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Month: December 2022

HKBU develops new aptamer drug for bone anabolic therapies

Posted on by HKBUCPRO

A research team led by Hong Kong Baptist University (HKBU) has identified a molecular target for bone anabolic therapies using a selected aptamer that serves as an inhibitor of sclerostin, a protein that prevents bone growth. The discovery offers hope for the development of an effective next-generation treatment for osteoporosis and osteogenesis imperfecta that is free of cardiovascular risk compared to the marketed antibody drug.

The research findings have been published in the international academic journals Nature Communications and Theranostics. The new drug is at the pre-clinical trial development stage, and the research team plans to start clinical trials in the US and on the Mainland in 2024.

Current medication increases cardiovascular risk

Osteoporosis is a metabolic condition which leads to a reduction in bone density, resulting in weakened bones that are more fragile and likely to break. Osteogenesis imperfecta, also known as “brittle bone disease”, is a rare congenital genetic disorder characterised by extremely fragile bones. Sclerostin has been identified as a therapeutic target for both diseases.

In 2019, the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved the use of the monoclonal antibody against sclerostin for the treatment of postmenopausal osteoporosis. Studies have also shown that sclerostin antibody enhances bone mass and bone strength of mice with osteogenesis imperfecta. However, as sclerostin plays a protective role in the cardiovascular system, it was seen that sclerostin antibody increased the risk of heart attacks, stroke and cardiovascular death during clinical trials. Therefore, a black box warning for potential cardiovascular risks is required by FDA.

A research team led by Professor Lyu Aiping, Dr. Kennedy Y.H. Wong Endowed Professor in Chinese Medicine and Director of the Institute of Integrated Bioinformedicine and Translational Science at HKBU; Professor Zhang Ge, Director of the Law Sau Fai Institute for Advancing Translational Medicine in Bone and Joint Diseases at HKBU; and Dr Yu Yuanyuan, Manager of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macau Greater Bay Area International Research Platform for Aptamer-based Translational Medicine and Drug Discovery and Assistant Professor of the School of Chinese Medicine at HKBU, endeavoured to develop alternative drug options.

“loop3” identified as a new therapeutic target

Sclerostin suppresses bone formation by antagonising the “Wnt signalling pathway”. The “Wnt signalling pathway” modulates the stem cells responsible for skeletal tissue regeneration. Therefore, inhibition of sclerostin promotes bone growth.

The research team discovered that a “loop3 domain” in the core region of sclerostin can be used as a molecular target to inhibit sclerostin. Through genetic studies, it was shown that deficiency of the loop3 domain can inhibit sclerostin’s antagonistic effect against the Wnt signalling pathway, but it does not affect the cardiovascular protective effect of sclerostin. The result suggests that the loop3 domain can serve as a molecular target for inhibiting sclerostin while preserving its cardiovascular protective function.

The researchers then proceeded to screen aptamers that can specifically inhibit sclerostin loop3. Aptamers are single-stranded DNA or RNA molecules that can selectively bind to molecular targets such as proteins. After binding with specific proteins, aptamers may inhibit protein–protein interactions and thereby elicit certain therapeutic effects. Through a combinatorial technology, an aptamer “aptscl56” was selected as a potential sclerostin inhibitor that targets the loop3 structure.

Aptamer selected as effective and safe sclerostin inhibitor

The research team examined aptscl56’s therapeutic functions with osteoporotic rat models and osteogenesis imperfecta mouse models. They found that aptscl56 effectively promots bone formation. On the other hand, the application of aptscl56 does not increase the risk of developing cardiovascular diseases such as aortic aneurysms and atherosclerotic development in both models.

The medical use of aptamers confers certain advantages, such as thermal stability and ease of synthesis. However, they are prone to rapid degradation and renal filtration. The research team therefore modified aptscl56 to produce an aptamer named “Apc001” with a longer half-life. The team demonstrated that Apc001 promotes bone formation, increases bone mass, improves bone microarchitecture integrity, and enhances bone mechanical properties in rats with osteoporosis and mice with osteogenesis imperfecta.

