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Trial Shows Glucose-Lowering Drug Effective with Elderly
A late-stage clinical trial shows the drug linagliptin, marketed by Boehringer Ingelheim and Eli Lilly and Company, helps elderly patients with type 2 diabetes lower their blood glucose levels. Researchers from Boehringer Ingelheim and University of Birmingham in the U.K. describe their findings online this week in the journal The Lancet (paid subscription required). Linagliptin —…
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Nanotech Window Coating Controls Building Light, Heat
Chemists and materials scientists at Lawrence Berkeley National Laboratory in California created a window coating of nanocrystals that can dynamically control the sunlight passing through the window and thus improve a building’s energy efficiency. The team led by Berkeley Lab’s Delia Milliron published its findings yesterday in the journal Nature (paid subscription required). The Department…
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Calculator Estimates Individual Surgical Complications Risk
Medical researchers with American College of Surgeons devised an online system that calculates an individual’s risk of developing complications for nearly all kinds of surgery. The team led by Karl Bilimoria, director of the Surgical Outcomes and Quality Improvement Center at Northwestern University in Chicago, with colleagues from the UCLA medical center and VA Greater…
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FDA Clears Enhanced Capsule Camera for GI Disorders
The Food and Drug Administration cleared for sale in the U.S. a new version of a tiny camera in a capsule, made by Given Imaging Ltd. in Yoqneam, Israel, and swallowed by patients to diagnose gastrointestinal (GI) conditions. The company expects its PillCam SB3 to be available in the U.S. in the last quarter of…
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TV, Cellular Signals Harnessed for Power, Communications
Computer scientists and engineers at University of Washington in Seattle developed a wireless process that harnesses existing television and cell phone signals as sources of power and a way of communicating. The team led by computer science professors Shyam Gollakota and Joshua Smith describes the process in a paper at ACM’s Special Interest Group on…
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FDA Funds Organ-on-Chip to Test Radiation Disease Treatments
The U.S. Food and Drug Administration awarded a contract to a Harvard University lab for simulated organ devices to test radiation disease countermeasures. The $5.6 million award will fund the work of Harvard’s Wyss Institute for Biologically Inspired Engineering from FDA’s research and development program on regulatory science and medical countermeasures initiative. Wyss Institute researchers,…
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Medtronic Acquires Telemedicine Systems Developer
Medtronic Inc., a medical device company in Minneapolis, Minnesota, is buying Cardiocom, a developer of telemedicine systems in nearby Chanhassen, Minnesota, in an all-cash transaction valued at $200 million. Medtronic’s devices currently help treat cardiac and vascular diseases, diabetes, and neurological and musculoskeletal disorders. Cardiocom, founded in 1999 and privately held, builds solutions for home…
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Design for Microenterprise Helps Target Emerging Markets
Engineers at Massachusetts Institute of Technology in Cambridge recommend designing products for small entrepreneurial businesses as a strategy for success in large emerging markets, such as India and China. Graduate student Jesse Austin-Breneman and engineering professor Maria Yang describe their findings in a paper delivered last week at the International Design Engineering Technical Conference of…
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Challenge Seeks Technique to Estimate Age from DNA Samples
A new challenge on InnoCentive asks for a crowd-sourced solution for determining an individual’s age from a small sample of that person’s DNA. The competition has a a prize purse of $25,000 and a deadline of 7 October 2013 for submissions (free registration required). InnoCentive in Waltham, Massachusetts conducts open-innovation, crowd-sourcing competitions for corporate and…
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Telemedicine Found to Improve Rural Pediatric Emergency Care
A study of rural emergency room cases in northern California shows physician consultations with teleconferencing result in higher quality of care for seriously ill and injured children. The findings of pediatrician James Marcin and colleagues at University of California in Davis were published yesterday online in the journal Critical Care Medicine (paid subscription required). Telemedicine…