Drug restores cells that are missing in MS patients

Credit: UC Denver/Ars Technica

http://arstechnica.com/science/2013/10/drug-restores-cells-that-are-missing-in-ms-patients/ / Multiple sclerosis MS autoimmune disease immune system destroys myelin sheaths surround surrounding neurons nerve cell cells myelin sheaths sheath insulator insulation surrounding electrical electric wires wire enable neuron transmit electrical impulses specifically specific efficiently efficient cells oligodendrocytes make myelin adult adulthood people MS oligodendrocyte precursor cells OPCs OPC migrate site sites myelination problem precursor cells fail mature properly myelin producing cells failure promotes disease progression progress current approved therapies therapy immunosuppressants research scientist scientists researchers The Scripps Research Institute screen screened 100,000 structurally diverse molecules find induce OPCs maturing maturation mature researchers researcher identified compounds rodent OPCs mature oligodendrocytes Petri dish thyroid hormone several physiological effects unattractive therapeutic agent for MS compounds work have limited therapeutic potential off target off-target activities toxicity, poor brain exposure demonstrated lack in vivo efficacy compounds provided valuable positive controls experiment useful compounds compound most effective inducers OPC maturation drug called benztropine already available oral form approved treatment Parkinson’s disease researchers benztropine, confirmed oligodendrocytes mature maturity myelin dish neuron neurons analyse analyzed benztropine’s activity mouse model MS diminished diminish clinical severity acute remission phases disease eliminate elimination eliminating relapse phase model system, benztropine immunosuppressive drugs treat use associated with dose depend dose-dependent adverse neurological side effects cognitive changes blurred vision anorexia psychosis authorb lower dose when combined with other therapies Fingolimod immunosuppressant reduced relapse rate relapsing-remitting reminder relapse remitting multiple sclerosis by over half. But its use can lead to a dose-dependent bradycardia it slows slow heart rate researchers' mouse model combination suboptimal doses of this with benztropine yielded decrease in clinical severity combination drugs results standard therapeutic dose of Fingolimod side effects dose dependent dependency /

How smart should your watch be? (update)

Updated Wednesday 16 November, 2013.


Do you have the time?
Left to right: Fitbit Force, Pebble, Galaxy Gear
Credit: CNet

New technologies require a new way of thinking. Human beings have to feel their way towards that new way of thinking.

Some examples:

• Edison, when attempting to sell the newly developed telephone, was told by one businessman, that if he wanted to communicate with someone, he would either visit in person, or send a boy with a note.

• An equally far sighted mayor of a small town which had just acquired a telephone, amidst the fanfare which accompanied this great step forward, made a speech in which he noted that he could foresee a day when every town would have a telephone!

Something similar happened with the automobile. Early designs look quaint today. To the engineers who conceived them, they were good design. What should a vehicle for people to drive on public roads look like? Like every other vehicle people drove. That is, a carriage which a horse might pull. So a very early automobile was, literally, a horseless carriage. And it was steered, not with the steering wheel that seems obvious to us, but with a tiller, or handle bars which might have come from a bicycle, which was obvious to the engineers of 1900.

We've recently worked through some of this with mobile (cell) phones. Much of what a mobile should look like, be & do is settled, but some of the details are still being worked out. Some of this is driven by the tension between competing aims, e.g., the desire for a larger screen, battery life & the ability to fit the phone into a pocket.

Something similar appears to be happening with the "smartwatch" at the moment. Mechanical watches occasionally included "smart features", such as alarms or phases of the Moon. Freed from the limitations of mechanical technology, miniaturized computer technology makes a plethora of options available.

Existing smartwatches include a range of different options from the many available. Do you want SMS on you watch? Email? Hands free telephone? Colour? Backlight? How big is too big? How long must the battery last?

If one day battery life is too short, scratch the Samsung Gear & Apple Watch.

Just want fitness tracking? Try Fitbit. Want the time too? Have a look at Fitbit Force (smallest device at the top of this item).

If colour isn't important & battery life of a week or more is a must, try Pebble.

Or, if 6 months of battery life is a must & SMS notifications (rather than the text itself) is OK, maybe Cuckoo will suit – see below.

