Immunology
In Amish country, nurses go door to door to stop deadly spread of measles
For the past few months, nurse Dale Weiser has been making unexpected home visits. As the state battles the deadliest measles outbreak in recent history, the clinical supervisor drives 30 miles (48.3km), sometimes daily, to a rural corner of Pennsylvania where many Amish people live. Walking into strangers' homes, Weiser says she tries her best to be respectful and non-intrusive as she vaccinates dozens of family members against the measles, sometimes around the kitchen table. A lot of people that I encounter, they don't have health insurance. They don't have a lot of interaction with the health system, and they just haven't seen the need to get these vaccines, said Weiser, who works for the Chester County Health Department.
The Download: why AI's latest breakthroughs and fears may be more hype than reality
The Download: why AI's latest breakthroughs and fears may be more hype than reality Plus: 22 nations have called for a new global body to oversee AI. Don't be fooled by this summer of AI hype It's been a busy few months for AI hype, with companies making breathless claims about hacking, mathematical breakthroughs, and the prospect of self-improving superintelligence. In all these cases, massive fanfare from the companies, presented as mea culpas in the hacking incidents, has been accompanied by intense press coverage. But once experts have had time to examine what happened, very different stories emerge. There's a strong commercial incentive to overstate AI capabilities. The authors argue that the illusion of speed and urgency promulgated by the tech companies is also a ploy to misdirect policymakers and the public.
More than 1,000 children killed in Bangladesh measles outbreak
More than 1,000 children have died in a measles outbreak in Bangladesh, where cases are rising again despite an emergency vaccination campaign. More than 19.8 million children in the country have already been vaccinated, but some 1,000 new suspected cases are still being reported every day. Unicef told the BBC that on 26 September, the government will move into an intensified phase of its campaign to reach children who have not yet been vaccinated. Until March this year, Bangladesh had made substantial progress towards eliminating measles, according to the World Health Organisation (WHO). But WHO data now shows it has had more measles cases than any other country so far this year.
'Smart' Nanoparticles Deliver mRNA Directly to Tumors in New Cancer Therapy
'Smart' Nanoparticles Deliver mRNA Directly to Tumors in New Cancer Therapy The treatment can reprogram immune cells that have been corrupted by the cancer, strengthening the body's ability to attack. They are responsible for keeping our own tissues in check, taking out cancerous cells before they have a chance to grow. Once a tumor forms, however, it can create an environment that declaws cancer-fighting immune cells--in some cases even reprogramming them to suppress other parts of the immune system. Overcoming the oppressive tumor environment remains a barrier for even some of the most promising treatments. "One of the biggest challenges in cancer immunotherapy is that the immune system may be capable of attacking a tumor, but the tumor environment can stop those immune cells from doing their job," University of Adelaide professor Chunxia Zhao explained in a press release .
Marina Larroudé Is Disrupting the Fashion Industry One Shoe at a Time
Follow this author to personalize your feed and get instant alerts. Follow Go to your personalized feed WHY FOLLOW? Smart Alerts: Get notified about major news as it happens. Carlin is a contributor for TIME. Growing up in São Paulo, it was so hot that "wearing black was not even an option," says the former fashion director turned shoe designer, 46, who has called New York City home for half her life.
AI models need more data about biology, and OpenAI is paying to create it
The OpenAI Foundation is funding a new effort called Data for Public Health. Last year Ruxandra Teslo, a policy analyst who focuses on clinical trials, posted an idea for supercharging medical AI systems: Use data from failed biotech companies. By bidding at their bankruptcy proceedings, she proposed, it might be possible to obtain detailed regulatory filings, manufacturing strategies, and safety data--types of information usually considered trade secrets. She called these documents " biotech's lost archive " and said they could be used to help train AIs that would act as powerful copilots in the often opaque drug approval process. Today the OpenAI Foundation, the nonprofit parent of OpenAI, said it would fund her idea as part of a new effort it calls Public Data for Health, which aims to help artificial intelligence make big leaps in medicine by paying to create "high-quality scientific datasets." The basic idea is that AI isn't going to be capable of making important breakthroughs in curing disease unless researchers can feed the models much more information than they have so far.