The use of wearable trackers found a link in patients reporting insufficient sleep with biological aging and increased risk of cardiovascular disease, according to study findings.

Insufficient sleep has been linked to adverse health outcomes such as obesity, hypertension, CVD, and premature death. The utilization of wearable trackers, which can measure sleep duration and sleep stages with integrated heart rate (HR) sensors, have remained relatively uncharacterized in generating sleep metrics for sleep-related biomedical research. Currently, sleep-health interactions rely on 3 methods to quantify sleep; sleep questionnaires/diaries, actigraphy, and polysomnography (PSG), which the authors noted as all having their distinct limitations.

The growth of wearable trackers from simple and low-cost fitness devices to more sophisticated and multi-functionable smartwatches has increased its potential as a source of accurate data measurement. Prior studies have shown consumer wearables, such as Fitbit and Jawbone, to perform similarly to actigraphs in that they were accurate in detecting sleep but did less well in detecting wake. A previous study by the authors additionally exhibited the efficacy of Fitbit-derived sleep tracking data in showing the differences in sleep patterns among a study cohort.

Researchers sought to expand on the limited research conducted on consumer wearables by addressing a variety of factors not yet examined in previous studies:

The study analyzed questionnaire responses, multi-model phenotypic data, and sleep tracking data generated from Fitbit Charge HR wearables for 482 Singaporean volunteers.

Study results showed that wearable devices, when compared to the PSQI, exhibit independent measures compared to subjective measures of sleep quality. When determining the relationship of wearable-derived sleep metrics to biomarkers such as CVD and LTL, however, a significant association was found in the data.

Multi-model phenotypic data analysis showed that wearable-derived TST and SE were associated with CVD risk markers such as body mass index (TST = 5.683; 95% CI, 1.111 to 2.735;P= .040; SE = 1.089; 95% CI, 2.127 to 5.105;P= .040) and waist circumference (TST = 1.100; 95% CI, 1.499 to 1.720;P= .893; SE = 4.103; 95% CI, 7.169 to 1.036;P= .009), that were not found in self-reported measurements.

For the link between wearable-inferred sleep insufficiency and premature telomere attrition, wearable-derived TST was associated with a measurement of LTL known as quantitative polymerase chain reaction (qPCR) ( = 7.288; 95% CI, 8.318 to 0.001;P= .028), which was not found in the self-reported measurements ( = 0.020; 95% CI, 0.015 to 0.055;P= .258).

Co-lead study author Lim Weng Khong, chief information officer at SingHealth Duke-NUS PRISM and assistant professor in the cancer and stem cell biology program at Duke NUS Medical School, emphasized the study findings for related factors to sleep duration. What we found was that volunteers with enough sleep tended to have longer telomeres compared to those that did not. This was even after accounting for other factors such as age and gender, and provides evidence for a link between chronic sleep deprivation and premature aging, said Khong.

In stressing the efficacy of wearable devices, senior author Patrick Tan, director of SingHealth Duke-NUS PRISM and professor in the cancer and stem cell biology program at Duke-NUS Medical School, said, researchers can leverage wearables to obtain precise data such as sleep patterns more efficiently and can analyze large sets of data at 1 time.

The growing adoption of wearables in Singapore means that more volunteers can contribute data from their own devices, providing further insights into health and disease," said Tan.

Reference

Teo JX, Davila S, Yang C, et al. Digital phenotyping by consumer wearables identifies sleep-associated markers of cardiovascular disease risk and biological aging. Commun Biol. 2019; 2: 361.

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Insufficient Sleep Linked to Biological Aging, Increased Risk of CVD Through Wearable Trackers - AJMC.com Managed Markets Network

Ablation

Inside the Northern Generaltheyre trying to burn awaya small piece of your heart.

I want to know which bit,how muchand what it holds.