Perhaps the very concept of a smartwatch will one day seem to be as short sighted as a tiller for steering an automobile. Maybe the place for such a display/interface is somewhere/something else. Google Glass, or something which is now only a gleam in some engineer's eye, may yet be the answer.

http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-34900_7-57607111/pebble-gear-..-fitbit-force-making-the-case-for-semi-smart-watch-over-smartwatch/

... Or maybe the Sony SmartWatch 2


Credit: Sony/cloudfront.net

http://www.gizmag.com/sony-smartwatch-2-review/29367/

Pebble

E-paper display, 1 week or more battery life.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/597507018/pebble-e-paper-watch-for-iphone-and-android?ref=live

Cuckoo

Limited display, 6 months battery.

http://www.kickstarter.com/projects/cuckoo/cookootm-the-watch-for-the-connected-generation / Fitbit Force Flex Pebble Samsung Galaxy Gear Sony smart watch Kickstarter crowd funding source sourced sourcing wrist firmware update SMS text email color TXT /

Intel shows PAX attendees SSD overclocking

Credit: Legit Reviews

Soon, you'll be able to overclock your solid state drive too!

http://www.legitreviews.com/intel-shows-pax-attendees-ssd-overclocking_122557 / Intel Developer Forum agenda workshop work shop SSD Overclocking new prototype Intel SSD next month community feedback IDF howing SSD Overclocking PAX Prime From what we gather Intel is thinking about about creating a ‘K’ series SKU for Intel Solid-State Drive Intel K series processors mainstream processors unlocked multipliers over clock clocked overclock overclocked K-series SKU SSD line up unlock dials SSD users user ability adjust clock speeds controller frequency NAND Flash memory bus frequency company companies overclocked drive drives clock speeds end users adjust the clock speeds picture pictures photo photos photograph photographs overclocking ability popular Intel Extreme Tuning Utility XTU Intel XTU popular enthusiast crowd overall system overclocking added ability overclock certain Intel SSDs popularity power more powerful speed SSD Intel overclocking part number SSDSC2BB480G4 : BTWL3070050Z480QGN first portion part number brings up a high end enterprise drive SSD DC S3500 Series 480GB w/ 20nm MLC NAND Flash overall drive custom prototype SSD overclocking drive demonstrated 480GB drive variety SSD sizes size prototype very early beta firmware two different settings setting controller clock speed default Intel Prototype SSD controller 400MHz Intel XTU software adjusted 625MHz 56.25% increase controller speed second setting speed NAND chips chips running 83MH boost 100MHz settings defined range /

Future of flexible displays

Credit: Centives

http://www.centives.net/S/2013/the-future-of-flexible-displays/ / Flexible displaysf. Jason Inofuentes wrote expect flexible displays made of plastics bend smartphone smart phone martphone-like device electronics within a phone food our phones tight squares bend at right angles displays won’t able bend about 18 degrees made plastic shouldn’t shatter when dropped lighter thinner more space battery longer standby times used cars wearable computers helmets history /

Voice of SIRI

http://www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/showtracker/la-et-st-live-chat-susan-bennett-the-voice-of-apples-siri-today-20131010,0,2326019.story

And in Australia

http://youtu.be/VMbtOo02ALI / Apple iOS iPhone 5s mobile cell phone smart smartphone personal assistant /

Next generation antibiotics could be turned on & off using light

Credit: ShutterStock/solarseven/Gizmodo

In 1st world countries, the revolution in medicine wrought by antibiotics has been largely forgotten. Before antibiotics, pneumonia had a frightening mortality rate. Syphilis killed more people than AIDS has done.

In 1988, a man in Wollongong, NSW, Australia died of a carpet burn! Why the exclamation mark at the end of the last sentence? Because in a first world country, in the antibiotic age, it normally takes an extraordinary effort of neglect for such a minor injury to lead to infection, septicemia & death.

Before antibiotics (pre World War II), prudence required that such a small abrasion be cleaned carefully with antiseptic, & then covered, to prevent entry of bacteria. If this was not done, & bacteria did enter the wound, serious, life threatening infection was possible.

Today, with antibiotics easily available, a carpet burn is likely to be ignored, until there is some sign of infection, at which point, a doctor's script would quickly solve the problem. Few would allow infection to proceed as far as happened in Wollongong in 1988.

However, there are signs that the antibiotic age may be coming to an end. Antibiotic resistance is a growing problem.

