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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 26, 2025 at 9:52am

Gene therapy can improve vision in young children with AIPL1-associated retinal dystrophy

Researchers  have found that gene therapy improved visual acuity and preserved retinal structure in young children with AIPL1-associated severe retinal dystrophy. This is the first human trial of gene supplementation therapy targeting this condition.

Retinal dystrophy caused by biallelic variants in the AIPL1 gene leads to severe visual impairment from birth, with progressive degeneration and limited treatment options. Previous studies of early-onset rod-cone dystrophies, including AIPL1-related forms, highlighted a critical window for intervention during early childhood, when some photoreceptor structure remains intact. Prior research using Aipl1-deficient mouse models and human retinal organoids demonstrated partial restoration of photoreceptor function through gene therapy.

In the study, "Gene therapy in children with AIPL1-associated severe retinal dystrophy: an open-label, first-in-human interventional study," published in The Lancet, researchers administered a single subretinal injection of a recombinant adeno-associated viral vector (rAAV8.hRKp.AIPL1) carrying the AIPL1 gene to one eye of each child to assess the safety and efficacy of gene supplementation therapy in improving visual function and preserving retinal structure.
Four children aged 1.0 to 2.8 years with confirmed AIPL1 mutations received a subretinal injection of rAAV8.hRKp.AIPL1 in one eye. The gene therapy vector, produced under UK regulatory approval, delivered the AIPL1 coding sequence using a human rhodopsin kinase promoter. Oral prednisolone was administered perioperatively to mitigate inflammation. Visual acuity, functional vision, retinal structure, and cortical responses were evaluated over a mean follow-up of 3.5 years.
Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 26, 2025 at 9:43am

Galloping Bubbles

Bubbles that break rules: A fluid discovery that defies logic

Researchers  have made an extraordinary discovery that is reshaping our understanding of bubbles and their movement. Picture tiny air bubbles inside a container filled with liquid. When the container is shaken up and down, these bubbles engage in an unexpected, rhythmic "galloping" motion—bouncing like playful horses and moving horizontally, even though the shaking occurs vertically.

This counterintuitive phenomenon, revealed in a new study published in Nature, has significant implications for technology from cleaning surfaces to improving heat transfer in microchips and even advancing space applications.  

These galloping bubbles are already garnering significant attention: their impact in the field of fluid dynamics has been recognized with an award for their video entry at the most recent Gallery of Fluid Motion, organized by the American Physical Society.

The newly discovered self-propulsion mechanism allows bubbles to travel distances and gives them an unprecedented capacity to navigate intricate fluid networks. This could offer solutions to long-standing challenges in heat transfer, surface cleaning, and even inspire new soft robotic systems.

Jian H. Guan et al, Galloping Bubbles, Nature Communications (2025). DOI: 10.1038/s41467-025-56611-5

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 11:15am

How AI is revealing the language of the birds

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 10:51am

An unknown illness kills over 50 people in part of Congo with hours between symptoms and death

An unknown illness has killed over 50 people in northwestern Congo, according to doctors on the ground and the World Health Organization this week.

The interval between the onset of symptoms and death has been 48 hours in the majority of cases, and that's what's really worrying.

The outbreak began on Jan. 21, and 419 cases have been recorded including 53 deaths.
According to the WHO's Africa office, the first outbreak in the town of Boloko began after three children ate a bat and died within 48 hours following hemorrhagic fever symptoms.

There have long been concerns about diseases jumping from animals to humans in places where wild animals are popularly eaten. The number of such outbreaks in Africa has surged by more than 60% in the last decade, the WHO said in 2022.

After the second outbreak of the current mystery disease began in the town of Bomate on Feb. 9, samples from 13 cases have been sent to the National Institute for Biomedical Research in Congo's capital, Kinshasa, for testing, the WHO said.

All samples have been negative for Ebola or other common hemorrhagic fever diseases like Marburg. Some tested positive for malaria.
Source: News agencies

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 10:06am

In raw milk, the phages did not reduce counts of Listeria or E. coli. In fact, phage counts decreased.

