Category Archives: Transhuman News

The COVID-19 pill developed by Merck and Ridgeback Biotherapeutics appears to reduce the risk of hospitalization by inducing mutations in the coronavirus, preventing it from making copies of itself.

Preliminary results from a clinical trial were so promising that the companies stopped it early and asked the Food and Drug Administration this month for emergency authorization to market the antiviral drug.

But in a study led by University of North Carolina researchers earlier this year, the drug also induced low levels of mutations in the DNA of hamster cells in theory, suggesting it could pose a slight risk of cancer.

Risks for the host may not be zero, the authors wrote in the Journal of Infectious Diseases.

Scientists from Merck, based in Kenilworth, N.J., pushed back against the study in a letter to the journals editor, saying the cell experiments, conducted in a lab dish, were not relevant to how the drug would affect an entire animal much less a human being. The UNC authors then replied with their own letter, defending their methods and urging that until further studies are conducted, the drugs use should be limited to those at risk of severe consequences of COVID.

The back-and-forth between the scientists is crammed with technical terms that defy straightforward description. But there is no question the stakes are big. Pending authorization of the drug by the FDA, the U.S. government has agreed to buy $1.2 billion worth of the pills at roughly $700 per course of treatment, enough to treat 1.7 million people.

And well into year two of the pandemic, despite the availability of highly effective vaccines that prevent most hospitalizations, thousands of new patients are admitted to U.S. hospitals each week.

The scientific dispute was first reported in Barrons, days after Merck reported that the drug, called molnupiravir, appeared to reduce the risk of hospitalization and death by half.

That finding came from an international clinical trial in which high-risk adults with mild to moderate COVID were randomly chosen to receive either the drug or a placebo.

Among volunteers who got the placebo, 14.1% were either hospitalized or died within 29 days (53 out of 377 people), while just 7.3% of those who got the drug (28 out of 385) were hospitalized. No one in that group died prompting Anthony Fauci, the nations chief infectious-disease scientist, to call the results very impressive.

The complete data have yet to be published. But more details, such as the age and preexisting health conditions of trial participants, will be disclosed before the FDA takes action. None of the participants had been vaccinated.

Physicians say that if authorized for emergency use, molnupiravir would be a valuable weapon against COVID because the oral pills are so easy to use. A previously approved treatment called remdesivir, on the other hand, must be given intravenously.

The vir at the end of both names means they are antivirals designed to work by attacking the virus directly, rather than by treating patients symptoms or giving an assist to their immune systems.

Molnupiravir, the drug from Merck and Miami-based Ridgeback, is called a nucleoside analogue. That means its molecules are chemical cousins of one of the building blocks of RNA, the genetic material inside the coronavirus.

The similarity enables the molecules to incorporate themselves into the virus RNA and cause mutations in the process, said Brianne Barker, a Drew University biologist who studies the immune systems response to viruses.

But these mutations would not cause the virus to become more transmissible or virulent. The drug has more of a scattershot effect, adding more and more mutations in chemical bases throughout the virus genome until it can no longer copy itself a phenomenon called error catastrophe.

As the virus keeps reproducing, more and more of the wrong bases are being made, she said.

Yet in the UNC cell experiments, the drug also appeared to cause low levels of mutation in DNA the basis for the genetic code in humans. The issue is whether the dose in question poses any real risk.

In their letter challenging the UNC study, the Merck scientists noted that the hamster cells were exposed to the drug for 32 days, substantially longer than the 3-to-6-hour exposure duration typically used per established guidelines. Whats more, the Merck team said it conducted its own experiments in lab rats, not isolated cells, and found no evidence that the drug caused DNA mutations.

Ronald Swanstrom, one of the authors of the UNC study, agreed that the drug was promising. A biochemistry professor at the universitys medical school in Chapel Hill, he said his teams findings are simply a sign that more study is needed.

Its really an unknown risk, he said of the mutations. Its someplace between an inconsequential risk and an important risk.

Results from experiments in cells and lab animals often do not translate to humans. But if there is a slight chance the drug could cause DNA mutations in those who take it, perhaps it makes sense to give it only to people above a certain age, he said. Thats because they are at higher risk of severe COVID, and also are old enough that any low level of mutation would not lead to cancer before they die of other causes.

Im not against them giving out the drug, he said. What I would like to see the FDA require is that they limit it to people who would really benefit.

Barker, who was not involved with the UNC study, agreed that more studies would be useful. She said the tests that the UNC team used were sensitive, meaning they were able to detect DNA mutations at very low levels possibly so low as to pose no health threat.

To err on the safe side, she said, maybe this means that we dont use this in people of childbearing age.

