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Five minutes with Rafe Johnson – 2021 – Articles – Transform magazine

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:41 am

How did you begin working on the development and ideation of a bionic heart?

I was approached by The Science Museum of Minnesota to design and develop experiences for an upcoming exhibition based around transhumanism, the process of humans merging with technology. One of these projects was to create a 3D hologram animation that presents a series of futuristic bionic organs using the peppers ghost concept which presents the hologram. What I found particularly interesting, and challenging was conceptualising a bionic heart through digital design. I was tasked with designing something that was both visually compelling and yet believable, the design concept had to be to be physiologically so that if it was used to design the physical product it could be implanted into someone, connecting the tubing to their arteries.

The goal of this exhibition, which runs parallel with my own goals, is to introduce the public to the world of human enhancement in an exciting and informative way, and what is more engaging than a holographic image of futuristic implants? There is plenty of science fiction that considers bionic bodies, but they tend to paint a dystopian world that makes us fear technological progress rather than welcome it; I believe its essential we paint an exciting picture of the future in which the capabilities of humans are vastly expanded, and I feel this exhibition portrays that perfectly.

What will designing in AR look like ten years away?

Whilst the fundamental process of designing is unlikely to change, the tools we use during the process certainly will. Augmented reality (AR) is one of the most interesting and exciting tools that can be used for this. As computers continue to reduce in size and increase in power we will see AR devices like the Microsoft Hololens reduce in size from bulky headsets to glasses to contact lenses and eventually brain implants. All aspects of the design process from research to prototyping will become faster, more streamlined and more connected, with areas of design most affected being concepting/prototyping and collaboration. We will be able to design, prototype, package and release our creations on one single platform, just as we often do with computers now. Our freedom to design where and when will be improved, despite your location; and our ability to collaborate will greatly increase as you'll be able to sync with collaborators anywhere in the world and instantly feel like you are in the same room as them. Discussing changes to your car design that's represented digitally in front of you, quickly making tweaks to the cars surfacing or perhaps the paint finish. At Seymourpowell we are already utilizing this technology, for example, when we were building the interior of Virgin Galactic's spaceship, I could be in my home in VR taking in feedback from a 3D avatar representation of my colleagues as we analyzed the inside of the ship. This allowed me to test and identify issues far more closely and talk to top designers around the UK.

What role does extended reality (XR) play in the world of transhumanism?

XR will play a very prominent role in the world of transhumanism, perhaps one of the most important roles. It's worth asking what reality is at this point. Reality in its simplest form is the sum or aggregate of all that is real or existent within a system. Our experience of reality is largely defined by our senses. If our sensory organs and brains can be adjusted, then so can our reality. In decades to come we may be able to experience things we cant yet comprehend. Neuroscientist David Eagleman is already exploring sensory substitution, creating a vest that converts audio data to vibrations, allowing users to feel sounds. His findings show that after some time users who have lost their hearing can start to understand what others are saying through these vibrations. As AR becomes more integrated into our lives, the more we will rely on extended reality technologies, just as we rely so heavily on our mobile phones now. Elon Musk argues that our attachment to mobile phones already makes us a form of early cyborg, imagine trying to go about your daily life without using a mobile phone. Whilst some voice understandable concern about having technologies so closely connected to our bodies, there are huge benefits, especially in the medical world. We will develop a much closer understanding and level of control of our own bodies and XR will be our primary way of interfacing with this.

What is the future of neural implants and how is the design process defining this?

A neural implant is a piece of technology implanted into the brain. Currently they're in the very early stages, however, many neuroscientists and tech leaders are working on prototypes and testing. It's likely the first brain implants will be used for medical purposes like repairing eyesight or reversing effects of other neural based diseases. The technology will inevitably move into the world of brain enhancement, for example a brain computer interface (BCI), which does exactly what youd think, connects your brain directly to a computer. Once we step into the world of altering and enhancing our brains, we really begin to consider the reality of turning ourselves into super humans, science fiction no more! Imagine a world in which brain enhanced humans can learn languages overnight or perhaps communicate telepathically. It will eventually become as easy as closing your eyes and plugging into the virtual world. As with all technologies and inventions, neural implants are driven and developed by the design process. It's the designers job to plan and direct the development of these technologies and ensure the best possible outcome. As with any design project, the prototyping phase is critical in testing and understanding which paths to take, and to help avoid any possible detrimental outcomes.

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How Many Milligrams Of Testosterone Do Men Naturally …

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:37 am

How many milligrams of Testosterone do men naturally produce?

3-10 milligrams per day, with the average being 6-7 milligrams per day.

When bodybuilders refer to Testosterone Replacement Therapy (TRT) dosages theyll often state that 200 milligrams is a therapeutic dosage.

This is typically not a therapeutic dosage at all, and is more like a small supraphysiological cycle being used year round.

A therapeutic dosage of Testosterone is a dosage that would bring serum Total and Free Testosterone levels in the blood up to what you would produce naturally if you werent hypogonadal.

Delving into the clinical data, we can see that the true milligram equivalent is actually far less than that.

Before delving in deeper, keep in mind that ester weight and the milligram amount per milliliter stated on the vial of your prescription doesn't necessarily equate to how many milligrams of Testosterone per milliliter your product truly contains. Let me elaborate on that.

Testosterone is the principal circulating androgen.

In men, it is secreted primarily by the Leydig cells in the testes at a daily production of about 6-7 mg [R].

Other clinical data corroborates this as well.

A more broad and accurate range is 3-10 mg per day [R], but in general, the average daily production is approximately 6-7 mg per day in healthy men.

The difference between 3 mg per day and 10 mg per day is massive, as you would logically conclude.

However, this is not reflected in the therapeutic reference ranges you will see in your blood work.

Depending on the lab, the healthy range of natural Testosterone production could be as low as 240 ng/dL on the bottom, and 1000 ng/dL on the high end.

Some labs are even worse.

It doesnt take a rocket scientist to realize that a Testosterone level 4x higher will not equate to the same quality of life, muscle building potential, etc.

However, 90% of doctors still are so far behind the curve that they truly believe that a 250 ng/dL Testosterone level is just as good as a 1000 ng/dL Testosterone level.

