Thiago Carvalho @cyrilpedia@qoto.org
I've worked on all of science, from B cells to T cells.
https://fellowsherpa.com
Joined Nov 2022
My Clinical Pipeline column for Nature Medicine this week examines the state of Sarepta's new gene therapy for Duchenne muscular dystrophy application at the FDA. Whatever its final efficacy turns out to be, the general strategy behind the therapy, an engineered micro-dystrophin is very clever.
It was inspired by the case of a 61 year old patient who had a deletion of almost half of his dystrophin gene and was still alive and walking. Here's that ref, from 1990:
https://www.nature.com/articles/343180a0
And here's my column:
'Using an industry-standard test, he measured the particulate matter outside the mask, then checked how much made it through the device and into the space around his nose and mouth. Percentage-wise, he told me, “it removes 99.99 … I didn’t measure how many nines; it was working so well.” On broader scales, too, the protective math plays out: Well-fitting masks can curb smoke-related hospitalizations; studies back up their importance as a firefighting mainstay.'
https://www.theatlantic.com/health/archive/2023/06/mask-wildfire-smoke-n95-effective/674325/
‘In the winter of 1750, Jean-Jacques Rousseau threw away his watch. “Thank heavens,” he remembered exclaiming after this sublime gesture, “I shall no longer need to know what time its!”’
- Peter Gay, ‘The Enlightenment, the rise of modern paganism’.
#Books #BookClub #HistoryBooks #Philosophy #Bookshelf #bookstodon
"In this article – which builds on a preprint we posted in March 2022 (Corneille et al., 2022) – we describe a range of persuasive communication devices that can be used to exaggerate the importance of and/or hide the weaknesses of scientific work, and urge authors to exercise caution when thinking about using such devices"
Interesting addition to the toolbox, if you're working on #microglia:
"We generated a constitutive Cre line controlled by the microglia signature gene Crybb1 that produced nearly complete recombination in embryonic brain macrophages (microglia and border-associated macrophages [BAMs]) by the perinatal period, with limited recombination in peripheral myeloid cells."
https://www.cell.com/immunity/fulltext/S1074-7613(23)00040-7
Be there or be square (if you're Lisbon):
Exposição "Oubliette", inaugura 6ª feira dia 16 Junho às 18h30 na Biblioteca Camões em Lisboa. Pieces by Ana Jotta, Constança Arouca, Jorge Nesbitt & Madalena Parreira
Texts by H. Manfredsenjensen
Opening on Friday, June 16th at Biblioteca Camões, Lisbon (Largo Calhariz 17), 18h30.
"Françoise Gilot, an accomplished painter whose art was eclipsed by her long and stormy romantic relationship with a much older Pablo Picasso, and who alone among his many mistresses walked out on him, died on Tuesday at a hospital in Manhattan. She was 101."
(photo credit Robert Capa/International Center of Photography/Magnum Photos)
"Compared with other bacteria, #Salmonella, a facultative anaerobe, has higher motility and accumulation in tumors and a special advantage in targeting tumor quiescence, possibly via the chemoreceptors of Salmonella"
https://www.cell.com/cell-reports-medicine/fulltext/S2666-3791(23)00189-1
'Here, we summarize progress and challenges in the development of broad-spectrum antivirals that target either viral elements (proteins, genome structures, and lipid envelopes) or cellular proviral factors co-opted by multiple viruses via newly discovered compounds or repurposing of approved drugs.'
#Virology #Antiviral #drugdevelopment
"Presently, most nanobodies are produced by immunizing camelids; however, platforms for animal-free production are growing in popularity. Here, we describe the development of a fully synthetic nanobody library based on an engineered human VH3-23 variable gene and a multispecific antibody-like format designed for biparatopic target engagement."
'When Professor Harald zur Hausen, who has died aged 87, identified a link between the human papillomavirus and cervical cancer almost half a century ago, few of his fellow scientists took the breakthrough seriously.'
https://www.ft.com/content/eeb66a36-29e4-4a14-b7a4-0ca59214ad05
Bairrada is a very underrated wine region of Portugal. They make wonderful dry sparkling like this one.
cc @BLMG
Gene therapy with AAV vectored micro-dystrophin for Duchenne muscular dystrophy. My latest #ClinicalPipeline column for #NatureMedicine.
Cool line up for this brain #organoid course at CRG-Barcelona, but too bad they could not get Dr. Michael Hfuhruhurr.
https://www.crg.eu/en/event/coursescrg-brain-organoids-advanced-hands-course-2023
"Our investigation reveals that the fetal HSCs respond to T. gondii infection with virulence-dependent changes in proliferation, self-renewal potential, and lineage output. Furthermore, maternal IFNγ crosses the fetal–maternal interface, where it is perceived by fetal HSCs."
'The cGAS-STING pathway has long been recognized as playing a crucial role in immune surveillance and tumor suppression. Here, we show that when the pathway is activated in a cancer-cell-autonomous response manner, it confers drug resistance.'
https://www.cell.com/cell-chemical-biology/fulltext/S2451-9456(23)00141-1
'Old and newly synthesized histones are asymmetrically distributed and inherited in Drosophila intestinal stem cell divisions. Disruption of asymmetric histone inheritance compromises stem cell differentiation, indicating a role in regulating cell fates in adult stem lineages in vivo.'
'What particularly impressed Tolstoy’s contemporaries was his seemingly superhuman ability to trace Prince Andrei’s thoughts after he loses the ability to communicate with others. “How does Count Tolstoy know [all] this?” asked the novelist Konstantin Leontiev. “He did not rise from the dead and visit us after his resurrection.” And yet he convinces readers that, yes, it could really be just this way.'
https://www.nybooks.com/articles/2023/06/22/death-and-the-hedgehog-tolstoy-as-philosopher/
IL6 is not always the bad guy.
"In the penumbrae of human stroke brain lesions, we identified a subpopulation of microglia that express vascular endothelial growth factor A. These cells, termed ‘repair-associated microglia’ (RAMs), were also observed in a rodent model of CVI and coexpressed interleukin (IL)-6Ra. Cerebrovascular repair did not occur in IL-6 knockouts or in mice lacking microglial IL-6Ra expression"
#Immunology #Inflammation #Microglia #Neuroimmunology
I've worked on all of science, from B cells to T cells.
https://fellowsherpa.com
Joined Nov 2022
