Transterrestrial Musings

1. 
   danae

   March 14, 2012, 9:04 pm | #

   That is absolutely amazing! The problem with lymphoma is that lymphocytes forget how to die, and pile up as tumors in far-flung places.

   I wonder how these nano-robots have been tested, and when they might be used in clinical trials.

   Reporting on scientific innovations is one of the best features of your blog. Thank you for including this type of news.
2. 
   Josh Reiter

   March 15, 2012, 8:46 pm | #

   Yea, I didn’t say anything at the time but it was a quite the coincidence that you posted this like right after I had watch ‘Death by Design: The Life and Times of Life and Times There was a lot of liberal pablum but when it stopped and let you listen to actual microbiologists talk about their work and findings it was riveting. Cells ordinarily can’t create new cells unless they voluntarily die to make room for their replacement. But many cancers seem to be this condition where new cells are created but the old cells can no longer tell themselves it’s time to turn out the lights. Finding that molecular switch that tells a cell it’s time to disappear is a huge game changer. We often think of life extension in terms of keeping the old cells alive for as long as possible but on the cellular level it’s also about turning off the extraneous cells that don’t self destruct as their normally would in youth.

Comments are closed.