on human embryonic stem cell research."
Despite such imbalance, there has been significant progress on the stem cell research front over the past five years. Many of the most important developments were not the headline-generating feats that would fulfill the promise touted in the early days of stem cells, but they were the steps necessary to bring the field to fruition.
"All of the little technical things have been worked out," says Thomson, noting such achievements in his lab as learning how to manipulate the genes within stem cells, a technique known as homologous recombination and that makes it possible to use the cells to mimic human disease in the laboratory dish. "We've done very well at Wisconsin."
And what started out as a lonely effort in a single lab has mushroomed into a significant industry on the UW-Madison campus. There are now almost 30 UW-Madison faculty engaged in different aspects of embryonic stem cell research.
Timothy Kamp, for example, a UW Medical School professor of medicine and physiology, has used human embryonic stem cells to derive cardiomyocytes, heart muscle cells that can substitute for the animal cells routinely used to study issues of the heart. "It is obviously very difficult to get living human heart cells for study," Kamp says. "We hope that having (these cells) will provide a routine source of cells amendable for detailed investigations."
It may be possible, Kamp adds, to genetically manipulate the embryonic stem cell-derived heart cells to mimic heart disease in the lab dish. "These cells will help us not only understand basic human cardiac cell physiology and biology, but also will likely play an important role in unraveling the basic mechanisms of disease."
In addition to the growing cadre of Wisconsin faculty lining up to explore issues of basic and applied biology with the help of stem cells, there is a growing physical infrastructure on campus as well. There are gleaming and unique facilities at the Wisconsin National Primate Research Center, and the Wasiman Center, for example, where neural stem cells are a research emphasis. Included there is a clinical biomanufacturing facility that could well process the first stem cells that will ever be used in a clinical setting.
In October of 1999, WARF created the WiCell Research Institute, a UW Research Park-based subsidiary devoted to distributing stem cells to qualified academic and industrial researchers, and to conducting basic stem cell science. To date, WiCell has shipped cells from three of the five original stem cell lines identified in the November, 1998 Science paper to as many as 140 labs worldwide. By early next year, Gulbrandsen says, WiCell will be shipping cells from all five lines.
According to Gulbrandsen, there are now other sources of stem cells in the United States that, along with WiCell, ship to as many as 200 labs engaged in embryonic stem cell research. "In five years, that is pretty remarkable and would not happen unless the research were critically important."
But Wisconsin remains the leading supplier of cells for research, notes Thomson.
"We've shipped more cells to more labs than anybody else—by a wide margin," says Thomson, who also serves as WiCell's scientific director.
What's more, WiCell has become a training ground for scientists who travel to Madison from around the world to learn how to grow and maintain the finicky cells. And in late September of this year, NIH named WiCell as one of three Exploratory Centers for Human Embryonic Stem Cell Research in the country, a designation that included $1.7 million in research funding.
"I hope WiCell evolves into an institute that broadly supports research on campus," Thomson says. "WiCell as a research institute is an evolving concept."
On campus, a new infrastructure is taking shape in the form of the Wisconsin Stem Cell Research Program. The mission of the new program, according to its manager, Barbara Lewis, is to provide a framework for UW-Madison stem cell research and training. It will organize seminar series, journal clubs, and an annual retreat for researchers from across the campus to discuss their work and funding opportunities. The program, she adds, will be active in private fund raising for a stem cell training program and basic and applied stem cell research initiatives. In addition to the new Wisconsin Stem Cell Research Program, future initiatives, campus leaders suggest, could bring facilities for both regenerative medicine and a Medical School 'translational facility' where stem cells would gain a more solid clinical footing.
"The university has invested heavily in nurturing the burgeoning area of stem cell biology," says R. Timothy Mulcahy, Graduate School associate dean for the biological sciences and associate vice chancellor for research policy. "We have supported cluster hires in the area of regenerative medicine and stem cell biology and established the Wisconsin Stem Cell Research Program to coordinate and facilitate stem cell research across campus."
Wisconsin, Mulcahy asserts, is well positioned to continue to lead the world in human embryonic stem cell research.
