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Sugar-coated nanotherapy dramatically improves neuron survival in Neurodegenerative model

The new therapy, made of nanofibers and trehalose, a sugar that naturally occurs in plants, traps and neutralizes toxic proteins to stop disease progression. Now trapped, the toxic proteins can no longer enter neurons and instead harmlessly degrade. The study, published in the journal of the American Society, was led by the Institute for Bioengineering of Catalonia and the Northwestern University.

A blood-brain barrier on a chip to study drugs against Alzheimer’s

A study led by the Institute of Bioengineering of Catalonia (IBEC) describes the development of an organ-on-a-chip that mimics the human blood-brain barrier. With this system, researchers can study the barrier permeability to different drugs and screen the most effective ones, avoiding animal tests. The device could also incorporate cells from patients to make a personalized study of the disease.