Based on the daily average production in milligrams, we can calculate that weekly the average healthy male produces between 42 to 49 mg per week.

A ton of men using 200 mg per week probably think that number is far too low and isnt accurate.

However, what a lot of guys don't consider is that the ester itself takes up a significant portion of the milligram content per milliliter.

After administering Testosterone, your body has to cleave the ester from the molecule to free up the Testosterone to actually be bioavailable in the body, and that ester accounts for a significant portion of that milligram/milliliter amount.

The only exception to this is Testosterone Base and Testosterone Suspension, which are just straight up Testosterone products with no ester attached, but you would never get a prescription for that as the half-life is so short it would require multiple administrations per day.

The Cypionate ester has a high molecular weight and accounts for 30% of the milligram total stated on a TRT prescription.

For example, if your TRT prescription was 200 mg of Testosterone Cypionate every week, despite the vial being labeled as 200 mg/ml, the Cypionate esters molecular weight takes up 30% of that mg content, and cleaving the ester from the Testosterone molecule in the body leaves only 140 mg/ml, which is 70% of the stated label dosage.

There are vastly different perspectives on hormone levels in the TRT community and the bodybuilding community.

There are many men (mostly bodybuilders) who believe that 200 mg per week is the bare minimum for high-end TRT, and dosages of 250 mg or even 300 mg per week are justified as within the realm of natural production still.

There are doctors who will corroborate this too, which to me is pretty baffling.

Very, very seldom does somebody actually need 200 mg a week to maintain the equivalent of healthy endogenous production.

Usually, those guys are essentially running a cycle year-round.

This is something Ive been saying for a while now, as I used to actually believe that 200 mg per week was therapeutic (until I started really monitoring my blood work closely).

My TRT is currently 125 mg per week, and even that is pushing into supraphysiological territory when you actually split that shot into seven micro shots to keep more stable blood serum concentrations.

Splitting a large dosage/administration of 125 mg per week into 7 administrations/micro-doses of 18 mg per day increases Free Testosterone more relative to a large weekly dosage, decreases the amount of aromatization to Estrogen occurring in the body, and maintains more stable Testosterone blood serum concentrations.

Often times, doctors will prescribe their patients 100 200 mg of Testosterone Cypionate every 7-10 days, and then advise them to administer it in one giant dosage once per week, or even once every 2 weeks.

This is insane and reflects on how completely inept the majority of physicians are when it comes to hormone management.

When you administer yourself with a large dosage at once, you spike your Testosterone levels to supraphysiological levels, often 2x or even 3x as high as they should be for a few days, which obviously has an equivalent amount of aromatization occurring in parallel to this.

Following this, levels slowly crash down as hormone levels decline in the body, and often times patients will fall back down to the low end of the reference range while waiting for their next shot.

The end result is a constant roller coaster of fluctuating Testosterone levels going from way too high, to way too low, over and over again, with far too much Estrogen aromatization occurring, resulting in completely unnecessary side effects.

These side effects often then need to be mitigated with an Aromatase Inhibitor, which doctors know even less about how to prescribe and mange correctly, and will often crash their patients E2 levels into the ground and leave them feeling like complete trash and ruining their lipids.

AIs are not something you want to be on long term as they are not healthy, and E2 management can be done via lifestyle and diet changes more often than not in the context of therapeutic TRT.

There are constant arguments about what the optimal replacement dose of Testosterone is.

There's a small camp of guys who believe that 10 milligrams of Testosterone Propionate per day is ideal for most men, and I'm inclined to agree with them far more than the guys who believe that dosages as high as 200 mg per week are necessary.

This will of course vary depending on a variety of factors, but typically 10 mg of Testosterone Propionate per day will put an individual at top end of the Testosterone therapeutic range.

I find that when men talk about ideal dosages being closer to 125 150 200 mg per week, the ester weight often isn't taken into account (Cypionate, Enanthate, Propionate, etc. all have different molecular weights), and they are often individuals who administer large dosages at once, let their levels spike way above the therapeutic limit up to supraphysiological levels for a few days, and slowly crash underneath that until their next shot.

If you get your blood drawn during a trough and the results show that you have a 850 ng/dL Testosterone level, you may not be accounting for the fact that right after you administered your fat weekly (or even bi-weekly) dosage, your levels probably skyrocketed upwards of 1500 ng/dL.

I found this statistic very interesting as 50 milligrams a week really is not much whatsoever in contrast to what most guys are injecting weekly believing they are just replacing their natural production.

There are a lot of massive bodybuilders, including IFBB pros, who maintain massive physiques in the off-season and in retirement with just 200 mg of Testosterone per week.

They're able to maintain physiques that are blatantly not maintainable naturally.

If top bodybuilders who are pros at 240 pounds plus are maintaining those physiques with just 200 mg per week, its pretty transparent that the 200 mg per week dosage is actually more than the therapeutic amount in most situations, and the clinical data backs this up.

Personally, I used to believe I needed 200 mg per week to maintain my physique, and I was SO wrong.

200 mg per week for most individuals is the equivalent of running a cycle year round, and certainly is not therapeutic in any capacity.

There are caveats to this, with SHBG, ester choice, body composition, diet, lifestyle factors, and many other things playing a significant role in how much Testosterone actually becomes usable in the body, consequently influencing how large of a dosage an individual would need to achieve healthy Free Testosterone levels.

But in general, true therapeutic TRT would be as simple as replicating the natural daily production of 6-7 mg with an exogenous source after factoring in the ester weight.

P.S. I do all of my daily TRT injections with an insulin pin now in my glutes and ventro glutes.

With such a low volume of daily oil, its something I can get away with daily without creating a lump of oil that doesnt absorb properly, which would occur if you tried to jab a large amount of oil too shallowly with a short needle.

No more harpoons for me.

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How Humans Really Burn Calories And What That Means For Losing Weight : Shots – Health News – NPR

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:37 am

Intense physical activity may not be as helpful in losing weight as you may hope. Catherine Falls/Getty Images hide caption

Intense physical activity may not be as helpful in losing weight as you may hope.

It's an eternal question: What diet is best for weight loss? Or, what should we eat (or avoid) to stay healthy?