My questions livebetween what doctors call the heartand what we mean by it,

wide as the gap between brain and mind.And in our lineage of bypassed heartswe should be grateful

for the literal. I know my heartis your heart good for running,not much else

and later as you sit up in your borrowed bedI get the whole thing wrong,call it oblation. Offering

or sacrice. As if youd given something up.As if their tiny re was ritualand we could warm by it.

Not everyone who writes and reads poetry is a horse-drawn arts person, with zero knowledge of the sciences beyond a little light Googling, but there are still plenty of us around. And we shouldnt despise the online toe-dipping so readily available to science outsiders: it can still energise curiosity and develop brain power. The internet is a friendly sort of school: no one will throw you out for being dumb at quadratic equations or, for that matter, tin-eared to prosody. You can forget assessment, progression, humiliation. You can wing across borders. Its all there, and all connectable, time, patience and imagination permitting.

The same day I discovered this weeks poem while browsing online, I had an email from my daughter, quoting some research on angiogenesis that had recently caught her interest. The paper she quoted, based on research by Bentley and Chakravartula on cell behaviour, made a good case for the hypothesis that cell activity is a perception-action process. In other words, that cells engage in a process analogous to a human moving their eyes or their heads or their bodies to create and interact with variables in optic flow. Cells make decisions! I found this exciting and, although Helen Morts poem deals with a different process, cardiac ablation, I think its special connection of the mechanical and emotional had made me far more receptive to the scientific prose. Both disciplines, poetry and cell biology, seemed to jump out of their respective study rooms and embrace like joyously absconding schoolkids. Reading the poem again after the scientific paper was like hearing a beautifully simple song, a melodic and emotional pattern into which the careful precisions of science had been distilled and shaped.

The speaker in Ablation sits at a hospital bedside, wanting answers to the simple, urgent questions people ask at such times. The questions only seem simple, of course. We know, and the speaker knows, that the heart is not a container for feelings and attributes, and the process of ablation is unlikely to burn away love, courage or good cheer but how do we understand these attributes if they have been displaced from their traditional bodily home? Such questions, the speaker rightly says, live / between what doctors call the heart / and what we mean by it, // wide as the gap between brain and mind.

The stanza break above also indicates the gap between the language lay people use about their bodies and minds, and the objective language of medical science. Sometimes I wonder if the constant anguished discussions in the UK about the failures of the NHS arent only practical in origin, but also reflect a profounder sense of underlying problems communication, as if patient and medical professional spoke across each other in different languages.

Morts poem centres on an ancient definition of the heart, now a well-worn metaphor, and does something almost unbelievably fresh with it. The phrase the lineage of bypassed hearts is particularly suggestive. It may allude to a family history of heart-bypass surgery, or to a habitual evasion of emotion. It seems to include a general and well-grounded fear people have of being reduced in their humanity when they become patients.

The speaker in the poem continues to seek a place for the transcendent. An appropriate conceit the misunderstanding of ablation as oblation enables the process. Its a beautifully economical move to retrieve what the narrator most fears will be lost, allowing the tiny fire of the surgical procedure to become ritual and provide both participants with the literal warmth of their shared love, and their sense of its significance.

You dont have to be Richard Dawkins to disagree profoundly with John Keats (a generally wiser and broader thinker than Dawkins) that Isaac Newton destroyed the rainbow by reducing it to a prism. This poem is not condemning medical science, but asking that an imaginative space be kept open. Emotionally, people need ablation and oblation to be allowed to rhyme.

Ablation is from Helen Morts collection No Map Could Show Them (Chatto & Windus, 2016). Reproduced by permission of the author c/o Rogers, Coleridge & White Ltd, 20 Powis Mews, London W11 1JN.

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Poem of the week: Ablation by Helen Mort - The Guardian

Posted By: Staff WriterNovember 18, 2019

With artificial intelligence and genetic engineeringcontinuing to shape the future of scientific innovation and discovery,questions about the ethical implications only seem to get more complicated.

Additionally, CRISPR a tool for DNA sequencing and geneediting is bringing new technological changes and advancements in a rapidlyshifting landscape.