"Thomson's discovery elevated the field to heights previously thought impossible, and has brought within reach all the promise others in the field have long dreamed of," Mulcahy says. "In 20 years we'll be surprised by what stem cell research has delivered. I'd hazard a guess that the biggest pay off will be in areas we haven't even considered."
Saturday, December 1, 2007
Artificial pancreas for diabetics
Scientists in Cambridge say they are moving a step closer to developing an artificial pancreas for people with diabetes.
They are conducting trials in Cambridge with 12 youngsters aged five to 18.
All have type-one diabetes which means their pancreas does not produce insulin - the hormone that regulates blood sugar levels.
Jeremy Smith, who is studying for his A Levels, is one of the volunteers.
The 17-year-old has had several overnight stays at the city's Addenbrookes hospital.
Computerised dose
Each time the diabetes care team fit him with a continuous glucose sensor which sits just under the skin.
Quote:
The artificial pancreas could dramatically improve quality of life, and life expectancy
Karen Addington
Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation
This beams his blood sugar readings to a monitor.
The idea then is for a computer program to work out the right dose of insulin, which is delivered via an insulin pump.
The artificial pancreas would automate diabetes care and free people from the repeated need for finger prick blood tests and insulin injections.
But the system has not gone live yet. Instead, Jeremy's glucose levels are checked every 15 minutes throughout the night and his insulin dose is altered manually.
It will be another six months before the first automated, hands-free trial is conducted.
Mathematical problem
The main stumbling block in the development of an artificial pancreas has been mathematical: no-one has perfected a computer program sophisticated enough to work out the right dose of insulin at any moment of the day.
Quote:
The human body has a very clever way of working out exactly how much insulin the body needs, and we are only just beginning to understand that
Dr Roman Hovorka
University of Cambridge
That is why the scientist leading the trial is not a medical doctor, but a mathematician.
Dr Roman Hovorka, from the University of Cambridge, said: "For an artificial pancreas, you need a brain.
"The human body has a very clever way of working out exactly how much insulin the body needs, and we are only just beginning to understand that."
That's why the overnight trials at Addenbrookes are important.
If the team can stabilise Jeremy's glucose levels then it will help devise the algorithm needed to automate his diabetes care.
Good progress
The trial went well - for the first few hours the glucose levels were flat and stable, although at one point the insulin pump became disconnected.
Quote:
It would be life-changing
Jeremy Smith
Jeremy has been wearing the pump for nearly three years and says this has happened only a couple of times.
The experiment will be repeated in a few days.
But the team already has enough data to show it is on track, and believes home testing of the device will happen within a year.
Nonetheless, it is likely to be several more years before a robust, workable device is widely available.
Jeremy Smith is enthusiastic about the trials and convinced an artificial pancreas is the way forward: "It would be life-changing.
"It would give far better glucose control and freedom from the side-effects of diabetes."
Karen Addington, chief executive of Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, has type-one diabetes.
Her charity is funding the trials in Cambridge and she is optimistic about the long-term potential of an artificial pancreas.
"Life expectancy with type-one diabetes is reduced by on average 15 years," she said.
"The artificial pancreas would remove the complications associated with the condition, such as heart and kidney disease, blindness, and stroke; it could dramatically improve quality of life, and life expectancy."
They are conducting trials in Cambridge with 12 youngsters aged five to 18.
All have type-one diabetes which means their pancreas does not produce insulin - the hormone that regulates blood sugar levels.
Jeremy Smith, who is studying for his A Levels, is one of the volunteers.
The 17-year-old has had several overnight stays at the city's Addenbrookes hospital.
Computerised dose
Each time the diabetes care team fit him with a continuous glucose sensor which sits just under the skin.
Quote:
The artificial pancreas could dramatically improve quality of life, and life expectancy
Karen Addington
Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation
This beams his blood sugar readings to a monitor.
The idea then is for a computer program to work out the right dose of insulin, which is delivered via an insulin pump.
The artificial pancreas would automate diabetes care and free people from the repeated need for finger prick blood tests and insulin injections.
But the system has not gone live yet. Instead, Jeremy's glucose levels are checked every 15 minutes throughout the night and his insulin dose is altered manually.