Devotees of paleo or keto will talk your ear off about why their diet is the most sensible. People choosing vegan diets (no animal products, including dairy) make a compelling case for both personal and global health.

Herman Pontzer, an evolutionary anthropologist at Duke University, argues that human metabolism has evolved to the point where how we eat and expend our calories is more important than all of our collective obsession with what to eat.

In his new book, Burn: New Research Blows the Lid Off How We Really Burn Calories, Stay Healthy and Lose Weight, Pontzer breaks down the science of metabolism and shares tales from his work studying caloric expenditure among hunter-gatherer societies.

One of the most startling findings is the notion of constrained daily energy expenditure. This is the idea that the human metabolism adapts to our activity levels to keep our daily calorie burn in a surprisingly narrow range no matter how hard you work out. But don't let that depressing fact hold you back from the gym it's crucial that you still get daily exercise for weight maintenance and overall health.

This interview with Pontzer is adapted from an interview for Public Radio Tulsa's Medical Monday program and has been edited for length and clarity.

In your book you debunk the common metaphor we use for caloric expenditure an engine or a machine. You say it would be more accurate to compare it to running a business. Why is that?

The engine view gets a few things right. We put fuel into our bodies in the form of food. And we do burn it off in all the tasks that our body does, the way that an engine burns fuel.

But an engine, like the engine in your car, doesn't get to decide how it burns the fuel. A car's energy burn is all about how hard you step on the gas pedal. Your body isn't like that. Your body is more like a business, as it has an overall goal like any business does. The overall goal of your body is to survive and reproduce, because that's what every organism has evolved to do. But there are many parts and pieces and departments that are in the service of that overall goal.

In a business you have finance, sales, human resources and security and everything else. It's the same with your body. You've got all these different organ systems that all work together. And like a business, when income is low, you can juggle things around. So you spend less on this or that task. And when things are good, you can ramp up the energy that you spend on different tasks. And so that kind of juggling or prioritization that businesses do is the same that your body can do with how it spends calories.

One fallacy with the engine model of calorie burning is we think, OK, I've got to burn more calories than I take in, either by eating less or exercising more or both. But as you point out, the metabolism adjusts, and it becomes harder to lose weight. So even though exercise isn't really a great weight-loss strategy, it's still very important for your overall health, right?

That's exactly right. If you're more physically active, eventually you don't burn more calories a day, but you change the way your calories are spent. If you spend your calories on exercise, what that means is you're spending fewer calories on other tasks.

And for most of us, that's a really good thing, because if we spend less energy, for example, on inflammation, we reduce our inflammation levels. If we spend less energy on stress reactivity, for example, our cortisol levels don't go up as high and our adrenaline levels don't go up as high, we achieve lower levels of stress response. And it seems that that exercise might also help keep testosterone for men or estrogen levels for women at a slightly healthier level. So that adjustment, that metabolic adjustment that we make is one of the reasons exercise is so good for us.

You've done extensive research with modern-day hunter-gatherers, like the Hadza people of Tanzania to better understand how human metabolism works. What did you learn?

The Hadza, to this day, don't have any domesticated crops or animals or machines or guns or electricity or anything like that. They live in grass houses in the open savanna in northern Tanzania. And every morning they wake up and women are off to get plant foods, such as berries and tubers. The men go off to hunt for a wild game using bow and arrow.

For somebody like me who studies how humans evolved, a community like that is just an invaluable way to ask what hunting and gathering does to our bodies. Because we humans evolved over millennia as a hunting and gathering species. And yes in a population like that, food can be scarce sometimes. And you're always spending lots of energy on physical activity. So your body really has to be good at prioritizing how it spends its calories.

The Hadza walk everywhere they go, and compared to us, are seldom sedentary. I'd assume they burn significantly more calories than we do in a day. Yet surprisingly, your work shows that their metabolism isn't all that different from the average American.

About 10 years ago, we went and measured how many calories men and women in the Hadza community burn every day. The Hadza are so physically active, we'd expect that their total calories burned every day would be much higher than we see in the U.S. and Europe and other industrialized populations. And instead, what we found was that actually, even though men are getting 19,000 steps today, women are getting 13,000 steps a day on top of all the other work they do, they aren't burning more total calories every day than we are in the West.

Physical activity ends up being another one of those things that the body can juggle and adjust. And so in the same way that your body can adjust to changes in your food environment, your body can adjust to changes in your physical activity. So for the Hadza, their "metabolic business" has adjusted so that they spend less on other body systems to make room for that big physical activity workload that they have.

What does this mean for someone who is trying to lose weight today?

If you or I started an exercise program tomorrow, we will burn extra calories from that exercise for a while. But after a couple of months, our bodies will adjust so that we're spending about the same energy every day as we were before we started the exercise. Your body adjusts how it spends its energy to keep the total calories burned every day within a relatively narrow range. It just speaks to how adaptable and flexible our bodies are and how we're not really in charge of our metabolisms the way we think.

You include a section in the book about the TV show The Biggest Loser in which contestants competed to see who could lose the most weight. What was the problem with that?

Contestants went on this show and were put under a brutal routine of intense exercise, coupled with near starvation. You can lose a lot of weight that way. But it's not sustainable. Your body pushes back hard by slashing its metabolic rate. Some of those contestants have been followed for years afterward. The folks that have been able to keep the weight off still have lowered metabolic rates from what they went through. A lot of the contestants gained the weight back.

It goes to show you the way to fix the obesity crisis societally or [to lose and keep weight off] individually is not some big, drastic crash approach. You've got to go more sustainably than that because the body will just push back if you push too hard.

So if your goal is to lose weight, nutrition will offer the bigger impact than exercise. But for maintenance of healthy weight, that's where exercise is essential?

That's right. Let's rethink what exercise is doing. I call it the rhythm section of your body. Exercise keeps everything on the same page, on the same beat, and it helps regulate how your body works. And so once you get to a healthier weight, once you are able to lose weight and get to a set point where you want to be, exercise is really key in keeping yourself there. Exercise changes the way that your body regulates how hungry you feel or how full you feel.

