Compiled by Bill Beggs Jr.
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The monthly technology column featuring timely tech trends, tips and updates.
SLU Scientists to Test
Myasthenia Gravis
Treatment Effectiveness
With support from the National Institutes of Health, Saint Louis University researchers have begun a controlled, blind study of a common and longstanding treatment for myasthenia gravis—a debilitating autoimmune disorder that causes severe muscle weakness and fatigue.
Surgical removal of the thymus gland has put the disease into remission, but other patients have gone into remission spontaneously, leaving unclear the need for surgery.
The disorder is also treated with prednisone, which has the potential for severe side effects including pronounced weight gain, osteoporosis, glaucoma and diabetes.
The study to compare effectiveness of the drug therapy and surgery will be conducted among 200 patients at 80 sites around the world, including SLU.
C2N Diagnostics Launches Alzheimer’s Research Tool
C2N Diagnostics has introduced an assay and research service for measuring the metabolism of amyloid-beta, a small peptide implicated in Alzheimer's disease. The biotechnology has the potential to accelerate drug development and enable earlier detection of Alzheimer's.
The assay's sensitivity may enable researchers to discriminate active from inactive drugs with a small number of patients. C2N is based at the Center for Emerging Technologies biotech incubator.
Scientific American recognized the assay's proprietary technology as one of the top 50 scientific advancements of 2006.
Wash U. Physician to
Head Up New Radiation Center
at Siteman Cancer Center
Jeffrey D. Bradley, M.D., associate professor of radiation oncology at Washington University School of Medicine, has been named director of the Kling Center for Proton Therapy. The facility for treating cancer patients with a new, highly precise form of radiation therapy, is slated to open next summer.
Bradley is an international expert in the application of stereotactic body radiation therapy, which delivers a tightly focused high radiation dose to a small area.
The Kling Center will be the first single-vault proton therapy center in the country. There are five larger such centers, but this will fit in a much smaller area and cost about 20 percent of the typical $100 million-plus price tag.
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