A panel discussion at Stanford University later thisweek, moderated by Russ Altman a professor of Bioengineering, Genetics,Medicine, Biomedical Data Science and Computer Science at the university, seeksto discuss how AI and CRISPR are influencing these ethical quandaries and howthey might influence the evolutionary process.

The two panelists for the free, sold-out event areleaders in the field. Jennifer Doudna, a professor of chemistry and molecularand cell biology at UC Berkeley, helped discover CRISPR-Cas9. Fei-Fei Li is acomputer science professor at Stanford in the universitys Institute forHuman-Centered Artificial Intelligence. She previously worked at the schoolsAI Lab and at Google.

The Institute for Human-Centered Artificial Intelligenceis hosting for forum at Stanfords CEMEX Auditorium, 655 Knight Way. It is setfor Tuesday, November 19, from 7 to 8:30 p.m.

While the event has sold out of pre-registration tickets,limited general admission will be available at the site. It will also belivestreamed.

To see more details, click here.

To watch the livestream, click here.

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Examining the ethics of scientific discovery - Cupertino Today

The latest lifestyle, fashion and travel trends

He is one of the most googled names in beauty, and she, one of the most prominent figures in fashion.

It was therefore a fitting match for Victoria Beckham to join forces with Augustinus Bader the notoriously publicity-shy director of stem cell biology and cell technology at the University of Leipzig for her first foray in to skincare.

Bader became a household beauty name in February 2018, after the launch of his cult-product The Cream caused convulsions of desire to ripple throughout the beauty industry thanks to its ultra-hydrating and restorative qualities.

And so when looking for a scientific collaborator to join her on her endeavour in to skincare, it seemed a natural fit for the two to merge theircomplementingareas of expertise.

The Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer (Victoria Beckham Beauty)

Cue the result of the pairing: Victoria Beckham Beautys Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer.

The moisturiser is the new-and-improved iteration of the Morning Aura Primer Beckham launched as part of her collaboration with Este Lauder in 2016.

The product, which Beckham has re-developed with the help of 59-year-old Bader, is a multifunctional cream thatclaims to prime, impart a glow and also to repair.

Commenting on the collaborative beauty effort, Beckham took to her Instagram page to note: It has been a dream to develop, with Augustinus, a priming moisturizer that works to improve the health of my skin and gives that fresh, natural glow that I love.

Meanwhile Bader said: "It was an honour to collaborate with Victoria for her first Skin launch. I'm excited to share some of our skincare benefits in this product. It's the first product of its kind to care for your skin cells while also preparing your skin for makeup application."

A celebrity facialist has revealed VB's 9-step daily skincare routine

This marks the first skincare product 45-year-old Beckham has launched under her beauty line, which she debuted to critical-acclaim in September, alongside the brands co-founder, Sarah Creal.

Victoria Beckham Beauty has the tagline Luxury Performance, Clean Beauty, and is refusing to pigeonhole itself as just a beauty brand, instead referring to itself as clean beauty movement.

Cell Rejuvenating Priming Moisturizer costs 92 for 30ml and launches tomorrow exclusively at victoriabeckhambeauty.com and augustinusbader.com.

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Everything you need to know about Victoria Beckhams first skincare product launching tomorrow - Evening Standard

VisiJet M2S-HT90 provides best-in-class heat deflection temperature of 90Cwhile meeting USP Class VI 93 standards. Thisstrong, rigid, transparent material is designed for durable goods and automotive applications - ideal for functional prototyping of parts that operate in high temperature environments such as appliances, enclosures and housings, as well as testing parts or assemblies with heated fluids and gasses. Due to its biocompatibility, VisiJet M2S-HT90 is also optimal for healthcare applications including medical devices that include fine features and small internal structures designed for fluid flow.