Clinical trials due to start in 2024

“Searching for reliable and safe alternatives to overcome the limitations of the currently available drugs is crucial to help patients who need bone anabolic therapies. Our ongoing studies, which span from identifying molecular targets for sclerostin inhibition to aptamer drug discovery, offer hope for the development of next-generation sclerostin inhibitors in the near future,” said Professor Zhang Ge.

“Our search for alternative drugs for bone anabolic therapies is a good example of tripartite collaboration between academia, industry and the government. The research work was partly conducted in collaboration with a local biotechnology company, and it was supported by the Innovation and Technology Fund. Some biotechnology companies in the Mainland were engaged in certain aspects of developmental research for the aptamer, such as toxicology tests. The collaborative efforts will continue to create more synergy and fruitful results,” said Professor Lyu Aiping.

The therapeutic aptamer Apc001 was granted orphan drug designation by the FDA for the treatment of osteogenesis imperfecta in 2019.

American University of Sharjah launches PhD in Biosciences and Bioengineering

Posted on by Amy Robinson

American University of Sharjah (AUS) is launching a new doctoral program in biosciences and bioengineering (PhD-BSBE), which will be available for students starting Fall 2023.

This is the fourth PhD program in the university’s portfolio, expanding AUS’ position as a provider of outstanding graduate education and leader in novel research. The multidisciplinary program is delivered by the College of Engineering in collaboration with the College of Arts and Sciences. Graduates of this program will be prepared to combat current and future healthcare challenges nationally and globally and be equipped with the necessary knowledge and skills to become future researchers, academics and entrepreneurs.

“Developments in the UAE and wider Middle East have contributed to the decision of the university to launch this program. The MENA region saw exponential population growth in the latter part of the 20th century and into the 21st century. With this population growth has come increased demand for essential services such as healthcare, food, security, water and energy. Professionals who are highly skilled in the fields of bioscience and bioengineering are essential to the development and universal provision of such services. Those completing the new PhD-BSBE will be well-placed to assist governments and private providers in the region and around the world ensure that populations are adequately catered for across these services, both now and into the future. They will apply their knowledge in biology, engineering and technology to address today’s medical needs and produce innovative solutions that enhance healthcare services,” said Dr. Fadi Aloul, Dean of CEN.

PhD-BSBE students will be advised and taught by qualified faculty at the forefront of their fields, and who are currently engaged in several research projects in biosensors and implantable devices, biomechanics, cardiovascular disease, cancer, cellular physiology, drug delivery, healthcare management, infectious diseases, inflammation, medical imaging and bioinformatics, microfluidics and lab-on-a-chip, neuroscience, and neuroengineering.

“The interdisciplinary nature of the program stimulates an academic environment that promotes excellence in teaching and research, helping students to become competent, innovative and responsible professionals. The PhD-BSBE program will directly serve to realize the UAE agenda by providing high-quality biosciences and bioengineering education to support the healthcare services, biotechnology and life sciences sectors,” said Dr. Mahmoud Anabtawi, Dean of CAS.

The program admits part-time and full-time students, with full-time students offered the opportunity to be considered for a competitive full graduate assistantship for the duration of the program. Program admission is based on applicants’ academic history, research capabilities and proficiency in specialized skills demanded by their area of research.

For more information about the program and admission requirements, visit www.aus.edu/cen/phd-in-biosciences-and-bioengineering.

Go East

Posted on by Anton John Crace

Founded in 2017, King’s Business School shares a number of qualities with its Asian counterparts. Young, vibrant, looking for connections and ready to tackle some of the world’s pressing problems. Professor Stephen Bach, Executive Dean of the business school, sat down with QS-GEN in Singapore to discuss why the college is looking East. Anton John Crace reports.

QS: Historically, business schools, especially those primarily offering MBAs, were an American idea. In the 1980s and 1990s, the model started to make its way across the Atlantic into Europe and in the late 1990 and early 2000s across the Pacific into Asia. The leaders of business schools we speak to in Asia talk about using their relative youth as a selling point for differentiation. King’s Business School is very young as well. How are you differentiating yourselves?

