Synapse - Life Sciences News Digest of the Medical center of the americas

A team of mechanical engineering seniors who developed a passive-gravity balancing exoskeleton for the human arm took first place in the first-ever New Mexico State University College of Engineering Senior Capstone Project Showcase on April 26.  Their device, acting as a support beam to the arm, may be used in rehabilitation for injuries such as a dislocated shoulder. This capstone project was part of a larger-scale body of research being conducted at NMSU's Reduced Gravity and Biomechanical Lab.

The team, who won $500 for their effort,... [more]

Miguel Velez-Reyes, PhD, chair of the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at the University of Texas at El Paso, is working with Spectral MD to help develop new, non-invasive technology to see deep into human skin. The DeepView imaging system helps doctors assess tissue health and provide earlier detection of bed sores, damage from burns, infections and cancer. With doctoral student Mohammed Alkhatib, Velez-Reyes is developing algorithms for Spectral MD to use in the technology. It collects information about blood flow beneath the skin – a critical indicator of tissue health and healing. Spectral MD is a clinical research... [more]

Premier Biomedical, Inc. announced recently it has advanced its pre-clinical testing of its extracorporeal-treatment methodology for use against cancer from test tubes to mice. These tests are being conducted by academic researchers at the University of Texas at El Paso (UTEP) under direction of Dr. Mitchell S. Felder of Premier Biomedical.  Premier Biomedical and UTEP are ahead of schedule by more than one year. Typical laboratory tests take up to two years before providing the positive results to move to this next phase of study.  

Lab tests have demonstrated the successful removal of picogram (one trillionth of a gram) quantities... [more]

Three faculty members in the Texas Tech University Health Sciences Center (TTUHSC) El Paso Department of Internal Medicine have published a paper in the February issue of Neurogastroenterology & Motility, the official journal of the American Neurogastroenterology and Motility Society and the European Society of Neurogastroenterology and Motility. Authors and co-authors on “The Addition of Pyloroplasty as a New Surgical Approach to Enhance Effectiveness of Gastric Electrical Stimulation Therapy in Patients with Gastroparesis,” are Irene Sarosiek, MD, PhD.; Jerzy Sarosiek, MD, PhD; and Richard McCallum, MD.  “This paper demonstrates for the first time in humans that the hybrid of the... [more]

Psychological stress can generate symptoms of depression and anxiety as well as impact the dendrites of brain cells, or neurons, according to research conducted by a New Mexico State University professor. Furthermore, the use of anti-depressants may relieve the symptoms of depression and anxiety and damage to the brain, but only if the stress is relatively mild.

Authored by Gail Leedy, professor of social work and coordinator of the School of Social Work program at the NMSU Albuquerque Center, the research conducted on female rats was published in the... [more]

On behalf of El Paso Children's Hospital, University Medical Center (UMC) Foundation gifted $40,000 to Bradley Fuhrman, MD, in support of pediatric research. Fuhrman is the physician-in-chief at El Paso Children's Hospital.

"It is clinical research that has given us medicine as we know it today. Dr. Fuhrman has a celebrated history of successful research. We are excited about the opportunity to support Dr. Fuhrman's research here at El Paso Children's Hospital", said Dennece Knight, executive director of UMC Foundation, the charitable organization for El Paso Children's Hospital, Children's Miracle Network and University Medical Center... [more]

What if a new system could be used to treat wastewater without the high input of electricity that regular sewage treatment plants require? What if this water treatment system, fed by nutrients in the wastewater, were able to use photosynthesis to produce renewable surplus energy to help meet the world's growing energy demand?

Just such a win-win approach is currently being designed and tested by researchers at New Mexico State University. If successful, their system will provide a more sustainable method for treating wastewater, a new viable approach to producing electric power and liquid biofuels, and a revenue stream... [more]

Theresa L. Byrd, DrPH, has published a research article in the journal Cancer, a journal of the American Cancer Society.  In collaboration with her colleagues, Byrd found that cervical cancer screening rates among women of Mexican origin can be improved using 1-on-1 interventions with a lay health worker, or promotora.  This is an important step to reducing racial and ethnic health disparities in cancer, because if caught in time, cervical cancer is treatable. Byrd is a professor of behavioral sciences in the Department of Medical Education and the SCI (Society Community and the Individual) Course Director. The study is titled “AMIGAS:... [more]

     Bacteria inside a mosquito's gut may hold the key to control deadly diseases such as malaria, Dengue Fever and West Nile virus. Researchers at New Mexico State University (NMSU) are studying the mosquito gut bacteria to discover how mosquitoes use their own gut bacteria to fight against malaria. They also want to try to reduce the mosquito population by disturbing gut bacteria to make mosquito lay fewer eggs.

    Jiannong Xu, an assistant professor in the College of Arts and Sciences, has studied the interactions of mosquitoes and malaria for 25 years.

    "Metagenomics is a new hot research approach that... [more]

Researchers with New Mexico State University's Chile Pepper Institute, working in cooperation with researchers in South Korea, have completed a high-resolution draft of the chile pepper genome. This is the first time the scientific feat has been performed with chile. The announcement was made recently at the New Mexico Chile Conference. The achievement puts NMSU and the Chile Pepper Institute on the cutting edge with a new level of research, said Paul Bosland, an... [more]