/ News
Maize cells produce enzyme-replacement drug
Growing crops is simpler and cheaper than culturing mammalian cells, which can harbour human pathogens and must be kept at precise temperatures and fed particular nutrients. But culturing mammalian cells is currently the only way to make some complex protein drugs.
For example, the rare lysosomal storage disease mucopolysaccharidosis I is treated using enzyme-replacement therapy. The enzymes must be made in cells, and the high production costs mean that the drugs can cost hundreds of thousands of dollars a year. So Allison Kermode, a plant biologist at Simon Fraser University in Burnaby, Canada, whose husband works with people who have lysosomal storage disorders, decided to develop a way to manufacture the necessary enzymes in maize (corn).
When human proteins such as enzymes are expressed in plant cells, they are usually decorated with plant-specific sugar molecules, which could prompt a dangerous immune reaction if injected into patients. But today inNature Communications1, Kermode and her colleagues describe how they avoided these modifications.
The team tweaked the protein-producing genes, not to alter the sequence of the human protein, but to ensure that, once made, the proteins would not be moved through the cell's Golgi complex, a structure where the problematic sugars are added. The engineered maize seeds produced proteins decorated with sugars that could be converted to human forms.
Richard Pattison, a cell biologist at the Boyce Thompson Institute for Plant Science in Ithaca, New York, calls the approach “very elegant”. Most attempts to solve the sugar problem require mutating the protein, which could disrupt its function, or engineering plants to modify proteins differently — a time-consuming approach that often does not work.
Pharma’s Market
Other plant systems have been used to make therapeutic proteins. In May, the US Food and Drug Administration approved Elelyso (taliglucerase alfa) — a drug for the lysosomal storage disorder Gaucher disease — which is produced in cultured carrot cells. And drugs made in duckweed, safflower and tobacco have progressed as far as clinical trials. However, making proteins with certain sugar patterns using these systems is still difficult or impossible.
In terms of controlling protein modifications, Kermode’s localization technique is “a significant improvement for the production of biopharmaceuticals”, says Herta Steinkellner, a molecular biologist at the University of Natural Resources and Life Sciences in Vienna.
And there particular advantages of packing transgenic proteins into corn kernels. Cereal crops can be grown using established methods, and seeds are ideal for long-term protein storage. However, Kermode says, the transgenic crops should be grown in contained greenhouses to prevent them from escaping into the environment.
But there is a long way to go before maize-made drugs reach the market, says Kermode. Enzymes purified from the engineered seeds are functional, but they have not yet been tested in cells, let alone humans. The team also needs to ensure that the seeds produce the protein in higher quantities. If all goes well, however, maize may one day become the go-to way to make complex protein drugs.
Source: http://www.nature.com/news/maize-cells-produce-enzyme-replacement-drug-1.11420
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Founded by Russian entrepreneur Dmitry Itskov in February 2011 with the participation of leading Russian specialists in the field of neural interfaces, robotics, artificial organs and systems.
The main goals of the 2045 Initiative: the creation and realization of a new strategy for the development of humanity which meets global civilization challenges; the creation of optimale conditions promoting the spiritual enlightenment of humanity; and the realization of a new futuristic reality based on 5 principles: high spirituality, high culture, high ethics, high science and high technologies.
The main science mega-project of the 2045 Initiative aims to create technologies enabling the transfer of a individual’s personality to a more advanced non-biological carrier, and extending life, including to the point of immortality. We devote particular attention to enabling the fullest possible dialogue between the world’s major spiritual traditions, science and society.
A large-scale transformation of humanity, comparable to some of the major spiritual and sci-tech revolutions in history, will require a new strategy. We believe this to be necessary to overcome existing crises, which threaten our planetary habitat and the continued existence of humanity as a species. With the 2045 Initiative, we hope to realize a new strategy for humanity's development, and in so doing, create a more productive, fulfilling, and satisfying future.
The "2045" team is working towards creating an international research center where leading scientists will be engaged in research and development in the fields of anthropomorphic robotics, living systems modeling and brain and consciousness modeling with the goal of transferring one’s individual consciousness to an artificial carrier and achieving cybernetic immortality.
An annual congress "The Global Future 2045" is organized by the Initiative to give platform for discussing mankind's evolutionary strategy based on technologies of cybernetic immortality as well as the possible impact of such technologies on global society, politics and economies of the future.
Future prospects of "2045" Initiative for society
2015-2020
The emergence and widespread use of affordable android "avatars" controlled by a "brain-computer" interface. Coupled with related technologies “avatars’ will give people a number of new features: ability to work in dangerous environments, perform rescue operations, travel in extreme situations etc.
Avatar components will be used in medicine for the rehabilitation of fully or partially disabled patients giving them prosthetic limbs or recover lost senses.
2020-2025
Creation of an autonomous life-support system for the human brain linked to a robot, ‘avatar’, will save people whose body is completely worn out or irreversibly damaged. Any patient with an intact brain will be able to return to a fully functioning bodily life. Such technologies will greatly enlarge the possibility of hybrid bio-electronic devices, thus creating a new IT revolution and will make all kinds of superimpositions of electronic and biological systems possible.
2030-2035
Creation of a computer model of the brain and human consciousness with the subsequent development of means to transfer individual consciousness onto an artificial carrier. This development will profoundly change the world, it will not only give everyone the possibility of cybernetic immortality but will also create a friendly artificial intelligence, expand human capabilities and provide opportunities for ordinary people to restore or modify their own brain multiple times. The final result at this stage can be a real revolution in the understanding of human nature that will completely change the human and technical prospects for humanity.
2045
This is the time when substance-independent minds will receive new bodies with capacities far exceeding those of ordinary humans. A new era for humanity will arrive! Changes will occur in all spheres of human activity – energy generation, transportation, politics, medicine, psychology, sciences, and so on.
Today it is hard to imagine a future when bodies consisting of nanorobots will become affordable and capable of taking any form. It is also hard to imagine body holograms featuring controlled matter. One thing is clear however: humanity, for the first time in its history, will make a fully managed evolutionary transition and eventually become a new species. Moreover, prerequisites for a large-scale expansion into outer space will be created as well.
Key elements of the project in the future
• International social movement
• social network immortal.me
• charitable foundation "Global Future 2045" (Foundation 2045)
• scientific research centre "Immortality"
• business incubator
• University of "Immortality"
• annual award for contribution to the realization of the project of "Immortality”.
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