Stephen Bach: One of the things we are really conscious of is that the world is moving East and we are careful not to be too UK-centric or US-centric in our orientation and in our curriculum. That’s reflected in the makeup of our student body and in our staff. We have 80-90 nationalities, our faculty is very international; that allows us to look at business in different contexts. So we are global in our nature.

Our other key differentiator is that we are putting sustainability and responsible business at the heart of King’s Business School, threading this through our curriculum in a variety of ways. For instance, business ethics is a mandatory topic at an early stage in our undergraduate programmes, and it is a consideration throughout our courses and modules. We also encourage our students to do consultancy projects, not just with big multinationals, but to support small businesses that we identify through our partnerships with our local municipalities. London is a city of huge inequality. You can move two kilometres down the road and you move from incredible wealth to incredible poverty. We think it is important for our students to understand that.

We’re doing a lot more on the ESG – environmental, social and governance – considerations that businesses face. We want our students understand the complexities and the trade-offs between the three elements and how to generate both financial returns and societal returns.

Next year, we’re launching our executive MBA: better business for a better world. We see that as quite an under-innovated market. Our EMBA will be focussed on big global challenges and our aim is to equip people to lead businesses under conditions of great uncertainty. How do you manage the complexities of ESG impact investing? What about the values that your people hold in different generations? How do you reconcile them? This interaction between business and society is very central to how we think about the role of the business school at King’s.

QS: During the pandemic itself, but especially now, the discipline within business that kept coming up over and over again was supply chain management, for example within the area of silicon chip manufacturing. Is there anything that Kings is noticing as a new area of business study and concern?

SB: I think we’re going to be seeing a lot more focus on the ‘S’ of ESG. At King’s we have a very strong Human Resource Management and Strategy, International Management and Entrepreneurship Departments working on issues like modern slavery and how we keep illegal and exploitative employment practises out of our supply chains. There is also work on the varieties of diversity. Not just gender diversity, but we also do a lot of work on disability. For example, we help run the All Party Parliamentary Group on Disability which raises UK parliamentarians’ understanding of disability related issues, including the issue of access to work.

Another very critical focus at the moment is health systems. I think health systems around the world are under huge strain, both in terms of the burden on the workforce and the expectations around the potential of new innovations and technologies. I think business schools like ours, working in partnership with King’s health faculties, with our engineers and lawyers, have got a lot to say about how we could transform those health systems.

QS: There’s an academic perspective that argues the class lines run much deeper than racial and gender lines. One of the areas we’re always pushing is the understanding that there are no bad students just students in bad situations. How is King’s living its values in this area?

SB: Traditionally these issues have loomed large in British society. There are a number of ways in to answer your question.

One of the things that we’ve done as a business school is we work very closely with the Sutton Trust, an organisation that very much works in the area of bringing people of disadvantaged backgrounds into universities, to lift their sights in a variety of ways. We start early around the ages of 15 or 16 with some of our local schools in pockets of real deprivation that have many families with no previous experience of higher education. We bring the students in for half a day or a day and just try to ignite their interests. For example, we might talk about the role of social media and branding: something that relates to our areas of academic focus and which is going to get them talking.

We also have a couple of more structured programmes, working with students closely, mentoring them and then bring them through a foundation programme. It’s not automatic that they would get into the business school, but we have a very high success rate and many will go on to other universities. This year, in terms of students from the UK, 48 percent of our undergraduates came from what we call widening participation backgrounds. We’re very pleased about that, but we’re also not naive. We then need to track their progress. Are they dropping out? It doesn’t appear to be the case, but we need to keep very close tabs on that.

QS: What is King’s looking to achieve, having strong partnerships with in Singapore and Asia?

SB: This is a very important market for King’s Business School going forward. We see Singapore as a tremendous area of growth; in financial services and other areas and other parts of the economy. We see Singapore as a gateway to this part of the world. There’s an increasing number of applications from Indonesia, Thailand, Vietnam, Malaysia. We want to attract the best students to come to King’s Business School so that they can avail themselves of an amazing education and stay to start their early careers in London – something that is enabled by our visa regulations.

