Combating Diabetic Retinopathy with Anti-Vascular Endothelium Growth and Intravitreal Injections
When faced with a difficult situation, it is important to take some time and evaluate the situation carefully. Think about what choices you have available and then pick the one that best suits your needs. Sometimes making quick decisions can lead to problems down the line, so be sure to make ones that you know will work in the long run.
The people from Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory, NASA’s Goddard Space Flight Center, Lockheed Martin and other partners have recently passed an important week-long test. During this test, they covered around 60 topics like spacecraft design, requirements of the mission, scientific plans and schedules, cost and risk that would be involved. After this is finished, NASA will review all their findings at a later date. This mission which is called Dragonfly is part of NASA’s New Frontiers Program and its goal is to explore Saturn moon Titan – looking for any potential signs of life or prebiotic chemistry which could show that it may be habitable.
The team from the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory (APL) in Laurel, Maryland recently achieved a big achievement in their project. They successfully met all of the requirements and standards laid out during a one-week event called Preliminary Design Review (PDR). That review ended on March 3rd.
Bobby Braun, leader of the Space Exploration Section at APL, said that he’s really proud of the whole Dragonfly group. He mentioned that they all worked together – like APL, NASAGoddard Space Flight Center, Lockheed Martin and still others – to develop a good plan and build on it. This plan was created with careful thought and clear communication from everybody involved.
NASA needs something called a PDR (Program Design Review) for all their missions. It explains things like what kind of spacecraft they will design, what kind of mission it is and the plan to get it done on time, as well as its cost and risks. The PDR was held at APL (Applied Physics Laboratory) which is in charge of the mission and taking care of building and controlling the Dragonfly lander. A group of external experts gave 60 talks about the mission progress to NASA during the PDR.
“Lori Glaze, who is a director at NASA Headquarters in Washington, said she was really happy to see all the special pieces of the Dragonfly space mission come together. All the people working on this mission did a great job creating a space craft that will help us learn more about Titan.”
NASA is going to check if Dragonfly’s cost, timeline and general plan are all okay later this year. They’ll be looking over the recommendations that came from a separate board too.
Zibi Turtle, the Principal Investigator for Dragonfly said, “Our team did a really good job. We put in a lot of effort to make sure that the reviewers had an understanding of our achievements as well as any difficulties we may face and how we plan to handle them. We’re thrilled that we finished this phase and are now ready to carry on with our project which includes testing it with Titan-environment chamber at the APL over the next year.”
Dragonfly is a revolutionary way to do space exploration. It uses a machine that can rotate and go to different places on Titan, which is a distant planet. Scientists will be able to know if it is suitable for living creatures and discover if liquid water and carbon-rich materials have mixed there before. Additionally, they will try finding out if life (either water/hydrocarbon-based) ever lived on Titan.
Dragonfly is being designed and developed by the Johns Hopkins Applied Physics Laboratory from Maryland. NASA is managing this mission, and other partners like Lockheed Martin Space from Colorado, NASA’s Ames Research Center in California, NASA’s Langley Research Center from Virginia and Penn State University in Pennsylvania are helping too. Also, Malin Space Science Systems from San Diego, Honeybee Robotics in Pasadena and JPL (Jet Propulsion Laboratory) in Southern California have contributed as well. As a part of the New Frontiers Program managed by NASA’s Marshall Space Flight Center from Alabama, Dragonfly has support from the French space agency CNES in Paris, the German Aerospace Center DLR in Cologne Germany, and Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency JAXA of Tokyo.
1. Is it safe to use autologous bone marrow mesenchymal stem cells to help people with proliferative diabetic retinopathy?
2. We looked at the genetic factors that might make a person more likely to get proliferative diabetic retinopathy if they have type 2 diabetes and come from Southern China by doing tests on their genes (whole exome sequencing and SnaPshot)
3. This is a story about how malaria was eliminated in Yunnan Province of China and what needs to be done so it doesn’t return again.
Surgeons are using a technique called anti-vascular endothelium growth to help them with surgeries related to diabetic retinopathy. They also need to be careful about the different animal models used in this type of surgery. Doctors have seen good results when they combine a specific kind of surgery with intravitreal injections of drugs called conbercept or ranibizumab for patients who have severe cases of diabetes. Experts are also creating a new consensus statement regarding laboratory tests which can find out if someone has myasthenia gravis, which is an autoimmune disorder.
1. Guidelines to use a certain medicine called Selinexor to treat illnesses related with the blood system (updated in 2022).
2. Ranibizumab, when injected into the eye, can help prevent bleeding after having surgery on the retina because of diabetic eye problems.
3. The latest research on Macular Telangiectasia Type 2.