It will be another six months before the first automated, hands-free trial is conducted.
Mathematical problem
The main stumbling block in the development of an artificial pancreas has been mathematical: no-one has perfected a computer program sophisticated enough to work out the right dose of insulin at any moment of the day.
Quote:
The human body has a very clever way of working out exactly how much insulin the body needs, and we are only just beginning to understand that
Dr Roman Hovorka
University of Cambridge
That is why the scientist leading the trial is not a medical doctor, but a mathematician.
Dr Roman Hovorka, from the University of Cambridge, said: "For an artificial pancreas, you need a brain.
"The human body has a very clever way of working out exactly how much insulin the body needs, and we are only just beginning to understand that."
That's why the overnight trials at Addenbrookes are important.
If the team can stabilise Jeremy's glucose levels then it will help devise the algorithm needed to automate his diabetes care.
Good progress
The trial went well - for the first few hours the glucose levels were flat and stable, although at one point the insulin pump became disconnected.
Quote:
It would be life-changing
Jeremy Smith
Jeremy has been wearing the pump for nearly three years and says this has happened only a couple of times.
The experiment will be repeated in a few days.
But the team already has enough data to show it is on track, and believes home testing of the device will happen within a year.
Nonetheless, it is likely to be several more years before a robust, workable device is widely available.
Jeremy Smith is enthusiastic about the trials and convinced an artificial pancreas is the way forward: "It would be life-changing.
"It would give far better glucose control and freedom from the side-effects of diabetes."
Karen Addington, chief executive of Juvenile Diabetes Research Foundation, has type-one diabetes.
Her charity is funding the trials in Cambridge and she is optimistic about the long-term potential of an artificial pancreas.
"Life expectancy with type-one diabetes is reduced by on average 15 years," she said.
"The artificial pancreas would remove the complications associated with the condition, such as heart and kidney disease, blindness, and stroke; it could dramatically improve quality of life, and life expectancy."
Is British man the first to "recover" from HIV?
A British man has confounded doctors by testing negative for HIV antibodies several months after two positive results. This follows a report last February of a man whose test results changed following treatment, and who remained antibody negative four years later.
Feeling tired and feverish, Andrew Stimpson visited the Victoria Sexual Health Clinic for an HIV antibody test in May 2002. The initial result was negative, but he was encouraged to return for more tests because antibodies are often undetectable during the first few weeks after infection.
Mr Stimpson tested HIV antibody positive in August 2002. But he remained healthy and was not prescribed antiretroviral drugs. Tests designed to measure the amount of HIV in his blood - known as the "viral load" - found it to be "exceptionally low".
More than a year later, in October 2003, he was offered another HIV antibody test, which came back negative. Subsequent tests in December 2003 and March 2004 produced the same result.
Mr Stimpson suspected he had been misdiagnosed, and considered legal action. However an investigation by Chelsea and Westminster Healthcare NHS Trust found the clinic had not made any mistakes. The samples taken in August 2002 were retested and again found to be antibody positive. Samples from March 2004 onwards were also retested and found to be antibody negative. DNA testing confirmed that all samples belonged to Mr Stimpson.
Based on the information currently available, it is not possible to say for sure whether Mr Stimpson is currently infected with HIV or whether he has ever been infected.
A spokeswoman for the Chelsea and Westminster Healthcare NHS Trust said: "I can confirm that he has a positive and a negative test. I can't confirm that he's shaken it off, that he's been cured. We urge him, for the sake of himself and the HIV community, to come in and get tested."
This is not the first documented case of an adult reverting from HIV antibody positive to negative. In February 2005, scientists at the 12th Conference on Retroviruses & Opportunistic Infections in Boston presented the case of a man who was diagnosed HIV positive in 1995 by two separate sets of antibody tests, and who had a detectable viral load.*
Two years after diagnosis the man had a very high viral load, and he began taking antiretroviral therapy. Following three years of treatment he was again tested for HIV antibodies and the result was negative. Over the next four years, during which he took no antiretroviral drugs, the man remained antibody negative. Scientists were also unable to detect any viral load or to culture the virus from his blood or semen.