We also we want to connect with our alumni in the region and draw them more into the business school. We want them to get involved in activities like our student mentoring programmes, or perhaps to draw on our talented students for their organisations’ own internship schemes.

Connections in the region could also be valuable for our new EMBA programme, which will be global in scope: one thing we are interested in exploring is virtual classrooms of students working in London with students maybe at some of the institutions here. This is an important and growing centre both economically and in terms of higher education, so we want to engage with our alumni here and think about future partnerships that will enrich our education and our research.

This article was from the QS Global Education News Issue 10. Download the full edition.

Thammasat students receive awards from the ‘Cultural Textiles Awards 2022’

Posted on by Thammasat University

Students from the Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts, Thammasat University received awards from the Cultural Textiles Awards 2022 of the Department of Cultural Promotion, Ministry of Culture to extend the design of Thai textiles to the international stage. This year, students of the Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts, Thammasat University received a total of 8 awards in various categories, and alumni of the Faculty of Fine and Applied Arts received 3 other awards, including the first prize in the creative textile category.

Creative textile Category

Saksit Pattaraprakit received the first prize for the work entitled “NEO-ZENKON NAKHON”

Petcharat Phrompool received the second runner-up award for the work entitled “In to the city”

Jesadaporn Sawatdiphan received an honorable mention for the work entitled “The rebirth of Andaman”

Natthanon Sangdaeng received an honorable mention for the work “Serpenti (Skin and Pattern of Snake)”

Silk Category

Thananuch Makdee received an honorable mention for the work entitled “Color of the wind”

Attaphon Meephan received an honorable mention for the work entitled “Return”

Cotton Category

Pemika Piahiang received the first runner-up award for the work entitled “Muang Khong” (Muang Khong Sub-District, Chiang Dao District, Chiang Mai Province)

Thatchet Prabpram received the second runner-up award for the work entitled “See Sea”

Nattaporn Jangpho received an honorable mention for the work entitled “The Riverside”

Pareeyuth Thongbamrer received an honorable mention for the work entitled “Khai Rang”

Rattawan Ruangsamut received an honorable mention for the work entitled “Nang Nuan”

EdUHK Dr Chrysa Keung addresses the needs of children from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds

Posted on by eduhk

Every child matters, and educational experiences when young, often leave an impression on people for the rest of their lives. For Dr Chrysa Keung, Assistant Professor of Department of Education Policy and Leadership (EPL) at The Education University of Hong Kong (EdUHK), the development of children from socioeconomically disadvantaged backgrounds is a key focus of her work. Her aim is to help young children develop positive thinking from an early age.

“A change in mindset can be initiated from the kindergarten stage, and parents, teachers, and even children do not allow external conditions to limit their thinking and future development,” she says.

Equality in education

Dr Keung majored in sociology and minored in anthropology at a university in Hong Kong. She began her academic interest during her PhD study, where she started looking at equality in education. Her thesis examined the relationship between family background and adolescents’ expectations for pursuing university education. After joining EdUHK, she remained committed to caring for people from socio-economically disadvantaged backgrounds, and further extended her areas of interest to education for younger children.

She pointed out that the working environment for early education is becoming more and more complex, and kindergarten teachers in Hong Kong need to consider the needs of children from different family backgrounds. For example, families in which both parents work, new arrivals to Hong Kong, as well as families from ethnic minorities all have very different living and educational experiences. “When designing teaching themes, kindergarten teachers will organise learning activities according to their social and economic background differences and the context of life experience. But the selection of content should not be limited to this scope,” Dr Keung says. She emphasises that children from these backgrounds need special care and attention from early years teachers, to identify individual needs and provide the appropriate support. This can present a significant challenge to teachers.