Derek Lowe, a pharmaceutical chemist who writes about drug discovery for Science magazine, made the same suggestion in a blog post this week. With that restriction in place, the compound looks like it can find a valuable place in fighting the pandemic, he wrote.

Like most drug studies, the Merck trial excluded pregnant and breastfeeding women. And women of childbearing age were asked to use contraception or abstain from intercourse, as were men of all ages.

An FDA advisory panel is expected to review the study results within weeks, and agency authorization could come soon after that. In the meantime, Lowe, Fauci, and others offer a commonsense reminder: It is far better to rely on vaccines and other preventive measures.

It decreased the risk, this pill did, of hospitalizations and death by 50%, Fauci said on CNNs State of the Union. You know the way to decrease the risk by 100%? Dont get infected in the first place.

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Mercks COVID-19 pill and the unknown risk of DNA mutation - The Philadelphia Inquirer

Albert Fritz. (Photo: Peter Abrahams)

The failure of the South African Police Service to process critical DNA evidence has resulted in 161 cases related to violence against women and children being struck off the court roll between December 2020 and August this year.

These numbers came to light after a question posed by the provincial standing committee chairperson for social development Gillion Bosman to Community safety MEC Albert Fritz regarding gender-based violence (GBV) and femicide and sexual offences cases that had been struck off the roll and delayed since December last year.

The exchange further revealed that theDNA evidence was unavailable within a reasonable timeframe, leading to delays in the court process.

Gillion Bosman.

Fritz said in his response to Bosman: "The CWB (Western Cape Court Watching Brief) Unit does not have disaggregated information from the charge sheet as the charge sheet does not separate a GBV case from a femicide case as recorded. The separation can only be determined by the docket once the National Prosecuting Authority made an informed decision."

Fritz further said there was a number of issues that affected the reasons why cases were struck off the roll.

"The complainant will file a withdrawal statement with the investigating officer indicating the reasons why she or he does not want to proceed with the criminal case any further. The complainant becomes untraceable for the investigating officer to get hold of for consultation or to testify against the accused," he said.

READ MORE |SAPS' DNA backlog grows to almost 240 000 cases

He addedmost often young victims were unable to testify due to trauma or other related factors.

"In the majority of cases, the DNA evidence is not available within a reasonable time which causes delays to a speedy trial for an accused," Fritz added.

Bosman said there were fears that the number of such cases might very well be higher than 161.

"This is because the CWB monitors a sample of all court cases for the purpose of highlighting potential police inefficiencies. In this way, the CWB is a critical tool to aid the furtherance of justice, and one which only the Western Cape government carries out," he said.

Bosman added he submitted a dossier to the president's National Council on Gender-Based Violence on behalf of residents on this crucial matter.

Last month, the provincial government revealed that 37 647 sexual offence cases were outstanding in the Western Cape due to the backlog of DNA specimens not processed at the SAPS Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL).

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Crucial DNA evidence leads to 161 GBV being struck off the roll in the W Cape - News24

Ginkgo Bioworks (NYSE:DNA) stock is doing well on Tuesday as it recovers with new coverage from an analyst.

The coverage helping out Ginkgo Bioworks today comes from William Blair analyst Matt Larew. He kicked off coverage of the stock with an outperform rating. Its worth noting that theres not much coverage of DNA stock by analysts so there isnt a consensus rating. The same is true for the price target, which Larew doesnt include in his coverage.

So why is the William Blair analyst taking a bullish stance on DNA stock? He believes that synthetic biology has the potential to revolutionize virtually every industry. Larew claims that Ginkgo Bioworkss platform will make it a long-term leader in the sector.

Todays positive coverage of DNA stock have it bouncing back from a negative short report last week. Scorpion Capital was behind that report and went so far as to claim that the company was a scam created by hedge funds and a snake oil salesman. You can learn all about that at this link.

That new coverage today is translating to movement for DNA stock. As of this writing, some 10 million shares of Ginkgo Bioworks stock have changed hands. Thats approaching the companys daily average trading volume of about 12.3 million shares.

DNA stock is up 14.3% as of Tuesday afternoon.

Theres more stock news to dive into below!

InvestorPlace has all the latest stock coverage that traders need to know about. That includes the latest concerning ESS Tech(NYSE:GWH), Robinhood(NASDAQ:HOOD), and Bionano Geonomics(NASDAQ:BNGO) shares. You can find all of that at the following links!

On the date of publication, William Whitedid not have (either directly or indirectly) any positions in the securities mentioned in this article.The opinions expressed in this article are those of the writer, subject to the InvestorPlace.comPublishing Guidelines.

