A2: Microbes in the News

Posted by On Filed under Microbes in the News, Uncategorized

Antibody helps detect protein implicated in Alzheimer’s, other diseases

https://www.eurekalert.org/pub_releases/2017-04/wuso-ahd041417.php

Summary: The article discusses research looking to find less invasive ways to identify and then track the progress of neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer’s. They have accomplished the first step by crafting an antibody which binds to the protein tau, which is present in tangles when damage to the brain is occurring. The antibody allows tau to stay present in the blood and accumulate long enough to be observable via blood tests.

Connection: The article discusses the use of an human antibody, but in a way we didn’t really cover in class. The antibody is not used as a flag for the destruction of a microbe or “not-self” entity in the body, but rather keep an entity around long enough to track its concentrations.

Critical Analysis:  This article does an excellent job of explaining the issues related to diagnosing neurodegenerative diseases, as well as the way in which the protein tau is associated and was identified as a potential measurable product for blood tests. Though the study has only done limited preliminary human trials, they were able to magnify the presence of tau in the blood of individuals with known neurodegenerative diseases. I believe the article did a great job of translating the innovative way in which scientists approach problems like that of diagnostics, and the interdisciplinary cooperation and literacy that is at the command of these researchers to accomplish what was discussed.

Question:  Would this antibody have the ability to track damage as it accumulates in individuals like football players, perhaps as a longitudinal study to gain more data and a predictive model for brain damage?

A2: Microbes in the News- Scientists find a new treatment for antibiotic-resistant bacteria

Posted by On Filed under Assignments, Microbes in the News

https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/scientists-find-a-new-treatment-for-antibiotic-resistant-bacteria-1.3352187

CTV News

Article published April 3rd, 2017

Researchers from Birmingham University in the UK have developed an interesting alternative to using antibiotics for a certain rare lung disease that can be caused by several bacterium including P. aeruginosa. They would run a similar process to dialysis, called plasmapheresis, but instead of removing waste from the blood they would remove a certain antibody from the blood that was in excess, which prevented them from fighting the infecting bacterium. They would run this several times a week, replacing antibodies via blood transfusions, and this reduced hospitalization time and reduced the effects of it significantly, all without antibiotics. Research is being done to see if this is a viable replacement to some antibiotic treatments.

This relates to class material because we covered usage of antibiotics and how to prevent resistance. This would be a very good way to eliminate adding resistance to bacterium that can be fought this way significantly by not even using antibiotics.

I thought it was interesting how they are trying to find ways to avoid antibiotics completely, which would significantly decrease the worry of antibiotic resistance. It is a fairly new treatment, but it looks very plausible and accurate based on the reasoning in the article. It is fairly simplified for the public but is in depth enough so that the treatment process can be understood.

One question I would ask is how this could be expanded upon to more diseases beyond just filtering out antibodies from the blood. Could this be applied to other immune response diseases? People who are immune suppressed?