Dr Keung’s research project has won funding from the Research Grants Council’s (RGC) Early Career Scheme (ECS). Currently, the project targets six districts in Hong Kong based on their relatively higher level of poverty. Kindergarten teachers from these districts have been invited to take part in interviews, and to observe their daily teaching approach, as well as document the way they interact with young children. Through the project, Dr Keung hoped to better understand the professional challenges faced by frontline kindergarten teachers. This way, she can offer suitable suggestions to improve pre-service training; and ultimately enhance the professional standards of future kindergarten teachers.

Participation by students

Dr Keung intends to use the funding received from Early Career Award so that undergraduate and postgraduate students can participate in the research project. This will enable future teachers to gain valuable experience in research work, acquire relevant skills and understand more of the complexities faced by frontline teachers.

Tokyo University of Science researches complex magnetization reversal mechanism

Posted on by Tokyo University of Science

Researchers develop a super-hierarchical and explanatory analysis of magnetization reversal that could improve the reliability of spintronics devices.

The reliability of data storage and writing speed in advanced magnetic devices depend on drastic, complex changes in microscopic magnetic domain structures. However, it is extremely challenging to quantify these changes, limiting our understanding of magnetic phenomena. To tackle this, researchers from Japan developed, using machine learning and topology, an analysis method that quantifies the complexity of the magnetic domain structures, revealing hidden features of magnetization reversal that are hardly seen by human eyes. Spintronic devices and their operation are governed by the microstructures of magnetic domains. These magnetic domain structures undergo complex, drastic changes when an external magnetic field is applied to the system. The resulting fine structures are not reproducible, and it is challenging to quantify the complexity of magnetic domain structures. Our understanding of the magnetization reversal phenomenon is, thus, limited to crude visual inspections and qualitative methods, representing a severe bottleneck in material design. It has been difficult to even predict the stability and shape of the magnetic domain structures in Permalloy, which is a well-known material studied over a century.

Addressing this issue, a team of researchers headed by Professor Masato Kotsugi from Tokyo University of Science, Japan, recently developed an AI-based method for analyzing material functions in a more quantitative manner. In their work published in Science and Technology of Advanced Materials: Methods, the team used topological data analysis and developed a super-hierarchical and explanatory analysis method for magnetic reversal processes. In simple words, “super-hierarchical” means, according to the research team, the connection between micro and macro properties, which are usually treated as isolated but, in the big scheme, contribute jointly to the physical explanation.

The team quantified the complexity of the magnetic domain structures using persistent homology, a mathematical tool used in computational topology that measures topological features of data persisting across multiple scales. The team further visualized the magnetization reversal process in two-dimensional space using principal component analysis, a data analysis procedure that summarizes large datasets by smaller “summary indices,” facilitating better visualization and analysis. As Prof. Kotsugi explains, “The topological data analysis can be used for explaining the complex magnetization reversal process and evaluating the stability of the magnetic domain structure quantitatively.” The team discovered that slight changes in the structure invisible to the human eye that indicated a hidden feature dominating the metastable/stable reversal processes can be detected by this analysis. They also successfully determined the cause of the branching of the macroscopic reversal process in the original microscopic magnetic domain structure.

In a recent study, researchers from Japan developed an analysis method, based on persistent homology, a mathematical tool, and principal component analysis, to quantify the complex changes in microscopic magnetic domain structures that are hard to detect with the naked eye.

 

The novelty of this research lies in its ability to connect magnetic domain microstructures and macroscopic magnetic functions freely across hierarchies by applying the latest mathematical advances in topology and machine learning. This enables the detection of subtle microscopic changes and subsequent prediction of stable/metastable states in advance that was hitherto impossible.  “This super-hierarchical and explanatory analysis would improve the reliability of spintronics devices and our understanding of stochastic/deterministic magnetization reversal phenomena,” says Prof. Kotsugi.

Interestingly, the new algorithm, with its superior explanatory capability, can also be applied to study chaotic phenomenon as the butterfly effect. On the technological front, it could potentially improve the reliability of next-generation magnetic memory writing, and aid the development of new hardware for the next generation of devices.