With only the rarest exceptions,InvestorPlacedoes not publish commentary about companies that have a market cap of less than $100 million or trade less than 100,000 shares each day. Thats because these penny stocks are frequently the playground for scam artists and market manipulators. If we ever do publish commentary on a low-volume stock that may be affected by our commentary, we demand thatInvestorPlace.comswriters disclose this fact and warn readers of the risks.

Read More:Penny Stocks How to Profit Without Getting Scammed

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DNA Stock: The Bull Call That Has Ginkgo Bioworks Bouncing Back After Last Week's "Scam" Accusation - InvestorPlace

Manchester United forward Cristiano Ronaldo said scoring is in his "DNA" after netting his 10th international hat trick for Portugal in Tuesday's World Cup qualifier over Luxembourg.

Ronaldo scored two penalties in the opening 13 minutes before completing his treble late in the game to help Portugal clinch a 5-0 win (stream the replay on ESPN+ in the U.S.).

- "Messi, forgive my mother... she called me Cristiano"- Stream ESPN FC Daily on ESPN+ (U.S. only)- Don't have ESPN? Get instant access

The 36-year-old has taken his tally to 115 goals for the national team, while he has now netted 794 senior goals since scoring his first professional goal on Oct. 7, 2002.

"Another victory, another step towards our goal, another historic night in defense of our colours!" Ronaldo said in an Instagram post.

"I had promised that I would always be looking for more and more and more! It is in my DNA and in our DNA, we are never satisfied, we never let our arms down and we will always fight for everything we can achieve!"

The Portugal captain recently spoke about his "ambition to motivate and do better" after overtaking Iran's Ali Daei as the top men's career international goal scorer.

Earlier this year, Ronaldo became the first player to win the top scorer award in three different leagues after netting 29 times for Juventus last season.

Ronaldo, who is Real Madrid's all-time goalscorer with 451 goals, won the "Pichichi" award as the top goalscorer in LaLiga three times.

Since returning to United, where he won the award as top Premier League scorer in 2008, Ronaldo has scored five goals and was voted as the league's player of the month for September.

Ronaldo is in contention for his sixth Ballon d'Or after being named among the 30 nominees for the prestigious award.

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Portugal's Cristiano Ronaldo on hitting 10th international hat trick Scoring in my DNA - ESPN

It almost sounds like Jurassic Park. Dino DNA? Wheres the animated double helixwhen you need it? While dinosaur DNA remains elusive, there's a chance it could be hiding in a 125-million-year-old fossil.

John Hammond would be disappointed because hed want to hatch raptors but paleobioloist Alida Bailleul of the Chinese Academy of Sciences, who led a study recently published in Communications Biology, is cautiously optimistic. While we cant resurrect monster theropods that can snap up an entire human as a meal, she and her team have found fossilized dinosaur cartilage in which there could possibly be preserved genetic material from an actual dinosaur.

Bailleul had previously studied a much younger fossil that still wouldnt give up most of its genetic secrets. 75 million years underground will do that.

We didn't find any DNA in there yet, she told SYFY WIRE. We don't even know if there will be any DNA in these cells, but a real-lifeJurassic Parkwill never happen. We can never clone dinosaurs and bring them back to life, even if we have their entire genome sequenced."

The cartilage belonged to Caudipteryx, a feathered reptile that vaguely resembled a peacock, which shouldnt be that surprising because birds are the closest thing you can find to a living dinosaur. Suspicion of DNA hit when the research team compared its fossilized cells to those of chickens. They found that structures in Caudipteryx cells that at least resembled chromatin, which is the material chromosomes are made of. Whether these structures are actually fragments of DNA is what they are now trying to investigate, because they could be anything.

Even fossils that are immaculately preserved may show no signs of DNA. It often degrades too quickly, which is why any ancient DNA that has been able to survive even hundreds of thousands of years, never mind hundreds of millions, is a find. The oldest DNA ever sequenced is that of a species of woolly mammoth that last roamed Siberia some 1.2 million years ago. Now try a specimen that is slightly over a hundred times as old. Even if the Caudipteryx fossil contains remnants of the dinosaurs genes, it is unlikely that they will appear as they once did.

If there is any DNA or any DNA-like molecule in there, it will most likely be very chemically modified and altered by diagenesis, with crosslinks everywhere, said Bailleul. It most likely cannot be sequenced, either.

Diagenesis consists of all the processes involved in morphing sediment into sedimentary rock, and any physical or chemical changes affect bones that are trapped in that rock as well. DNA usually doesnt survive this. If there is DNA in the cartilage specimen, it may have been altered beyond recognition, or ended up too fragmented to reveal much information. The Caudypteryx cells reacted like normal cells once stained and examined in a lab. That really doesn't mean much except that they probably contain organic molecules and maybe DNA.