The paleo diet is based on the idea that when we were all hunter-gatherers, we ate a certain way, and we didn't have problems with obesity or Type 2 diabetes or high blood pressure. But based on your study of the Hadza, what is it that the paleo folks get wrong?

If you go out and have a chance to live with a group like the Hadza, you realize that a lot of the stories we tell ourselves about the past, including things like the paleo diet, just kind of fall apart. So there's this idea in the paleo diet world that there's one sort of single natural human diet, and that diet was very meat heavy, hardly any carbs at all and certainly no sugars.

[In reality] the Hadza have a mix of plants and animals in their diets. It changes day to day and year to year, but about half of the calories are coming from plants. And not only that but actually something like 10[%] to 20% of their calories every day comes from wild honey, which is just sugar and water, you know, which it would not be on any paleo diet person's menu. Another big part of their diet is the starchy tubers and these root vegetables, which you often aren't allowed to eat on some version of the paleo diet.

One last thing that stunned me from your book: You write about the metabolic cost of pregnancy comparing pregnant women to Tour de France riders.

You can push the body as in the Tour de France, where riders burn 7,000 or 8,000 calories a day for three weeks. But it also makes sense that pregnancy is pushing the same metabolic limits as something like the Tour de France. They both run your body's metabolic machinery at full blast for as long as it can keep it up. It just speaks to how taxing pregnancy is, for one thing, but it also speaks to how these things are all connected. Our energetic machinery gets co-opted into these different tasks and makes connections that unite all of these different experiences.

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deCODE genetics – New study on inheritance and fetal growth USA – PRNewswire

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

A total of 243 fetal growth variants are reported and 141 of them were grouped into four main clusters based on separating the effect of the variant on birth weight though the maternal versus fetal genome. The majority of variants show an effect only in the fetus and a quarter of those show evidence of a parent-of-origin specific effect on birth weight i.e. the effect on the fetus differs depending on whether the child inherited the variant from the mother or the father. Some variants have an effect only in the mother but around 30% affect birth weight both through the maternal and fetal genomes, where for some the effect is in the same direction, no matter whether from mother or father, while for others the effect is in opposite directions.

Polygenic risk score analysis of disease-associated variants revealed that variants associating with blood pressure do not associate with birth weight when in the maternal genome but in the fetal genome the blood pressure raising allele correlates with lower birth weight. Variants that associate with risk of type 2 diabetes associate with birth weight through both the maternal and fetal genomes but in opposite directions. In the mother, the risk alleles correlate with higher birth weight but when in the fetus they correlate with lower birth weight.

"The ability to analyse directly the effect of each of the transmitted alleles and the maternal non-transmitted allele allows us to separate what happens through the mother from a direct effect on birth weight through the fetal genome," says Valgerdur Steinthorsdottir scientist atdeCODE Geneticsandauthor on the paper.

The study reports an expanded GWAS meta-analysis of 400,000 children, 270,000 mothers and 60,000 fathers, combining data from the Icelandic Birth Register for 125,000 newborns and their parents with public summary level fetal growth data on children and mothers from the Early Growth Genetics Consortium and UK Biobank. The effects of the fetal, maternal and paternal genomes on birth weight were analysed and the study further includes analysis of birth length and ponderal index.

"It is clear from these results that in our beginnings we are not only shaped by the half of our maternal genome that is transmitted to us but also the untransmitted half," says Kari Stefansson CEO of deCODE genetics. "Here we show how the influence of the two halves can be separated."

Based inReykjavik, Iceland, deCODE is a global leader in analyzing and understanding the human genome. Using its unique expertise in human genetics combined with growing expertise in transcriptomics and population proteomics and vast amount of phenotypic data, deCODE has discovered risk factors for dozens of common diseases and provided key insights into their pathogenesis. The purpose of understanding the genetics of disease is to use that information to create new means of diagnosing, treating and preventing disease. deCODE is a wholly-owned subsidiary of Amgen (NASDAQ: AMGN).

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Why Shares of Fulgent Genetics Rose 77% in the First Half of 2021 – Motley Fool

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

What happened

Shares of Fulgent Genetics (NASDAQ:FLGT) climbed 77% through the first half of 2021, according to data from S&P Global Market Intelligence. The rise was due to the incredible numbers of COVID tests the company was able to run and the customers it was able to line up.

FLGT data by YCharts.

Prior to a broad market sell-off in February, shares of Fulgent had been up more than 250% for the year. As vaccination rates climbed and the need for testing seemed to be waning, the stock collapsed almost 65%. Now that the delta variant of the coronavirus is taking hold, it appears investors are once again jumping on the bandwagon.

Image source: Getty Images.

The volatility obscures a business that has been consistently growing its revenue while demonstrating amazing operating leverage since early in the pandemic. Its core business -- genetic testing -- suffered when doctors' offices and clinics were closing last year, but it has more than fully recovered. Management expects that segment to grow 174% in 2021. Some of the recovery is thanks to being awarded a contract from the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) to track COVID through genome sequencing. Still, COVID testing volume is likely to drive the stock price for the remainder of this year.

That's good news for shareholders as cases of the virus have more than doubled in the past two weeks and are up close to 300% over the last month. The company has plenty of capacity. In 2020, Fulgent did 230 times more tests than in the prior year. It managed that increase while still delivering rapid turnaround times to several large counties including Los Angeles and Miami-Dade, as well as the New York City public school system. To top it off, the company's profit margins expanded much faster than revenue, and it has guided for $12 in earnings per share this year on the back of 97% sales growth.

If its partnerships with corporations, large school districts, counties, and the CDC can keep testing volume high, shareholders could get a second half of the year that mirrors the first. Add in potential deals with insurance companies to cover testing and growth for the $2.5 billion company could just be getting started.

This article represents the opinion of the writer, who may disagree with the official recommendation position of a Motley Fool premium advisory service. Were motley! Questioning an investing thesis -- even one of our own -- helps us all think critically about investing and make decisions that help us become smarter, happier, and richer.

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SMD – Genetics study in Pakistani and Bangladeshi communities will take action on health inequality – QMUL

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

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People of Bangladeshi and Pakistani origin have some of the highest rates of heart disease, type 2 diabetes and poor health in the UK.Social Action for Health (SAfH), a health inequality and community development charity, wants people to act to change this.