What causes antibiotic resistance? Evolution. Bacteria are capable of reproducing very quickly. Several generations in an hour. An antibiotic represents a selective force. When exposed to such a selective force, a high reproduction rate allows bacteria to evolve resistance very quickly — around 600 times faster than human beings can evolve.

Bacterial evolution of antibiotic resistance is the essential problem, but it has been exacerbated by various types of mismanagement & abuse. Every time an antibiotic is used, the risk of antibiotic resistance is created. The obvious solution is to minimize antibiotic use. Trivial uses, such as on a minor cut (or carpet burn) are not justified. Cleaning with an antiseptic & covering the wound to prevent entry of bacteria should suffice.

Other abuses include:

• routine feeding antibiotics to animals. When animals are raised in confined situations, such as feed lots, infection risk rises. Antibiotics may be routinely fed to animals as a "growth promotant". Effectiveness of such use is controversial, but is pushed by drug companies, & used by farmers.

• in some parts of the world, antibiotic use is largely or wholly uncontrolled with resultant abuse.

What can you do?

Take all the tablets! A packet of antibiotic tablets, represents a course of treatment which will eliminate the infection. It is not sufficient to take the antibiotic until signs of infection disappear. At this point, a small number of bacteria may remain, with some acquired resistance. It is important to continue treatment to eliminate such bacteria. Failure to do so may result in return of the infection in a resistant form (which is more difficult to treat), or passing it on to others.

What are the drug companies doing? Running a race. There is an ongoing race between antibiotic resistant bacteria & drug companies. One of the measures they are taking is described in the linked article:

http://www.gizmodo.com.au/2013/10/next-generation-antibiotics-could-be-turned-off-using-light/ding / continue fighting pathogens new improved antibiotics antibiotic-resistant bacterial strains threat superbugs CDC staffers current salmonella outbreak more permanent solution stubborn bacteria scientist scientists University of Groningen Holland Netherlands technique tweak tweaks prove viable idea create smart antibiotic respond light heat turn turned on off switch protect healthy bacteria unnecessary damage deactivate residual antibiotics encourage resistance antibiotics designed stick inhibit enzymes keep bacteria alive specific shape bind effectively altering shape lock and key antibiotics researchers quinolones shaped like the letter C tagged light sensitive light-sensitive molecule azobenzene blasted light heat morph letter Z waste products bacteria bulk up against antibiotics pesky side effects researchers’ researcher research researchers coaxing the antibiotics respond ultraviolet infrared light superbugs superbug super bug bugs Nature /

Bigger screen for iPhone 6

Recently, I abandoned the iOS platform, largely because a 3.5 inch screen wasn't big enough anymore, & the tall, narrow 4 inch screen of the iPhone 5 didn't seem like a meaningful improvement.

Apparently, 4.7 & 5.7 inch screens are now under testing for use in the iPhone 6.

And the “iWatch”? — AMOLED display with 320 x 320-pixel resolution.

http://bgr.com/2013/10/08/iphone-6-specs-display-resolution-size/ / Apple iPhone 6 rumour rumors iPhone 5s iPhone 5c debut rumors rumor mill bigge new report well respected well-respected Apple analyst Peter Misek Apple’s next generation next-generation iPhone 6 larger 4.8-inch displa bigger screen next iPhone larger screens Android powered Android-powered iPhone rivals rival next flagship iPhone feature bigger display DisplaySearch analyst David Hsieh, upcoming iPhone 6 more standard high-definition resolution current Retina displays display welcome change many people user users customers customer Hsieh’s report research Apple’s supply chain suggests company test testing 4.7-inch panel 1,280 x 720-pixel resolution 5.7-inch display full HD 1080p resolution DisplaySearch has reported accurate details of unannounced products past earlier report The Wall Street Journal testing various display sizes 6 inches next generation next-generation iPhone larger side panels DisplaySearch Apple testing KGI Securities analyst Ming-chi Kuo accurately reported nearly every single detail Apple’s iPhone 5s iPhone 5c ahead unveiling measure 4.5 5 inches diagonally DisplaySearch several products Apple launches over the next year feature increased resolution second generation second-generation iPad mini MacBook Air 12 inch 12-inch panel flat-panel televisions television 55-inch 55 inch 65 inch 65-inch ultra HD 4K displays display Hsieh Apple’s iWatch feature flexible AMOLED display 320 x 320 pixel resolution /