IIT-AIIMS Team Builds World's 1st Machine That Kills Coronavirus In Air With Ionised Water

Some of us have turned into extreme germophobes -- avoiding to touch surfaces and constantly washing hands from fears of contracting the novel coronavirus.

Authorities are spraying disinfectants on streets and commonly touched surfaces for preventing the spread of the coronavirus. However, Dr Debayan Saha from IIT Kharagpur and Shashi Ranjan from AIIMS has created a novel device that performs loads better than conventional disinfectant sprays.

The machine is called Airlens Minus Corona and it takes an entirely different approach to nip the novel coronavirus in the bud. The machine looks like a humanoid robot from a movie in the ’60s (very reminiscent of the tin man from the Wizard of Oz).  the machine basically disperses water droplets which are made of ionised water.

This water is ionised with the corona discharge. This water when it comes in contact with COVID-19, it oxidises the viral protein, rendering it not harmful. The machine can be used on the streets with crowded people to sanitise these mass-gathering places efficiently.

PerSapien Innovations

The company is called PerSapien Innovations. According to Sashi Ranjan, “Diving deeper into the scientific research I did at NUS, Singapore, I realized that oxidation is one of the most potent antimicrobial tools which can sterilize the entire city.”

He further added, “Our technology uses an optimal combination of electric energy and water atomization techniques to induce a charge on water droplets while creating the most potent oxidative entities, Hydroxyl radicals that can oxidize and kill the coronavirus.”

Now you might be wondering why do we need this when we already have alcohol-based dispersion systems that are commonly being used. Debayan has an answer to this.

“Alcohols (like ethanol or IPA) are known to inactivate viruses by denaturing their protein coat. But the alcohol-based hand sanitizer is useful for individuals or for sanitizing surfaces at a smaller scale (home, offices, etc.) in the fight against Coronavirus. However, this is insufficient in such an emergency as it is impractical to use alcohol for sanitizing cities.”

This is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for medicines, exercises and so on.     

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New Paper-Based Zika Test Can Diagnose Virus in 20 Minutes

Reports state that researchers have developed a new paper-based Zika virus test which can detect the infection of the virus within 20 minutes. The test reportedly can effectively differentiate the Zika virus from other mosquito-horned virus like dengue.

Doctors often have difficulty deciphering whether a particular mosquito-borne virus test is positive for Zika or other similar viruses. The resin behind this is the presence of a viral protein called NS1. This protein can be found in the bloodstream of an infected person.

However, many other viruses from the same family, which is called flavi-viruses, have very similar versions of the NS1 and can cause false positives for other viruses. Falvi-vruses reportedly include dengue, the virus which causes yellow fever and even the West Nile virus.

Commenting on the new test for the Zika virus, associate professor  said, “It’s important to have a single test that can differentiate between the four serotypes of Dengue and Zika because they co-circulate. They’re spread by the same mosquito.”

In order to reach the findings, the team of researchers exposed mice to Zika and Dengue virus and screened the resulting antibodies in pairs against flavivirus’ version of the NS1 protein. Through this process, the researchers were able to identify the pairs of antibodies that particularly react with one version of the NS1.

The researchers then reportedly used the identified pairs to create five different tests, one for each type of virus. They coated strips of paper with one antibody from each pair, while the second antibody was attached to gold nanoparticles, according to reports.

Although the approach requires five strips per sample to test the presence of each virus, the researchers are currently working on a version through which it would be possible to test all five viruses through one strip.

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Two Drugs That Could Halt The Progression Of Neurodegenerative Diseases

Researchers have found two drugs already in various stages of use and human clinical trial that seem to prevent all neurodegenerative diseases in mice. Published in the journal Brain, the research could be a major breakthrough in preventing the devastating diseases from progressing in humans.

When brain cells are infected with a virus, the pathogen co-opts the cell to produce its own viral proteins, which begin to build up within the cell. In order to fight this and prevent the spread of the virus, the cell reacts by blocking all protein production. In many neurodegenerative diseases, a similar situation occurs, in which faulty proteins are over-produced in the brain cells and the brain reacts in a very similar way, but for much more prolonged periods.
Problems start to arise because the brain cells halt protein production for such a long period of time that the brains cells effectively starve themselves and start dying. When this spreads to neurons, it can then lead to the familiar symptoms of memory loss, movement impairment, and even death in severe types of neurodegenerative diseases.

In 2013, the same team of researchers found a compound that prevented the brain cells from overreacting and shutting down all protein production, which prevented the brain cells from dying. Yet there was a catch: the molecule also damaged the pancreas. And so they have since turned to other drugs to see if they can find others that achieve a similar result.

After screening over 1,000 different drugs already in existence, they came across two that seemed to have the desired effect. One of these, known as trazodone, is already used clinically to treat patients with depression, while the second, called DBM, is naturally found in small amounts in liquorice and is currently undergoing trials to see if it can effectively treat cancer.

The researchers first tested the drugs on mice that had a prion-related disease, and found that not only did it work in the same way that the previous one did in preventing brain cell death, the mice also showed improvement in disease-related behavior, while at the same time there was no observed impact on the pancreas. Following this, the drugs were then tested on mice that had other neurodegenerative diseases and they were found to improve their ability to perform memory tests.

This is promising news, as since the drugs have already been or are in the process of being tested on humans, it should make the process of proceeding to clinical trials much easier. While the researchers stress that the drugs are not a cure, they could prevent the disease progression, radically altering how we treat them. 

 this is only for your information, kindly take the advice of your doctor for medicines, exercises and so on.  
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  htps://gseasyrecipes.blogspot.com. feel free to view for easy, simple and healthy recipes  
 https://kneereplacement-stickclub.blogspot.com. for info on knee replacement