SAfH are working with Queen Mary University of London to promote the biggest study in the world researching genetics in people of Bangladeshi and Pakistani heritage. With the tagline #OurGenesOurHealth, they hope that British Bangladeshi and Pakistani people can be part of the movement making medical studies representative of those that will benefit most.

The research study, Genes & Health, aims to help fight against major diseases and SAfH are raising awareness of the study and encouraging people to take part. Genes & Health are hoping to get the attention of British Pakistanis and Bangladeshis by sharing a video they have produced with the help of members of the local Pakistani, Bangladeshi communities and Centre of the Cell Youth Membership Forum.

The video features children filmed in their own homes highlighting the diseases they are more at risk of developing and making a plea to their community to give five minutes of their time to provide a once in a lifetime saliva sample and fill in a short form to help change their future. This will contribute to breaking the cycle of health inequality, improving medications and treatment and increasing representation of these groups in medical research improving health and life chances for future generations.

Resarch made possible by Genes & Health volunteers is already making a difference. For example, data from Genes & Health hashelped show that one of the reasons some British Bangladeshi and British Pakistani people have very severe covid-19 is because an inherited genetic risk factor is 4 times more common in the South Asian community.

By volunteering this Eid and beyond, British Pakistani and Bangladeshi can join almost 50,000 people already signed up to give the gift (#GiveAGiftForEid) of a saliva sample to improve their communitys representation in a health research.

A further 50,000 people are needed, so the team is asking people 16 and over, who are of Bangladeshi, British-Bangladeshi, Pakistani or British-Pakistani heritage, to donate a saliva sample. For more information, or to take part, click here.

Dr Sarah Finer at Queen Mary University of London, said: As a doctor and researcher working in east London, I see the huge impact of conditions such as type 2 diabetes, heart disease and depression have on British Bangladeshis and Pakistanis. There is an urgent need to better understand the causes and consequences of ill health in these communities who are disproportionately affected by health conditions and under-represented in many research studies.

Genes & Health is a unique programme of research, focusing on health and disease in British Bangladeshis and Pakistanis. It brings together a network of world-class researchers who are making important new discoveries, including on COVID-19, type 2 diabetes, heart disease and the development of new medicines. Genes & Health research will have a big impact on health and disease in the long-term, and will help redress inequalities that exist currently. Genes & Health thanks the almost 50,000 volunteers who have helped make it a success so far and looks forward to many new volunteers joining us this Eid.

CeriDurham, CEO at SAFH, said: Social Action for Healths mission is to work alongside diverse communities in East London and inspire them to take action to live healthier lives. We believe that by people engaging with this research, not only will health inequalities be addressed, but it will inspire more medical studies to engage with a more diverse and representative group of beneficiaries.

The parents of these children wanted to be involved in making this video because they want a better, healthier future for themselves and their communities. They have something important to say and we should all be listening. We've had very positive feedback from parents, who are committed to tackling health inequalities as much as we are.

Farah, a parent of two children who took part in the video, said: Its heart-breaking to see that from one generation to the next we are carrying conditions like diabetes with us. This needs to stop. This impactful video shows how our innocent children may in the future suffer from these medical conditions when they can be prevented.

We hope that the shock tactic our video has will wake up the South Asian community into taking positive action and this is why my children agreed to take part and why I wanted them to be in this campaign. This isnt all about us, its about the future of our children and grandchildren."

The study is funded by the Wellcome Trust and Barts Charity, sponsored by Queen Mary University of London, and reviewed and approved by London South East National Research Ethics Service Committee.

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Genetics may play a role in the link between education, intelligence, and voter turnout – PsyPost

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

Voter turnout is an important factorperhaps the most important factorin ensuring that the democratic process properly represents a population. Despite this, governments around the world are constantly faced with poor turnout. Understanding how individual differences predict this is important to building meaningful interventions.

While it is known that education and intelligence correlate with voter turnout, the precise mechanism of this relation is unknown. The same goes for the well-established relation between genetics and voter turnout (between 40-50%, according to some studies). The authors of a recent study published in Human Behaviour decided to examine the two factors together, to see to what extent genetic influence on voter turnout was mediated by education and intelligence.

The authors also wanted to create a more robust study than previous experiments which have relied on reared-together twin studies (making it difficult to separate nurture from nature) and voter self-reporting, known to be particularly unreliable. Instead, the present study used a large (Danish) genetic dataset comprising roughly 47 000 individuals, in correlation with actual voter registration records.

The results of the study seem to agree with the authors hypothesis. That is, genotypes that predicted individual differences in education and performance on intelligence tests also predicted differences in voter turnout.

Its important to note, however, that these relations are correlational in nature (not causal), and that their mechanisms are not yet understood. The authors allude to previous studies, for example, which suggest that the influence of genetics on education attainment may be exerted via personality traits or, indirectly, through the family environment.

Nonetheless, the correlation is clear and robust. Individuals with a greater genetic disposition to obtain a degree of education one standard deviation higher than the mean were 2.66 times more likely to vote in municipal elections. Similarly, scoring one standard deviation higher on intelligence testing was correlated with a 1.85x greater likelihood to vote in national elections.

There are some limitations, including the fact that the data is limited to a single nation. Nonetheless, the studys large size and its robust correlational measures obtained through actual voter registration make this a particularly significant study statistically speaking, and lay the groundwork for interventions that will help increase voter turnout, buoying the democratic process.

The article, Genetic predictors of educational attainment and intelligence test performance predict voter turnout, was authored by Lene Aare, Vivek Appadurai, Kasper M. Hansen, Andrew J. Schork, Thomas Werge, Ole Mors, Anders D. Brglum, David M. Hougaard, Merete Nordentoft, Preben B. Mortensen, Wesley Kurt Thompson, Alfonso Buil, Esben Agerbo, and Michael Bang Petersen.

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Cannabis, Genetics, Basketball And Rap: BSF Seeds, The Weed Seed Bank That Took Over Latin America And Spain – Yahoo Finance

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

This article by Hernan Panessi was originally published on El Planteo, and appears here with permission.

