Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Gastrointestinal Disease, Obstructive Sleep Apnea, Technology / 18.11.2023

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_61077" align="alignleft" width="150"]Giovanni Traverso MD PhDKarl Van Tassel (1925) Career Development Professor Department of Mechanical Engineering Koch Institute of Integrative Cancer Research Division of Gastroenterology Brigham and Women’s Hospital Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA Dr. Traverso[/caption] Giovanni Traverso MD PhD Karl Van Tassel (1925) Career Development Professor Department of Mechanical Engineering Koch Institute of Integrative Cancer Research Division of Gastroenterology Brigham and Women’s Hospital Harvard Medical School, Boston, MA, USA   MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: I think its always important to acknowledge that this is a big team effort.  We have the teams from MIT, Celero Systems, West Virgnia University (WVU) and Brigham and Women’s Hospital (BWH) all working together on this.   For this study, Celero prototyped the devices that we tested in pre-clinical (Swine) models and in a first-in-human study with the team at WVU. Our lab focuses on the development of ingestible devices for drug delivery and sensing and these have informed the development of these efforts as you can see. MedicalResearch.com: What types of vital signs are measurable in this fashion? Response: Heart rate and respiratory rate.
Allergies, Author Interviews, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Pharmacology / 23.03.2019

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_48094" align="alignleft" width="128"]Daniel Reker, PhDKoch Institute for Integrative Cancer ResearchMassachusetts Institute of Technology Dr. Reker[/caption] Daniel Reker, PhD Koch Institute for Integrative Cancer Research Massachusetts Institute of Technology MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? Response: We started thinking more about this topic following a clinical experience five years ago that Dr. Traverso was involved in where a patient suffering form Celiac disease received a prescription of a drug which potentially had gluten. This experience really opened our eyes for how little we knew about the inactive ingredients and how clinical workflows do not currently accommodate for such scenarios. We therefore set up a large scale analysis to better understand the complexity of the inactive ingredient portion in a medication as well as how frequently critical ingredients are included that could potential affect sensitive patients.
Author Interviews, Breast Cancer, Brigham & Women's - Harvard, Nature, Technology / 23.09.2016

MedicalResearch.com Interview with: [caption id="attachment_28309" align="alignleft" width="157"]Natalie Artzi PhD principal research scientist MIT's Institute for Medical Engineering and Science (IMES) and Assistant professor of medicine Brigham and Women's Hospital And co-authors: Avital Gilam, João Conde, Daphna Weissglas-Volkov, Nuria Oliva Eitan Friedman, Noam Shomron Dr. Natalie Artzi[/caption] Natalie Artzi PhD principal research scientist MIT's Institute for Medical Engineering and Science and Assistant professor of medicine Brigham and Women's Hospital With co-authors: Avital Gilam, João Conde, Daphna Weissglas-Volkov, Nuria Oliva, Eitan Friedman, Noam Shomron MedicalResearch.com: What is the background for this study? What are the main findings? Response: Metastases are the primary cause for mortality in breast cancer, the most common cancer in women regardless of ethnicity. Recent studies show that germline sequence variants, such as single-nucleotide polymorphisms (SNPs) in miRNA-binding sites, can disrupt the downregulation by miRNAs, with a profound effect on gene expression levels and consequentially on the phenotype, including increased risk for cancer. In the current study, we aimed to determine the potential effect of SNPs within miRNA-binding sites on metastatic breast cancer progression and their potential use as suppression targets to prevent metastasis. Our collaborators at Tel-Aviv Universityin a research led by Dr. Noam Shomron found that the SNP, rs1071738, located in a target site for miR-96 and miR-182 on the 3’-UTR of the PALLD gene, encodes the Palladin actin-associated protein, which is a documented player in breast cancer motility. In vitro experiments revealed a functional downregulation of Palladin levels by miR-96 and miR-182, which subsequently reduces migration and invasion abilities of breast cancer cells. My lab then showed in an in vivo experiment that the use of nanoparticles embedded in a hydrogel scaffold as a miRNA delivery vehicle enables an efficient and specific delivery of miR-96/miR-182 directly to breast tumours, which results in marked reduction of breast cancer metastasis. We then proceeded to study the effect of combination therapy in which we will use a chemotherapy drug to shrink the primary tumor and the miRNAs to prevent metastasis. The intercalation of a chemotherapy drug, cisplatin, to the miR-conjugated nanoparticles further improved the effect, leading to significant reduction in both primary tumour growth and metastasis. Our study highlights the therapeutic potential of miRNAs, and specifically miR-96 and miR-182, and support the importance of Palladin regulation in breast cancer metastasis.