Reference

DOI: https://doi.org/10.1080/27660400.2022.2149037

Title of original paper: Super-hierarchical and explanatory analysis of magnetization reversal process using topological data analysis

Journal: Science and Technology of Advanced Materials: Methods

LCCM hosts the inaugural Mathew Knowles Scholarship Competition

Posted on by Global University Systems

London College of Creative Media (LCCM) recently hosted the inaugural, grand final of the Mathew Knowles Scholarship competition. Taking place in front of a sold-out audience at the college’s iconic Music Box venue, five students battled it out to win the enticing prize of free tuition for up to three years of studying. The competition is named after Dr Mathew Knowles, the GRAMMY-Award winning US music executive. Knowles is also known as the mastermind behind the success of Destiny’s Child and his daughters Beyoncé and Solange and he is a visiting lecturer at LCCM. After a show of talented performances and a tight competition, the Mathew Knowles Scholarship was awarded to the postgraduate producer Felix Clarke. “Winning the Scholarship was a huge honour, a bit beyond comprehension. I feel incredibly fortunate to be able to study something I’ve dreamt of my entire life.” On receiving the scholarship from Mathew Knowles, he quipped: “It’s crazy. Destiny’s Child was one of the first CDs I ever bought. It’s come full circle!”

The finalists, India Shinton (producer and performer), Angel Seka (producer and performer), Jevon Langridge (drummer), Opeyemi Martins (music business) and Felix Clarke were judged by a top-tier panel of music experts, Columbia Record A&R Lashawna Stewart and songwriter for PINK, Michael Kay, as well as Dr Mathew Knowles. Commenting on the scholarship and the grand final, host and LCCM creative industries liaison JD Donovan said: “The Mathew Knowles scholarship was a fantastic year-long initiative, with more than 100 young musicians and applicants putting themselves forward. We showcased some incredible talents and provided an incredible final night of entertainment and positivity. How the judges narrowed it down to two finalists, Felix and India, I just don’t know.”

Elsewhere at LCCM in October, the college hosted its first graduation ceremony since the pandemic. Hosted at Hilton London Bankside’s beautiful “Bankside Ballroom,” with more than 100 students and 300 guests, the ceremony was led by LCCM’s Programme Administration Manager and Master of Ceremonies Andres Castellanos followed by Principal Anthony Hamer-Hodges. Dr Mathew Knowles also took to the lectern, delivering the Honorary Valedictory speech, having earlier hand-signed a motivational letter for every graduate.

LCCM graduates include BRIT Award winner Tom Walker, and fellow artists and writers Rhys Lewis and Chiara Hunter. Other former students making waves include Marie Dahlstrom, JOY (ANONYMOUS), Sans Soucis (just signed to Decca Records) and Nathan Challinor, the latter for his co-writes with BBC Sound of 2022 finalist Baby Queen. LCCM’s custom-built teaching and artist development facility The Music Box in Central London features a 120-cap entertainment venue and multiple recording studios. Major artists including Kojey Radical, Moses Boyd, Amber Run, Novelist and Kara Marni have spent time rehearsing or recording from The Music Box in recent months, as well as meeting with LCCM students.

Faculty of Public Health at Thammasat initiates ‘Health in Detention’ course

Posted on by Thammasat University

The Faculty of Public Health at Thammasat University in collaboration with the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC) jointly organized a course for both Thai and international graduates of the Faculty of Public Health on “Health in Detention”.

The course has been in development since 2017, making Thammasat the first university in Asia-Pacific to offer this course. The objective is to allow attendees to obtain basic knowledge in promoting, preventing, and taking care of the health of prisoners. They also have access to the health system, the justice system, and medical ethics including social and environmental factors affecting the health of prisoners including exchanging
knowledge with the on-site officers.

Asst. Prof. Dr. Wannapha Naravej, Lecturer of the Faculty of Public Health, Thammasat University said that the “Raising Awareness of Health in Detention Course” of the Faculty of Public Health, Thammasat University is included as part of the Master’s degree program in Global Health under GH 662 Health in Detention subject. This year, the course is organized in the form of a Hybrid class (Onsite & Online) with the objectives to enhance learning and understanding of the detention system and the problem of the prison population. Special emphasis will be placed on the role of human rights and professional ethics in providing well-being to men, women, and children in detention and detention internationally in the wake of COVID-19.