Biomedical engineers at Antleron (Leuven, Belgium), an R&D company with a mission to enable living therapies, are using 3D Systems' VisiJet M2S-HT90 to develop bioreactors as part of their personalized manufacturing 4.0 strategy. "Antleron is excited to be here in 3D Systems' booth at Formnext to showcase - for the first time - what is in store for next-generation medical applications with the ProJet MJP 2500 Plus printer and VisiJet materials," said Jan Schrooten, chief executive officer, Antleron. "The combined mechanical and biocompatible properties of 3D Systems' VisiJet M2S-HT90 are enabling us to accomplish innovations in cell biology moving from 2D to 3D and beyond. We now can rapidly translate our 'out-of-the-box' cell processing ideas into new ways to develop products for life science applications."

In addition to VisiJet M2S-HT90, Figure 4 PRO-BLK 10, and Figure 4 HI TEMP 300-AMB, the company also announced six additional materials for a range of applications including: Figure 4 EGGSHELL-AMB 10, Figure 4 FLEX-BLK 20, Figure 4 MED-AMB 10, Figure 4 MED-WHT 10, Figure 4 TOUGH-BLK 20 and Figure 4 RUBBER-BLK 10.

3D Systems' also recently announced on November 1 that its new biocompatible denture material, NextDent Denture 3D+, received 510(k) clearance from the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA). The combination of this new dental 3D printing material, NextDent 5100 dental 3D printer, and industry-leading intra-oral scanning and dental software solutions yields an end-to-end digital dentistry solution. As a result, customers can expect more precise,predictable results than through analog techniques - enabling more efficient, cost-effective creation of dentures for patients.

"At Formnext 2019, 3D Systems is showcasing application-specific, production workflow solutions that helpcompanies design and create new and improved products, while gaining efficiencies," said Vyomesh Joshi, president and CEO, 3D Systems. "We collaborate with our customers to design the solution that best fits their needs. This begins with understanding their application, and then selecting the material which will enable production of their desired part. Blending our expertise in materials science, application engineering, 3D printing technology and software allows 3D Systems to deliver unprecedented solutions that keep them ahead of the competition."

For more information about 3D Systems' presence at Formnext 2019, please visit the company's website.

Forward-Looking StatementsCertain statements made in this release that are not statements of historical or current facts are forward-looking statements within the meaning of the Private Securities Litigation Reform Act of 1995. Forward-looking statements involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause the actual results, performance or achievements of the company to be materially different from historical results or from any future results or projections expressed or implied by such forward-looking statements. In many cases, forward-looking statements can be identified by terms such as "believes," "belief," "expects," "may," "will," "estimates," "intends," "anticipates" or "plans" or the negative of these terms or other comparable terminology. Forward-looking statements are based upon management's beliefs, assumptions, and current expectations and may include comments as to the company's beliefs and expectations as to future events and trends affecting its business and are necessarily subject to uncertainties, many of which are outside the control of the company. The factors described under the headings "Forward-Looking Statements" and "Risk Factors" in the company's periodic filings with the Securities and Exchange Commission, as well as other factors, could cause actual results to differ materially from those reflected or predicted in forward-looking statements. Although management believes that the expectations reflected in the forward-looking statements are reasonable, forward-looking statements are not, and should not be relied upon as a guarantee of future performance or results, nor will they necessarily prove to be accurate indications of the times at which such performance or results will be achieved. The forward-looking statements included are made only as of the date of the statement. 3D Systems undertakes no obligation to update or review any forward-looking statements made by management or on its behalf, whether as a result of future developments, subsequent events or circumstances or otherwise.

About 3D Systems More than 30 years ago, 3D Systems brought the innovation of 3D printing to the manufacturing industry. Today, as the leading AM solutions company, it empowers manufacturers to create products and business models never before possible through transformed workflows. This is achieved with the Company's best-of-breed digital manufacturing ecosystem - comprised of plastic and metal 3D printers, print materials, on-demand manufacturing services and a portfolio of end-to-end manufacturing software. Each solution is powered by the expertise of the company's application engineers who collaborate with customers to transform manufacturing environments. 3D Systems' solutions address a variety of advanced applications for prototyping through production in markets such as aerospace, automotive, medical, dental and consumer goods. More information on the company is available at http://www.3dsystems.com.