The explanation for this man's reversion is still unclear, but some experts say it may have been an effect of the therapy. Undetectable viral load is not uncommon during treatment, and the absence of antibodies is not conclusive proof that the virus has been completely eliminated.
Mr Stimpson may not be the first to revert to being HIV negative, but unlike the other man he never underwent treatment. Both cases are certainly unusual and intriguing. However it is too early to say whether they will have any implications for HIV medicine. Hopefully matters will become clearer after more tests are carried out.
Feeling tired and feverish, Andrew Stimpson visited the Victoria Sexual Health Clinic for an HIV antibody test in May 2002. The initial result was negative, but he was encouraged to return for more tests because antibodies are often undetectable during the first few weeks after infection.
Mr Stimpson tested HIV antibody positive in August 2002. But he remained healthy and was not prescribed antiretroviral drugs. Tests designed to measure the amount of HIV in his blood - known as the "viral load" - found it to be "exceptionally low".
More than a year later, in October 2003, he was offered another HIV antibody test, which came back negative. Subsequent tests in December 2003 and March 2004 produced the same result.
Mr Stimpson suspected he had been misdiagnosed, and considered legal action. However an investigation by Chelsea and Westminster Healthcare NHS Trust found the clinic had not made any mistakes. The samples taken in August 2002 were retested and again found to be antibody positive. Samples from March 2004 onwards were also retested and found to be antibody negative. DNA testing confirmed that all samples belonged to Mr Stimpson.
Based on the information currently available, it is not possible to say for sure whether Mr Stimpson is currently infected with HIV or whether he has ever been infected.
A spokeswoman for the Chelsea and Westminster Healthcare NHS Trust said: "I can confirm that he has a positive and a negative test. I can't confirm that he's shaken it off, that he's been cured. We urge him, for the sake of himself and the HIV community, to come in and get tested."
This is not the first documented case of an adult reverting from HIV antibody positive to negative. In February 2005, scientists at the 12th Conference on Retroviruses & Opportunistic Infections in Boston presented the case of a man who was diagnosed HIV positive in 1995 by two separate sets of antibody tests, and who had a detectable viral load.*
Two years after diagnosis the man had a very high viral load, and he began taking antiretroviral therapy. Following three years of treatment he was again tested for HIV antibodies and the result was negative. Over the next four years, during which he took no antiretroviral drugs, the man remained antibody negative. Scientists were also unable to detect any viral load or to culture the virus from his blood or semen.
The explanation for this man's reversion is still unclear, but some experts say it may have been an effect of the therapy. Undetectable viral load is not uncommon during treatment, and the absence of antibodies is not conclusive proof that the virus has been completely eliminated.
Mr Stimpson may not be the first to revert to being HIV negative, but unlike the other man he never underwent treatment. Both cases are certainly unusual and intriguing. However it is too early to say whether they will have any implications for HIV medicine. Hopefully matters will become clearer after more tests are carried out.
Virtual surgery may soon be a reality
A surgeon accidently kills a patient, undoes the error and starts over again. Can mathematics make such science fiction a reality?
The day is rapidly approaching when your surgeon can practice on your "digital double" — a virtual you — before performing an actual surgery, according to UCLA mathematician Joseph Teran, who is helping to make virtual surgery a viable technology. The advantages will save lives, he believes.
"You can fail spectacularly with no consequences when you use a simulator and then learn from your mistakes," said Teran, 30, who joined UCLA's mathematics department in July. "If you make errors, you can undo them — just as if you're typing in a Word document and you make a mistake, you undo it. Starting over is a big benefit of the simulation.
"Surgical simulation is coming, there is no question about it," he said. It's a cheaper alternative to cadavers and a safer alternative to patients."
How would virtual surgery work?
"The ideal situation would be when patients come in for a procedure, they get scanned and a three-dimensional digital double is generated; I mean a digital double — you on the computer, including your internal organs," Teran said. "The surgeon first does surgery on the virtual you. With a simulator, a surgeon can practice a procedure tens or hundreds of times. You could have a patient in a small town scanned while a surgeon hundreds or thousands of miles away practices the surgery. The patient then flies out for the surgery. We have to solve mathematical algorithms so what the surgeon does on the computer mimics real life."
