Macromolecules biochemistry

New Delhi: Startup Jeevam Health on Tuesday said it has raised Rs 1.8 crore from Y Combinator in a pre-seed investment round. Founded in 2020, the company is targeting to provide service to 200 million Indians suffering from chronic health conditions like autoimmune and metabolic issues. Unlike conventional doctors who prescribe medication to suppress or manage the symptoms, Jeevam doctors use nutritional biochemistry , advanced diagnostics , and digital tools to identify the root cause of patient disease and aim to cure the root cause. "Getting backed by Y Combinator reinforces our vision to transform primary healthcare in India," JeevamHealth co-founder and CEO Piyush Vishwakarma said in a statement. Jeevam Health co-founder and chief technology officer Kamran Alam said a team at the company is working on building the software stack to analyse thousands of biomarkers using functional medicine concepts and seek patterns in the patient's health conditions. "The … [Read more...] about Jeevam Health raises Rs 1.8 crore from Y Combinator

Hardly a year ago, Özlem Türeci and Ugur Sahin were still largely unknown names in the world of Big Pharma. Having founded their small biotech firm with the name BioNTech only in 2008, the work of the married couple focused primarily on cancer research. But due to the devastating coronavirus pandemic and BioNTech's project named "Lightspeed" launched in mid-January 2020, erstwhile the husband and wife team have become much feted around the world for developing the first vaccine against COVID-19 — the disease caused by an infection with the virus. Their shot, produced with US partner Pfizer , has proven more than 90% effective in creating immunity against the original virus , and reportedly also against its British and South African variants. Therefore, one can rightly say BioNTech CEO Ugur Sahin and his chief medical officer, Özlem Türeci, are saving the lives of millions of people around the world. Germany's highest honors German President Frank-Walter … [Read more...] about BioNTech vaccine inventors receive Germany’s Knight Commander’s Cross

More cash from the Canadian Agricultural Partnership is flowing into Niagara. Announced at the Vineland Research and Innovation Centre (VRIC) on March 18 during a rare in-person news conference, at least $330,000 of taxpayer dollars from the federal-provincial agriculture partnership will be used for the purchase of specialized equipment to improve research capabilities for two VRIC research projects. The first project will look at harvesting and storage practices for apples and tomatoes, with research being improved by the use of new equipment to evaluate air quality, food ripening and shelf life, revealed Toby Barrett, the parliamentary assistant to the province’s agriculture minister. “With respect to our massive integrated food system, it’s so important to be able to have storage, particularly over the winter,” Barrett said, noting his prior experience working in a controlled-atmosphere apple storage facility. The fruit research, he said, will help growers to make “better … [Read more...] about Vineland Research and Innovation Centre to get $330K for two projects

"Why doesn't s/he just stop when s/he knows how much it's hurting me?" This is one of the most common questions asked by those who love someone addicted to substances and/or harmful behaviors. It might be helpful for those loved ones to know that stopping isn't simply a matter of wanting to, or simply understanding that you may be causing someone else's pain. Research indicates that to "just stop" is not so easy. One of the main reasons is called dopamine . Research on the brain indicates that addiction is about powerful memories, and recovery is a slow process in which the influence of those memories is diminished. Both addictive drugs and highly pleasurable or intense experiences (such as a life or death thrill, a crime , or an orgasm ) trigger the release of the brain chemical dopamine, which in turn creates a reward circuit in the brain. This circuit registers that intense experience as "important" and creates lasting memories of it as a pleasurable experience. … [Read more...] about Dopamine: Why It’s So Hard to “Just Say No”

The image of a boy with shining eyes and crippled limbs damaged by Agent Orange prompted Ngo Thi Thuy Huong, born in 1974, "to do something" to revive contaminated land in Vietnam. Dr Ngo Thi Thuy Huong In the 1990s, aquaculture was still not a properly invested industry. Therefore, Huong, who was then a student, cherished the dream of studying aquaculture to find solutions to obtain high yield. During her four years at university, Huong had chances to go to many areas and she realized that people were raising fish without a specific method. In 1999-2001, while studying for a master’s degree in aquaculture at Ghent University in Belgium, she spent time on deep studies in ecotoxicology with the focus on assessing the impact of heavy metals on the health of aquatic species and danger to humans. Ecotoxicology remains an unfamiliar concept in Vietnam which has not received appropriate attention. “For me, just analyzing the content of toxins in the environment, that’s not … [Read more...] about Female scientist dreams of reviving contaminated land