The course has been honored by lecturers who are experts in various disciplines, such as representatives of the International Committee of the Red Cross (ICRC), Department of Corrections, Ministry of Justice, Thailand Institute of Justice, Ministry of Public Health as well as professors and experts in Global Health, Faculty of Public Health, Thammasat University.

 

CUVET has developed the first stem cell transportation technology to treat pet diabetes

Posted on by Chulalongkorn University

For the first time in Thailand, a research team from Chula’s Faculty of Veterinary Science (CUVET) is the first to have successfully developed a method to culture dog pancreatic cells from stem cells and cell transplantation technology.  They aim to test the method in the lab and sick animals suffering from diabetes.

Diabetes affects not only humans but also our pets with as many as 5-10 % of the cases found in cats as well as dogs.  Treatment with insulin injections is still not very effective. For this reason, a research team from Chula’s Faculty of Veterinary Science has collaborated with Bio ink Co., Ltd., one of Chula’s spin-off companies, to develop a method for pancreatic cell culture from stem cells and cell transplantation technology for the first time in Thailand. “Diabetes in humans and pets share some similarities though the knowledge on the treatment is far apart.  Using stem cells and advanced forms of technology to treat diabetes in human beings has become a trend, so we try to apply this technology to animal treatment as well,” Assistant Professor Dr. Chenpop Sawangmek, Department of Veterinary Pharmacology Science, Faculty of Veterinary Science, Chulalongkorn University and co-founder of Bio ink Co., Ltd. said as he described the motivation that led to this project. “Diabetes is a chronic disease and complications can be fatal to our pets.  The inability to control sugar levels can also cause the deterioration of various organs in the body.  This is a cause of much suffering for the pets as well as their owners, not to mention the financial burden.”

CUVET stem cell transplantation technology to treat pet diabetes

Stem cell innovation in the treatment of diabetes in animals

According to Assistant Professor Dr. Chenpop, the type of diabetes mostly found in dogs is type 1 diabetes where the body lacks beta-cells to create insulin resulting in insulin deprivation in their bodies.  For type 2 diabetes, mostly found in cats, the body still has beta-cells but there is a deficiency in insulin secretion or insulin resistance. Treatment for the two types of diabetes is therefore different. Dr. Sirirat Nantavisai and Dr. Watchareewan Rodprasert co-founders of Bio Ink Co. Ltd. enumerated that for this research, the Veterinary Stem Cell and Bioengineering Innovation Center (VSCBIC), a research unit of CUVET, and Bio Ink Co, Ltd. focused primarily on the type 1 diabetes in dogs as the currently used insulin injections treatment for dogs is not very effective. “During the research process, we will create dog’s pancreatic cells which one might call insulin-producing cells (IPCs) derived from canine mesenchymal stem cells (cMSCs) while developing transplantation technology to use in replacing pancreatic cells that have been damaged or destroyed.  The cells that have been produced can efficiently create and secrete insulin.” Dr. Watchareewan further explained that when used along with the double encapsulation transplantation technology, this method produces strong cells and prevents them from damage and deterioration while also preventing rejection from the immune system.

Stem cells and the hope for treating diseases in human beings and animals

At present, the research team has developed canine cell tissue for stem cell extraction and multiplication.  It has also been successful in creating the process of inducting cells along with transplantation technology.  This platform has been successful and is now ready to be tested for its efficiency and safety in both lab and sick animals.  It is estimated that within 3 years it can be used as an actual form of treatment in animals. “Stem cells can be adapted for use in various ways.  If we can successfully develop cells from stem cells, in the future all organs can be directly replaced by cells or tissues.  We are studying these options along with creating prosthetic bones to replace damaged bones or accelerate their repair along with producing eye cornea which is a collaborative research project between the faculties of Medicine and Engineering” said Assistant Dr. Chenpop.