How far off is this virtual surgery?
"A three-dimensional double of you can be made, but it would now take 20 people six to nine months," Teran said. "In the future, one person will be able to do it in minutes. It's going to happen, and it will allow surgeons to make fewer mistakes on actual patients. The only limiting factor is the complexity of the geometry involved. We're working on that. Our job as applied mathematicians is to make these technologies increasingly viable."
The technology will be especially helpful with new kinds of surgeries, he said.
"A virtual surgery cannot be a cartoon," said Teran, who works with a surgeon. "It has to be biologically accurate. A virtual double needs to be really you."
Teran is organizing a virtual surgery workshop that will take place at UCLA from Jan. 7 to 11 as part of UCLA's Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics. For information,
Making virtual surgery a reality will require solving mathematical equations, as well as making progress in computational geometry and computer science. An applied mathematician, Teran works in these fields; he develops algorithms to solve equations. Advances by Teran and other scientists in computational geometry, partial differential equations and large-scale computing are accelerating virtual surgery.
How human tissue responds to a surgeon, Teran said, is based on partial differential equations. Teran solves on a computer the mathematical equations that govern physical phenomena relevant to everyday life. He has studied the biomechanical simulation of soft tissues.
"Most of the behavior of everyday life can be described with mathematical equations," he said. "It's very difficult to reproduce natural phenomena without math."
Tissue, muscle and skin are elastic and behave like a spring, Teran said. Their behavior can be accounted for by a classical mathematical theory.
Progress in his field is already rapid, Teran said, noting that "things in geometry that used to take days and days start to take hours and minutes."
Teran believes medical schools will increasingly train physicians using computer surgical simulation.
Teran's applied mathematics can also be used to design more durable bridges, freeways, cars and aircraft.
"I would like people who design bridges to be able to use a virtual model — I'm interested in making that a reality and in creating numerical algorithmic tools that let people who design bridges have more computational machinery at their fingertips," he said.
As an undergraduate, Teran realized "you can use math problems to solve real problems and can help people in ways that seem totally unrelated to math." He earned his doctorate at Stanford University, where he took graduate classes in partial differential equations and worked on new ways of solving the governing equations of elastic biological tissues. He was a postdoctoral scholar at New York University before joining UCLA's faculty.
"I started with math because I like problem-solving, and I like how elegant math is," Teran said. "I like how much careful analysis is required, and that there's a right answer. Now I'm completely fascinated by what you get from a simulation, the kinds of complex behavior you can reproduce on a computer and the kinds of questions you can answer. Math will tell you how the world is. It will give you an answer, and it's intellectually stimulating and fun. It really pays off."
Teran, who is teaching a course on scientific computing for the visual effects industry, said he came to UCLA because it is one of the country's best universities for applied mathematics, because its medical school is among the country's best and because it is near Hollywood, where he helps to make movie special effects.
Teran, who works with UCLA's Center for Advanced Surgical and Interventional Technology, spoke this fall as part of Intel Chief Technology Officer Justin Rattner's keynote address at the Intel Developer Forum on the rise of the "3-D Internet." Teran demonstrated virtual surgery applications.
The future 3-D Internet will include an "avatar" — a virtual representation of you — that could look "just like you, or better than you," Teran said.
The graphics will be astonishingly realistic and three-dimensional, he said, but the simulation needs to be much more accurate, a goal Teran is working to achieve.
"As virtual words get more realistic, modern applied mathematics and scientific computing are required," he said.
The day is rapidly approaching when your surgeon can practice on your "digital double" — a virtual you — before performing an actual surgery, according to UCLA mathematician Joseph Teran, who is helping to make virtual surgery a viable technology. The advantages will save lives, he believes.
"You can fail spectacularly with no consequences when you use a simulator and then learn from your mistakes," said Teran, 30, who joined UCLA's mathematics department in July. "If you make errors, you can undo them — just as if you're typing in a Word document and you make a mistake, you undo it. Starting over is a big benefit of the simulation.