Late 1990s. Asturias, the northern coast of Spain. Young Mariano was succumbing to family dilemmas, melting from anxiety and suffering from chronic pain caused by a colon condition.

He was still a kid when Chali, a friend 10 years older, invited him a few puffs of marijuana. After a few hits the young man burst out laughing. Suddenly, his nerves calmed, his dilemmas took the back seat and his pain magically disappeared.

"What is this?" Mariano asked Chali, and laughed again. He began smoking weed regularly and gained an interest in a know-how that, at the time, was quite unusual for young people: cannabis seeds and genetics.

His friend Chali shared with him strains from Afghanistan, India and Holland, countries that already had a strong cannabis culture.

One day, his friend Chali told him about Asturjaya, the first seed bank in Asturias. "They had pure strains, they brought seeds and stabilized them. They sold regular varieties," recalls Mariano Duque, breeder and creator of BSF Seeds, proclaimed as "the best seed bank in the world."

"We are crazy for this plant. The necessity of not having seeds made us make them. It used to be impossible to get seeds, so when we got a hold on them, we kept them like gold," he says, standing in the present, stirring his past.

That fast-paced summer

Back then, there were no social networks and no forums. Information was really scarce and Chali, his friend, took him to discover his small farm in the mountains. There, he showed him crosses, told him about sativas, indicas and various genetics.

It was 2001 and Mariano, who at that time was working delivering pizzas on a motorcycle, quickly knew that this was his true passion.

"I would leave work and go to the mountains every day," he says. And it was during that fast-paced summer, while visiting Asturjaya and learning from his friend that Mariano shaped his worldview . "It opened up the world to me, he asserts.

Story continues

BSF Seeds

With the first seeds and harvests came a new form of socialization: you could smoke better and now Mariano had the password on how to do it.

He stumbled with the store Mi Mara, in Oviedo, 100 kilometers from his home, another important piece for this green fable.

See also: Lion Rolling Circus: The Independent Argentine Brand That Revolutionized The Cannabis Accessories Market In LatAm - And Is Coming For The US Now

"That's where it all started. I was crazy about seeds. 'I have to make them,' I thought. I gave them away. It was my form of activism. I told everyone: 'Don't smoke hashish, smoke marijuana," he recalls.

He bought four bulbs, set up a room and grew some crosses.

The Dutch catalog

By 2003, fate put an opportunity in his hands: as the stores had seeds at ridiculous prices, Mariano decided to invest some 500 pesetas (less than USD 4) in a Dutch seed catalog that had some contact addresses.

"In Holland it was already legal. Spain had a legal vacuum. As long as it was for consumption and not for sale, it was not illegal."

He continued growing (summers outdoors, winters indoors), continued giving away seeds and here and there, until one day, an enthusiastic Mariano showed up at Spannabis 2008 to meet in person with the leaders of all the Dutch seed banks. "It was my dream," he recalls.

"My business was very small. I went around all the stands giving away seeds and asking for information. Almost begging. Mariano recognizes that now all those brands are his competition. They bear no taboos about information that they release and consider that if people know more, they will have better cannabis and it will be legal all over the world.

Suddenly, Asturias became too small for him and he moved to Tenerife, the island of eternal spring. Within months, he opened his own grow shop, which he called THC Canarias.

"It went very well. I won some cannabis cups and banks started calling me.

And, the business grew so much that he even organized his own cannabis cup.

The young promise of the breeders

By 2011, Mariano opened the Asociacin Club Medical THC, his own cannabis association and the first of its kind in the Canary Islands. "They gave me legal permission to grow, it was a dream come true."

In that raid, he began to recover seeds and reached the Super Sativa Seed Bank in California, one of the pioneering banks in the world. He recovered some seeds that were thought to be extinct and, from that point and on, a media rush started and never stopped spreading.

Suddenly, his name began to circulate among the great experts in the community and even Jorge Cervantes himself, author of Marijuana Horticulture: The Indoor/Outdoor Medical Grower's Bible, wrote to congratulate him. "I thought it was a prank. I learned everything from his books," he assures.

But it was true: Mariano Duque's work had grown so much that Cervantes and even the Soft Secrets magazine were surprised by his story and highlighted his work. "They put my face on the cover, in a crop. They were saying that the Canary Islands were full of THC. That was a boom. They said that I was the young promise of breeders."

Thus, his association went from grouping four scared friends to employing more than 1,500 people.

He networked with other banks, continued to develop professionally. And, suddenly, the dream was over: the police started to chase him, he was tapped and accused of being a little less than a drug dealer. They took everything from him, absolutely everything. His case ended up in court and is still open.

See also: Argentina Presents Cannabis, Hemp Industry Bill: Here's Everything You Need To Know

"They persecuted me in my country just for doing what I like, in a legal way and paying taxes."

Uruguay: the connection

At that time, in South America, Uruguay was legalizing the production, commercialization, possession of all uses of marijuana. Emboldened by this context, Mariano traveled to Uruguay like a whirlwind.

After a few months living in Uruguay, he showed up at every cannabis-related event. And of course, he was there when the first Expocannabis took place.

"One night, during a party I met a Chilean. We became friends and I started telling him my story. That's when we sparked the seed-bank project," he says.

That Chilean was none other than Tarek Jury, a marketing expert who teamed up with him, became his partner and became the co-creator of BSF Seeds.

"They created the brand based on the information they needed. What characteristics were they looking for? They wanted them to be bigger, stronger, faster," adds Felix Hadad Rivas, the CMO of BSF Seeds.

He continues: "They were creating everything with a small team of people. The business became increasingly profitable. They gave value to the seeds. The bank started to grow and became more professional. As an important observation, we always advocate responsible consumption. It is one of the brand values. And we always respect the user and are based on a human-centered perspective."

On their neck, BSF holds some 89 distinctions from various cannabis cups around the world. "That speaks highly of the product," Hadad Rivas adds.

BSF Seedverse

One of the brand's main aims is to train its users through its BSF School. In addition, they have a solidarity component, BSF Solidarity, a program through which they give away seeds for medical treatments for folks in need.

"We don't stop at just selling a seed," Duque confesses.