That is a dino-sized maybe. Even organics on distant worlds like Mars and Titan are not enough to provide proof that life exists there, because no alien DNA has shown up yet. The only thing that is certain right now is that these are original dinosaur cells and nuclei that have not been invaded by bacteria. It is impossible for bacteria to mimic actual cell nuclei, but that is just one of the many things that need to be ruled out. What is in the nuclei of the cells needs to be determined chemically in order for Bailleul and her team to be certain whether or not it is DNA.

Its complicated to figure out, which is why we need to use different chemical methods to figure out exactly what those organic molecules are, she said. I hope we can reconstruct a sequencesomeday, somehow. I could be wrong, but I could also be right.

Sorry, Hammond, but it doesn't look like your dream of a prehistoric theme park is ever going to come to life. Not that wed necessarily want it to.

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Could real-life dino DNA finally be within reach thanks to this amazingly preserved fossil? - SYFY WIRE

Ever wonder what could happen if your DNA data were leaked in a cyber attack and then sold to companies? Well, this is a question that anyone who has asked or is planning to do some kind of genetic test, like Ancestry, andMe and MyHeritage, you should ask yourself.

On some level, its like someone stealing your card details of credit, but potentially less disastrous. Its much less harmful to your life than if someone with bad intentions stole your credit card or your social security number, explains computer biology expert and University of Southern California researcher Michael Edge .

Leakage of the genetic code is as if credit card data were stolen (Image: Reproduction/Peggy und Marco Lachmann-Anke/Pixabay)

On the other hand, the advancement of scientific knowledge may bring greater problems for the user who had the genomic data leaked. Thats because theres a consensus in the scientific community that an individuals genome will reveal a lot about individuals in the future, Edge explains. The lucky is that this is not yet a reality.

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However, genetic information cannot be changed, which can easily be done with a credit card. Today, it is possible to discover the level of relatedness between different people through these data and this will be forever available in cases of leakage. In addition, this information can end up in public banks, specialized in DNA, around the world. In most cases, there are no risks in these scenarios, but sometimes the information can be used for other purposes, much less noble.

Therefore, users should be careful in accepting the privacy policy of companies that promise to read DNA tests. In this regard, a North American survey, carried out in 1024, found that 35 of 90 companies operating in this sector did not supply information on how they would handle biological samples or genetic data from their users. This is potentially worrisome.

In addition, companies tend to share this data with third-party companies on a standard basis, and even those that require consent to share data have wide discretion over sharing, as consent is usually given by the user

What laws exist to protect genetic data?

In the US and most of the world, there are still few federal laws governing the use of genetic information and most representatives politicians have no basis to technically discuss these DNA topics.

Among the available cases, the Genetic Information Nondiscrimination Act (GINA) prevents the genetic information of a US individual from being used to deny health insurance coverage and to discriminate against them in a work environment. In other words, having an increased risk for developing Alzheimers or any other hereditary condition cannot prevent a person from accessing health care. However, GINA does not cover life insurance, for example.

In addition, some state laws govern genetic privacy. For example, residents of the state of California have the right to receive information from these companies about the sharing of information obtained, including to whom the data is delivered. However, the initiatives are still small compared to the preciousness that the genetic code can deliver.

And in Brazil?

We have already mentioned it here at Canaltech what could happen if a persons genomic data fell into the wrong hands. We spoke with Leandro Netto, lawyer specializing in digital law at Lima Junior | Domene (LJD), who told us the following: The LGPD regulates any and all data that identifies or may make an individual identifiable. And DNA is one of the most accurate ways to identify someone. It is important to consider that the LGPD is not only regulates the storage, shipping, collection and other forms of use of DNA while classified as personal data. Furthermore, the LGPD expressly determines that DNA is classified as sensitive personal data, which imposes on companies that employ this information is more careful and also a greater duty of information to its holders.

As for the regulation by Anvisa, so far, we still dont have anything similar here. Anvisa regulates the activity of laboratories that carry out clinical analysis tests. But there is no express provision about their link to DNA tests. In another parallel, although the DNA test for biological link purposes is classified by the Federal Council of Medicine as a medical act, there is no sufficiently clear regulation for these exams. It is important to point out that there are bills addressing the subject, but, so far, any normative application would be carried out by analogy and in an incipient way, explains the lawyer.

Source: Live Science

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What are the risks of data leakage when taking a DNA test? The Clare People - The Clare People