SOURCE 3D Systems

http://www.3dsystems.com

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3D Systems Continues to Announce New Materials - Opening New Production Solutions for Broad Industry Adoption - PRNewswire

19.11.19

Prostate Cancer UK and Movember have awarded funding to Queens University Belfast and The University of Manchester to continue progressing treatment for prostate cancer as part of the Belfast-Manchester Centre for Excellence.

With prostate cancer being the most common cancer among males in the UK with more than 47, 500 new diagnoses every year, the funding started back in 2014. Prostate Cancer UK invested 5m to create the first regional Movember Centre of Excellence in partnership between Queens University Belfast and The University of Manchester.

The funding will allow clinical trials to be expanded, develop and pioneer novel treatments while enhancing expert knowledge of this aggressive cancer that affects one in eight men.

Since the formation of the Belfast-Manchester Centre of Excellence (known as FASTMAN) the researchers have established new tests to find high risk patients, and find which patients respond best to numerous treatment options.

Joe OSullivan, Professor of Radiation Oncology at the Centre for Cancer Research and Cell Biology at Queens University Belfast, Co-Director of the Movember Centre of Excellence and Clinical Director of Oncolofy in Belfast Trust explains: We have made huge progress in personalised treatment for prostate cancer patients through the development of new tests to identify the type of tumour, as well as gaining a deeper understanding of the role of radiotherapy in prostate cancer therapy.

Through these new tests, we can potentially identify patients with particularly high-risk prostate cancer to determine what treatment will be most effective, tailored to the particular tumour.

We have also tested several new treatment options through clinical trials which have had encouraging results. We are currently planning to expand availability of these trials to eligible men across the nation. We are proud of the real successes to date and we are delighted to be able to continue this important work.

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Prostate cancer research injects 1.25m of funding to develop treatment - National Health Executive

A new screening system developed by scientists at the UCLA Jonsson Comprehensive Cancer Center leverages redundancy in an important component of a cell nucleotide metabolism to help identify new drugs that specifically and potently block processes that are essential for cancer cell growth.

BACKGROUND

There are many small molecule kinase inhibitors, such as Gleevec, that have been developed to target cancers and other diseases. However, scientists still dont fully understand the full effects of these drugs. Current screening methods do not capture the effects these inhibitors may have on other components of cells, such as biochemical metabolic networks. Using their understanding of metabolism, the team designed a new high-throughput screening system that allows for identification of selective inhibitors of metabolic pathways.

METHOD

Working with theMolecular Screening Shared Resource at UCLA, the team performed a large scale analyses of 430 kinase inhibitors that have annotated targets within cellular signaling pathways and many of which are currently being used in the clinic. Unexpectedly, multiple inhibitors were found to block nucleotide metabolism and their targets were revealed using mechanistic studies.

IMPACT

This new metabolism-focused screening approach can be a powerful tool in getting new insight into how existing drugs impact metabolic networks and could potentially provide a new understanding into how these drugs are working in the clinic. In addition to characterization of existing compounds that are already being used for treating cancers and other diseases, this screening method could one day also be applied to identify new small molecule modulators of currently un-targeted metabolic pathways not only nucleotide metabolism which can help lead to new drug discoveries.

Reference: Abt, et al. (2019) Metabolic Modifier Screen Reveals Secondary Targets of Protein Kinase Inhibitors within Nucleotide Metabolism. Cell Chemical Biology DOI:https://doi.org/10.1016/j.chembiol.2019.10.012

This article has been republished from the following materials. Note: material may have been edited for length and content. For further information, please contact the cited source.

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Screening System Designed To Detect Drugs That Block Drivers of Cancer Cell Growth - Technology Networks