This is because the heat used in pasteurization changes the shape of the proteins that would otherwise interfere with the phage's activity. In raw milk, these proteins bind to the phages and prevent them from reaching their bacterial targets.

Salmonella, however, was a different story. The phages successfully reduced that pathogen's count in both pasteurized and raw milk.

In pasteurized milk, the phages reduced pathogen counts by a factor of 200–1,500. In raw milk, the reductions were more modest but still significant at 13 to nearly 200 times. These findings were also published in Food Microbiology.

However, they did not observe significant reductions in either gouda (a semihard, aged cheese) or queso fresco (a soft, fresh cheese).

Cheese is the act of turning a liquid to a solid. Those phages are now trapped in a spot, and the bacteria are trapped in a spot, and their ability to find each other is greatly reduced.

However, there were modest reductions in pathogen counts compared to the control in the cheese samples treated with the phages.

The major limitation for using bacteriophages to combat dairy pathogens remains the cost. The researchers had to add 1,000,000 times as many phages as pathogen to see these results in milk. Given that the phage products are relatively expensive, this is a significant barrier to their widespread application, especially for smaller producers.

 Emily Everhart et al, Commercial bacteriophage preparations for the control of Listeria monocytogenes and Shiga toxin-producing Escherichia coli in raw and pasteurized milk, Food Microbiology (2024). DOI: 10.1016/j.fm.2024.104652

Emily Everhart et al, Control of Salmonella enterica spp. enterica in milk and raw milk cheese using commercial bacteriophage preparations, Food Microbiology (2025). DOI: 10.1016/j.fm.2025.104725

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 10:02am

Phages prove effective at killing pathogens in milk

Researchers have demonstrated that bacteriophages can effectively reduce the amount of common foodborne pathogens in milk.

Bacteriophages are viruses that infect bacteria. Some phages follow a lytic life cycle where they inject their DNA into the host cell and hijack its mechanisms to reproduce. When the number of phages grows too large, the cell will burst, killing the bacteria. The released phages will continue to self-propagate, seeking out more and more of their target bacteria to infect and kill. Then, once they have used up all the bacteria, they will simply die off.

Each bacteriophage is highly specific and will only target one genus or one species, and in some cases, only one strain of a bacteria.

If you have a target like a foodborne pathogen—like E. coli—there are phages that will really only infect E. coli. So, any good bacteria in your gut and in your food will be unaffected, and your human cells will be completely unaffected.

Bacteriophages are an organic anti-bacterial option that has no impact on the color, flavor, or texture of the food.

Researchers looked at a series of commercially available bacteriophages that target the most common dairy-borne pathogens: Listeria, Salmonella, and E. coli to see how effective they were in destroying these bacteria in milk and cheese.

Each of the products they evaluated were a mixture of phages that target certain pathogenic species or strains.

They  saw significant reductions in pathogen counts in pasteurized milk. These effects were observable within a few hours and held steady for a week.

Listeria counts decreased by a factor of 10,000 compared to the control. For E. coli it was a bit more complicated, as some strains decreased by only a factor of five, while others decreased by 100 times.

These findings were published in Food Microbiology.

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 9:37am

Humanoid robots can swiftly get up after they fall with new learning framework

Humanoid robots, which have a body structure that mirrors that of humans, could rapidly and effectively tackle a wide range of tasks in real-world settings. These robots and their underlying control algorithms have improved considerably in recent years. Many of them can now move faster, emulating various human-like movements.

As these robots are designed to walk or run similarly to humans, thus balancing on two legs, they can sometimes collide with objects or trip on uneven terrain, falling to the ground. Yet, in contrast with humans, who can easily pick themselves up when they fall, humanoid robots can sometimes get stuck on the ground, requiring the support of human agents to get back on their feet.

Researchers recently developed a new machine learning frame work that could allow humanoid robots to automatically get back up and recover after falling to the ground. This framework, presented in a paper on the arXiv preprint server, could make these robots more autonomous, potentially contributing to their future large-scale deployment.