Plans for producing medical products from stem cells

With knowledge in bioengineering and stem cell technology, the Faculty of Veterinary Science VSCBIC research unit and Bio Ink Co. Ltd. now have plans to develop stem cell products like cell therapy and stem-cell-derived products to treat pets soon.  One example is the exosome product that can be used for sick pets or administered to damaged organs for rehabilitation and repair.  It can also be adapted to treat such diseases as cancer, liver or kidney disease, and diseases stemming from organ deterioration, infections, or illnesses related to the immune system. The products are expected to be tested on lab animals within the year and in no more than two years will be offering them commercially.

For the full release and more images, please visit: https://www.chula.ac.th/en/highlight/92729/

 



 

 

 

  

Making sense of coercivity in magnetic materials with machine learning

Posted on by Tokyo University of Science

Coercivity is a physical property of magnetic materials that has much importance in the optimization of energy efficiency in various applications, such as electric motors. However, it is difficult to analyze using the currently available theories, since they cannot account for the material’s defects and other types of inhomogeneities. To tackle this, scientists combined data science, materials informatics, and an extension of the Ginzburg–Landau model to explain how coercivity arises from microstructures in magnetic materials.

Soft magnetic materials, i.e., materials that can be easily magnetized and demagnetized, play an essential role in transformers, generators, and motors. The ability of a magnetic material to resist an external magnetic field without changing its magnetization is known as “coercivity,” a property closely linked to the energy loss. In applications such as electric cars, low-coercivity materials are highly desirable to achieve higher energy efficiency.

However, coercivity and other magnetic phenomena associated with energy losses in soft magnetic materials originate from very complex interactions. The usual macroscale analysis suffer from oversimplification of the material’s structure and they often need additional parameters to adjust the theory to the experiment. Thus far, although the tools and frameworks to analyze coercivity are widely available, they mostly do not consider directly the defects and boundaries in the material, which is fundamental to develop new applications.

Against this backdrop, a research team including Prof. Masato Kotsugi from Tokyo University of Science (TUS), Japan, recently developed a new approach to connect the microscale characteristics to a macroscopic physical property, coercivity, using a combination of data science, machine learning, and an extension of the GL model. This study, led by Dr. Alexandre Lira Foggiatto from TUS, was published in Communications Physics on 8 November 2022.

The team aimed to find a way to automate the coercivity analysis of magnetic materials while accounting for their microstructural characteristics. To this end, they first gathered data for both simulated and real magnetic materials in the form of microscopic images of their magnetic domains. The images, after preprocessing, were used as input for a machine learning technique called principal component analysis (PCA), which is commonly used to analyze large datasets. Through PCA, the team condensed the most relevant information (features) in these preprocessed images into a two-dimensional “feature space.”

This approach, combined with others machine learning techniques, such as artificial neural networks, allowed the researchers to visualize a realistic energy landscape of magnetization reversal in the material within the feature space. A careful comparison of the results for experimental and simulated images demonstrated the proposed methodology to be a convenient strategy for mapping the most important features of the material in a meaningful way. “Describing the energy landscape using machine learning showed good results for both experimental and simulated data. Both shared similar shapes as well as similar explanatory variables and correlations between them,” remarks Dr. Foggiatto.

Overall, this study showcases how materials informatics can be cleverly leveraged to not only automate but also clarify the physical origin of coercivity in soft magnetic materials. With any luck, it will help materials scientists and physicists derive new physical laws and models to go beyond the state-of-the-art models and frameworks. Moreover, the applications of this strategy go well beyond coercivity, as Dr. Foggiatto highlights: “Our method can be extended to other systems for analyzing properties such as temperature and strain/stress, as well as the dynamics of high-speed magnetization reversal processes.”

Interestingly, this is the second study Prof. Masato Kotsugi and his colleagues have published in relation to the extended Landau free-energy model they are developing. They hope that, in the near future, their functional analysis models will help achieve high efficiency in electric car motors, paving the way to more sustainable transportation.