Israel Active

After seven years’ research, Israeli scientists have discovered a defective protein responsible for the rare condition known as SOFT that causes abnormal growth in some people. The discovery aids pre-natal testing and knowledge of how skin and bone develop and interact during tissue development.

Researchers at Israel’s Technion and Ben-Gurion University have engineered insulin-producing tissue, which lowers blood sugar levels when transplanted into animals.

This piece of news from May comes via a friend who just sent it to me. For the first time an Israeli child under 10 had a tumour successfully removed using “warm” chemotherapy infusion. The successful operation was performed at Schneider Children’s Medical Centre.

Three Israeli professors have published the results of their work to record neurone patterns during speech attempts and converting these into computer-generated synthesised speech. It could help “locked in” syndrome sufferers such as Stephen Hawking.

Vladislav Zaitsev was suffering from severe jaw infection causing loss of bone and inability to eat, drink or speak. Doctors decided to bring in engineers from Israeli company RAFAEL who used missile technology to construct a brand new titanium jaw. Ironically, before his Aliya in 1997, Vladislav was a missile engineer in the former Soviet Union.

Tel Aviv University Professor Sagi-Eisenberg and PhD student Nurit Pereg-Azouz have identified a group of 30 proteins involved in the trigger process for an allergic reaction. They have isolated two specific proteins that could be targeted by medication without the side effects of steroid treatments.

A team of microbiologists, including Professor Eshel Ben-Jacob of Tel Aviv University, has discovered that cancer cells and bacteria behave in the same way as terrorists do in real life. They spy out the body, manipulate genes, enslave normal cells and become dormant to avoid danger.

(Thanks to Israel21c) Scientists at the Hebrew University - Hadassah Medical School have discovered a peptide (small protein) derived from the HIV virus that interferes with a cell’s ability to repair itself. The peptide weakens cancer cells, making them more vulnerable to conventional therapies.

Rasheda Ali, daughter of the legendary Muhamad Ali, came to Hadassah Ein Kerem to see Professor Karussis’s stem cell work to treat brain diseases. Ms. Ali is a member of the advisory board of Israeli biotech Brainstorm. Her father suffers from Parkinson's disease.

Just hours before a man was due to donate a lobe of his liver to his three-year-old nephew, a deceased donor was found and whose organs saved two further children. All three operations were performed at Schneider Children’s Medical Center in Petah Tikva.