"We consider ourselves one of the most professional banks. We have alliances all over the world. And we even have the backing of Mike Angelotti, the organizer of The Emerald Cup. Our facilities are as professional as they can be. We take the plant to its maximum splendor," says Mariano.

BSF Seeds

Felix dixit: "Every employee considers himself a Bsfinian. Part of a culture that grew organically. It was not a marketing plan. It was constructed naturally and it has a tremendous value.

These days, there are Bsfinians on every continent and the messages of support, affection and closeness assure: "The plant is going to be free."

Inspiration in the basketball world

Duque explained that "BSF is the league of seeds. It 's like the NBA."

See also: The Benefits Of Using Hemp In The Construction And Textile Industries

In their catalog, they have "mixes" (they call them "teams") with different themes. They also feature "star players", which are consecrated varieties of the bank. And, as in the NBA, they go through "drafts" in which a handful of varieties compete to stay in the catalog.

-How did you design this referential universe linked to basketball?

-We spent a year and a half working on it. Until we came up with the idea of making the league, of making it a game. With BSF Seeds we deliver something extra: we have collectible packs and a "hall of fame" reserved for influential people. We have rappers like Original Juan and Akapellah. Soon Nitro is going to enter that league, too.

-And where does your connection to rap come from?

-I'm a rapper. I've been rapping and listening to freestyle since I was 13. Rap and weed. All rappers like to smoke. And all the rappers wanted to smoke with Mariano. Friendships were created with many artists. The first one was Supernafamacho from El Club de Los Poetas Violentos. He was into cannabis associations and I helped him with his club. He introduced me to everyone and we had an idea: to take a seed to Jota Mayscula, which was the first seed of a rapper in Spain. That's where the alliance with rap comes from.

Smokers, growers, breeders and freestylers.

"My brother Mariano gets a really good hash," spits Original Juan on "I Don't Give a Fuck."

"Shout-out BSF who sponsors me," Duki tosses in "Volando Bajito," a track from his new album Desde el fin del mundo.

With this push, came BSF Arena, a tournament in which international MCs competed via digital. An event that had jurors of the stature of Trueno, Duki and Original Juan and received the support of Urban Roosters, the brand behind the Freestyle Master Series, the most relevant freestyle leagues on Earth.

Undoubtedly, Mariano Duque is part of the international rapper imaginary. "We are the bank of rappers," he says.

"In the middle of the pandemic, I got the crazy idea to do all this. I talked it over with Juan Ortelli, who is a Bsfinian, and we gave it a green light. This was done so that people in pandemic would have rap," Duque confesses .

These days, BSF Seeds also plans to get into music production and will collaborate with artists Jaloner and Sudakillah.

-How much more innovation is possible in the world of genetics?

-The truth is that there is no end to it. Genetics in cannabis is a world to be built. With the current situation, with the legality advancing in the world, research is just beginning. We don't sell seeds, we sell dreams. It was the first thing I received when I entered this world.

Photos courtesy of BSF Seeds

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3 Things About Fulgent Genetics That Smart Investors Know – Motley Fool

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

During the COVID-19 pandemic, Fulgent Genetics (NASDAQ:FLGT) was in the right place at the right time. Fulgent became a key provider of COVID-19 testing in 2020 and saw its revenue explode by almost 1,300% over the prior year. Few companies benefited more during the pandemic -- and few have a bigger cloud of uncertainty hanging over them as investors worry about what comes next.

The good news is that Fulgent isn't a one-trick pony. The company is going through a metamorphosis, strengthened by a reinforced balance sheet and a growing core business in an attractive genetic testing market. Investors should prepare to shift their perspective.

Image source: Getty Images.

Before the COVID-19 testing opportunity came along, Fulgent's core business was a small but fast-growing next generation sequencing (NGS) genetic testing service primarily focused on pediatric rare diseases.

That segment is still expanding fast. In the first quarter ended March 31, NGS volume grew 185% year over year from 13,000 to 38,000 tests, while corresponding revenue grew 115% to $16.7 million. Management is projecting NGS revenue of over $100 million in 2021, representing 170% year-over-year growth.

Fulgent has an efficient technology and operating platform generating gross margins of about 80% and operating margins above 70%. As a result, liquidity is a real bright spot for Fulgent. At the end of Q1, it reported $697 million in cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities. Management expects to close the year with more than $1 billion in short-term liquidity, excluding any merger- and acquisition-related activity.

The encouraging growth in the core business is understandably offset by a rapid reduction in COVID-19 testing revenue. Unless there is a flare-up of infections from virus variants, COVID-19 testing revenue will continue to fall dramatically. Management is projecting $418 million in COVID-19 testing revenue for the remainder of the year, compared with $312 million in Q1 alone.

This precipitous revenue falloff is an operational challenge, but Fulgent has an experienced management team that over the past year has proven to be strong operators in building and scaling the business.

Fulgent will report quarterly earnings in early August. Smart investors will keep an eye on these three areas for signs management is executing on the long-term growth potential:

1. Continued COVID-19 testing

While testing volumes are declining, the endpoint is not zero. Fulgent has proven to be a high-quality, low-cost, fast-turnaround provider of gold-standard RT-PCR tests. Many screening programs are not allowing less sensitive antigen or rapid molecular tests to be used. As a result, Fulgent has been able to secure contracts for "return to normalcy" testing, particularly with school systems and the government.

The Department of Health and Human Services announced it will invest $12 billion in COVID-19 testing through the American Rescue Plan, with $10 billion going to schools. Fulgent management estimates that more than 1 million tests per day will be needed with this new program. Look for contract wins and continued testing volume in the near term.

2. Growth catalysts

Fulgent is expanding into additional genetic testing areas, including hereditary cancer, which is a high-growth area. There are more than 550 ongoing clinical trials for oncology genetic therapies, which will drive the need for more genetic testing and higher reimbursement over the coming years. Pharma companies are advocating and paying for genetic testing, since it will drive demand for their therapies. Fulgent has also established FF Gene Biotech, a joint venture focused on oncology in China, which is expected to be a $45 billion market. Stay tuned to these critical long-term developments.