Learning Getting-Up Policies for Real-World Humanoid Robots

Xialin He et al, Learning Getting-Up Policies for Real-World Humanoid Robots, arXiv (2025). DOI: 10.48550/arxiv.2502.12152

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 9:10am

For chronic radicular spine pain, moderate certainty evidence indicates that epidural injection of local anesthetic and steroids and radiofrequency of the dorsal root ganglion are unlikely to result in pain relief. Low certainty evidence suggests epidural injections of local anesthetic or steroids may also yield minimal pain relief.

In physical functioning, moderate certainty evidence shows joint-targeted injections and epidural injections with local anesthetic or steroids probably provide little to no improvement.

Low certainty evidence suggests certain procedures may slightly increase the risk of non-serious adverse events, including joint radiofrequency ablation.

When looking at the substantial cost, inconvenience, and false hope of these common procedures compared to data that suggests they are ineffective, it is unclear why they have persisted. If the study results are valid, another issue suggested is a major communication disconnect regarding procedures and patient outcomes in health care.

Xiaoqin Wang et al, Common interventional procedures for chronic non-cancer spine pain: a systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomised trials, BMJ (2025). DOI: 10.1136/bmj-2024-079971

Jane C Ballantyne, Spinal interventions for chronic back pain, BMJ (2025). DOI: 10.1136/bmj.r179

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 25, 2025 at 9:10am

Common procedures for chronic spine pain found to offer little to no relief

Researchers found that commonly performed interventional procedures for chronic non-cancer spine pain may provide little to no pain relief when compared with sham procedures.

Chronic spine pain, defined as persistent pain along or referred from the spine lasting three months or longer, presents a global health challenge with significant socioeconomic implications.

While interventional procedures such as epidural steroid injections, nerve blocks, and radiofrequency nerve ablation are frequently used, clinical guidelines have offered conflicting recommendations regarding their effectiveness.

In the study, "Common interventional procedures for chronic non-cancer spine pain: a  systematic review and network meta-analysis of randomized trials," published in The BMJ, researchers conducted a comprehensive search of Medline, Embase, CINAHL, CENTRAL, and Web of Science, for spine pain procedural outcome efficacy.

Eighty-one trials with 7,977 patients were included in meta-analyses out of 132 eligible studies. Patients with chronic axial or radicular spine pain were randomized to receive common interventional procedures or comparators, including sham procedures and usual care. Frequentist network meta-analyses were performed, and the GRADE approach was used to assess the certainty of evidence.

For chronic axial spine pain, moderate certainty evidence showed that epidural injection of local anesthetic, epidural injection of local anesthetic and steroids, and joint-targeted steroid injection, result in little to no difference in pain relief compared with sham procedures.
Low certainty evidence suggests minimal pain relief differences for intramuscular and joint-targeted injections of local anesthetic, with or without steroids. Intramuscular injection of local anesthetic with steroids signaled that it may actually increase pain.
Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on February 22, 2025 at 12:01pm

Breathing and vision may be linked

Researchers  have discovered a fundamental mechanism that affects the size of the pupil, namely our breathing. The study, published in the Journal of Physiology, shows that the pupil is smallest during inhalation and largest during exhalation—something that could affect our vision.

Like the aperture in a camera, the pupil controls how much light reaches the eye. It is therefore fundamental to our vision and how we perceive our surroundings. Three mechanisms that can change the size of the pupil have been known for over a century: the amount of light, focus distance and cognitive factors such as emotion or mental effort.

Now, scientists have discovered a fourth: breathing. The pupil is smallest around inhalation onset and largest during exhalation.

This mechanism is unique in that it is cyclical, ever-present and requires no external stimulus

Martin Schaefer et al, The pupillary respiratory‐phase response: pupil size is smallest around inhalation onset and largest during exhalation, The Journal of Physiology (2025). DOI: 10.1113/JP287205

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