"A Peugeot J5 with number plate, XS 626 LSV, and a DAF articulated vehicle with number plate, AA 902 MML, had an accident as both drivers were struggling for the right of the way. They were both going to Lagos when the accident happened around 9.30am on Sunday. It happened just before the campus of the Dominion University in Sepo, on the Lagos-Ibadan Expressway.There were 96 people involved, with 17 confirmed dead. It is obvious that both drivers were speeding and suddenly lost control of the vehicles. The Peugeot bus was loaded with passengers and goods, but the casualty figure rose because the other vehicle was travelling to Lagos with huge number of illegal passengers."Meanwhile, a man who attributed the accident to witches was shouted down as he brings out a book that predicts that witches and wizards will cause accidents on the road. Sympathizers warned him to stop, citing that there are no witches on the road.
LA JOLLA–Salk Institute researchers have found that an experimental drug candidate aimed at combating Alzheimer's disease has a host of unexpected anti-aging effects in animals.
The Salk team expanded upon their previous development of a drug candidate, called J147, which takes a different tack by targeting Alzheimer’s major risk factor–old age. In the new work, the team showed that the drug candidate worked well in a mouse model of aging not typically used in Alzheimer’s research. When these mice were treated with J147, they had better memory and cognition, healthier blood vessels in the brain and other improved physiological features.
“Initially, the impetus was to test this drug in a novel animal model that was more similar to 99 percent of Alzheimer’s cases,” says Antonio Currais, the lead author and a member of Professor David Schubert’s Cellular Neurobiology Laboratory at Salk. “We did not predict we’d see this sort of anti-aging effect, but J147 made old mice look like they were young, based upon a number of physiological parameters.”
“While most drugs developed in the past 20 years target the amyloid plaque deposits in the brain (which are a hallmark of the disease), none have proven effective in the clinic,” says Schubert, senior author of the study.
Several years ago, Schubert and his colleagues began to approach the treatment of the disease from a new angle. Rather than target amyloid, the lab decided to zero in on the major risk factor for the disease–old age. Using cell-based screens against old age-associated brain toxicities, they synthesized J147.
Previously, the team found that J147 could prevent and even reverse memory loss and Alzheimer’s pathology in mice that have a version of the inherited form of Alzheimer’s, the most commonly used mouse model. However, this form of the disease comprises only about 1 percent of Alzheimer’s cases. For everyone else, old age is the primary risk factor, says Schubert. The team wanted to explore the effects of the drug candidate on a breed of mice that age rapidly and experience a version of dementia that more closely resembles the age-related human disorder.
Another notable effect was that J147 prevented the leakage of blood from the microvessels in the brains of old mice. “Damaged blood vessels are a common feature of aging in general, and in Alzheimer’s, it is frequently much worse,” says Currais.
Currais and Schubert note that while these studies represent a new and exciting approach to Alzheimer’s drug discovery and animal testing in the context of aging, the only way to demonstrate the clinical relevance of the work is to move J147 into human clinical trials for Alzheimer’s disease.
“If proven safe and effective for Alzheimer’s, the apparent anti-aging effect of J147 would be a welcome benefit,” adds Schubert. The team aims to begin human trials next year.
Salk has an issued patent on J147 licensed to Abrexa Pharmaceuticals.
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"Boeing's newest airliner took to the sky for the first time on Friday. The Boeing 737 Max flew from the company's Renton, Washington, factory for a 2 1/2-hour maiden flight before landing at Boeing Field near Seattle. The first completed 737 Max 8 airliner rolled out of the assembly facility in Renton last month and was presented at a ceremony in front of several thousand Boeing employees. The prototype took off for its inaugural flight with Boeing's flight-operations vice president and chief test pilot, Craig Bomben, and Capt. Ed Wilson at the controls. Over the years, the 737 family has become the best-selling airliner in the history of commercial aviation, with more than 13,000 aircraft sold since 1965. It is arguably Boeing's bread-and-butter model."