"Surgical simulation is coming, there is no question about it," he said. It's a cheaper alternative to cadavers and a safer alternative to patients."
How would virtual surgery work?
"The ideal situation would be when patients come in for a procedure, they get scanned and a three-dimensional digital double is generated; I mean a digital double — you on the computer, including your internal organs," Teran said. "The surgeon first does surgery on the virtual you. With a simulator, a surgeon can practice a procedure tens or hundreds of times. You could have a patient in a small town scanned while a surgeon hundreds or thousands of miles away practices the surgery. The patient then flies out for the surgery. We have to solve mathematical algorithms so what the surgeon does on the computer mimics real life."
How far off is this virtual surgery?
"A three-dimensional double of you can be made, but it would now take 20 people six to nine months," Teran said. "In the future, one person will be able to do it in minutes. It's going to happen, and it will allow surgeons to make fewer mistakes on actual patients. The only limiting factor is the complexity of the geometry involved. We're working on that. Our job as applied mathematicians is to make these technologies increasingly viable."
The technology will be especially helpful with new kinds of surgeries, he said.
"A virtual surgery cannot be a cartoon," said Teran, who works with a surgeon. "It has to be biologically accurate. A virtual double needs to be really you."
Teran is organizing a virtual surgery workshop that will take place at UCLA from Jan. 7 to 11 as part of UCLA's Institute for Pure and Applied Mathematics. For information,
Making virtual surgery a reality will require solving mathematical equations, as well as making progress in computational geometry and computer science. An applied mathematician, Teran works in these fields; he develops algorithms to solve equations. Advances by Teran and other scientists in computational geometry, partial differential equations and large-scale computing are accelerating virtual surgery.
How human tissue responds to a surgeon, Teran said, is based on partial differential equations. Teran solves on a computer the mathematical equations that govern physical phenomena relevant to everyday life. He has studied the biomechanical simulation of soft tissues.
"Most of the behavior of everyday life can be described with mathematical equations," he said. "It's very difficult to reproduce natural phenomena without math."
Tissue, muscle and skin are elastic and behave like a spring, Teran said. Their behavior can be accounted for by a classical mathematical theory.
Progress in his field is already rapid, Teran said, noting that "things in geometry that used to take days and days start to take hours and minutes."
Teran believes medical schools will increasingly train physicians using computer surgical simulation.
Teran's applied mathematics can also be used to design more durable bridges, freeways, cars and aircraft.
"I would like people who design bridges to be able to use a virtual model — I'm interested in making that a reality and in creating numerical algorithmic tools that let people who design bridges have more computational machinery at their fingertips," he said.
As an undergraduate, Teran realized "you can use math problems to solve real problems and can help people in ways that seem totally unrelated to math." He earned his doctorate at Stanford University, where he took graduate classes in partial differential equations and worked on new ways of solving the governing equations of elastic biological tissues. He was a postdoctoral scholar at New York University before joining UCLA's faculty.
"I started with math because I like problem-solving, and I like how elegant math is," Teran said. "I like how much careful analysis is required, and that there's a right answer. Now I'm completely fascinated by what you get from a simulation, the kinds of complex behavior you can reproduce on a computer and the kinds of questions you can answer. Math will tell you how the world is. It will give you an answer, and it's intellectually stimulating and fun. It really pays off."
Teran, who is teaching a course on scientific computing for the visual effects industry, said he came to UCLA because it is one of the country's best universities for applied mathematics, because its medical school is among the country's best and because it is near Hollywood, where he helps to make movie special effects.
Teran, who works with UCLA's Center for Advanced Surgical and Interventional Technology, spoke this fall as part of Intel Chief Technology Officer Justin Rattner's keynote address at the Intel Developer Forum on the rise of the "3-D Internet." Teran demonstrated virtual surgery applications.
The future 3-D Internet will include an "avatar" — a virtual representation of you — that could look "just like you, or better than you," Teran said.
The graphics will be astonishingly realistic and three-dimensional, he said, but the simulation needs to be much more accurate, a goal Teran is working to achieve.
"As virtual words get more realistic, modern applied mathematics and scientific computing are required," he said.
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