3. Mergers and acquisitions

Fulgent's large cash position and strong operating leverage could make acquisitions a way to rapidly generate revenue that is accretive to the bottom line. In last year's Q4 conference call, CEO Ming Hsieh called out his interest in acquisitions to expand the core diagnostic business in Asia and Europe. It's a big world, and billions of people will need the genetic tests Fulgent is developing.

The market doesn't like uncertainty, which has helped push Fulgent shares down 56% from their 52-week high. The share price may go even lower as investors struggle to understand the profit picture in the next few quarters.

For patient long-term buy-and-hold investors with a tolerance for some uncertainty, Fulgent Genetics may actually be the best value biotech stock out there and could be a great addition for your portfolio.

This article represents the opinion of the writer, who may disagree with the official recommendation position of a Motley Fool premium advisory service. Were motley! Questioning an investing thesis -- even one of our own -- helps us all think critically about investing and make decisions that help us become smarter, happier, and richer.

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Latest Research Strengthens Link Between Genetics and Suicidal Behaviors – University of Utah Health Care

Posted: July 21, 2021 at 2:34 am

Jul 13, 2021 11:00 AM

Author: Doug M Dollemore

Suicide isnt just about a bad day, week, month, or year. Its not just about sadness or feeling hopeless. Nor is it just the predictable end result of schizophrenia, post-traumatic stress, or other mental disorders. In truth, death by suicide can be attributed to any or all of these things, plus a multitude of other factors that, in combination, can lead someone to end their own life.

Among the least understood of these factors is genetics. Research, much of it conducted at University of Utah Health, strongly suggests that risk for suicide death is partially inheritable and tracks in families independent of the effects of a shared environment. Identifying these genetic risk factors, scientists say, could lead to better ways to predict who might be at risk of suicide and new strategies for preventing the worst from happening.

Understanding the underlying factors involved in suicidal behaviors is key, says Eric Monson, M.D. Ph.D., a chief resident psychiatrist at U of U Health. Suicide is inherently preventable, indicating that the more we know about its risks, the more potential lives that could be saved.

To address this growing interest, University of Utah Health scientists are collaborating on an investigation called the Utah Suicide Genetic Risk Study (USGRS). The researchers, in cooperation with the state Office of the Medical Examiner, has collected nearly 8,000 DNA samples from Utahans who died by suicide, one of the largest DNA collections from suicide victims in the world.

This DNA resource is linked to the Utah Population Database (UPDB), which contains medical, demographic, and genealogic information, then de-identified for the research team. Together, these databases are helping U of U Health researchers identify specific gene variants, or SNPs (pronounced snips), and other genetic mutations that could contribute to suicide risk.

Among their latest findings are:

Variants in nerve signaling gene may play a role in risk of death by suicide

A pair of newly discovered variants in a gene that plays a key role in the transmission of nerve signals in the brain could help explain why death by suicide is more prevalent in some families, according to a study published in Molecular Psychiatry and led by U of U Health scientists.

Neurexin-1 (NRXN1) is a gene that helps regulate synapse activity in the brain. Synapses, also known as neuronal junctions, are where electronic signals pass from one nerve cell to another. In a previous genome-wide study of Utah families spanning several generations, NRXN1 was identified as a gene that could potentially elevate the risk of death by suicide. Other research suggests that NRXN1 is also associated with schizophrenia, autism, and other psychiatric disorders. These disorders may be linked to increased suicide risk.

In this new study, the researchers conducted laboratory experiments comparing the effects of normalNRXN1to variant NRXN1. They discovered that NRXN1 variant synapses were twice as active as normal ones, suggesting that genetic alterations in this synapse pathway may play a role in increasing risk of suicide.

This result gives us a clue about one of likely many gene pathways that may lead to increased risk, says Hilary Coon, Ph.D., senior author of the study and a research professor in the Department of Psychiatry. However, more study will be needed to understand how these changes might interact with environmental risk factors and additional genetic risks that are yet to be discovered.

Prior trauma and a genetic predisposition for PTSD among those with bipolar disorder may increase risk of death by suicide

Individuals with bipolar disorder who are genetically predisposed to develop post-traumatic stress disorder following distressing events in their lives could be at greater risk of death by suicide than others who attempt it, according to a study in Translational Psychiatry led by U of U Heath scientists. The researchers say the finding could lead to better screening measures to detect prior trauma among bipolar disorder patients and identify those who are at greatest risk of suicide death.

The study, the largest combined clinical and genetic effort to investigate risk factors for death by suicide in bipolar disorder, is among the first to find differing risk factors for suicide attempts and death, according to Eric Monson, M.D., Ph.D., lead author of the study.

Rates of death by suicide are 10 to 30 times higher for people with bipolar disorder than for the general population, Monson says. What we found in this study is that a combination of prior trauma, a genetic predisposition for PTSD, and a diagnosis of bipolar disorder is almost a perfect storm that puts an individual at greater risk of death by suicide.

Rare genetic variants could help scientist pinpoint genes linked to suicide risk

Five newly discovered rare but potent genetic variants could help scientists identify specific genes and genetic pathways associated with suicide death, according to a study published in the American Journal of Medical Genetics Part B. The study, led by Emily DiBlasi, Ph.D., a research instructor in the Department of Psychiatry, is among the first comprehensive examinations of rare genetic variations linked to suicide death.

Rare variants represent less than 1% of the genetic variations in humans. Unlike more common variants, which usually are found near or adjacent to generalized regions of the human genome, rare variants are found within specific genes. These variants can alter proteins and adversely affect how a gene functions; ultimately, they may have a powerful and damaging influence on the risk of death by suicide.

Rare variants are a compelling source of the unaccounted genetic variation in suicide risk, DiBlasi says. Identifying these risk markers within specific genes could help us better understand some of the more puzzling aspects of the complex role that genetics might have in suicide death.

However, while evidence for the role that genetics might play in suicidal behaviors is growing, DiBlasi and her U of U Health colleagues emphasize it shouldnt be mistaken for destiny.

Were really in the early stages of genetic discovery, DiBlasi says. But based on what we know so far, its important to keep in mind that even if an individual has all of the variants that weve identified, it doesnt mean they are going to die by suicide. It just means that their risk might, and I must stress might, be elevated.

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