Daily Protein Science: Kids

Beijing: A three-year-old girl in China has become the first person in the world to have her skull reconstructed with the help of 3D printing technology, after a 17-hour-long ground-breaking surgery. The girl was suffering from a medical condition called hydrocephalus, which causes a buildup of excess cerebrospinal fluid in the brain. The condition left her with a head weighing about 20 kg, while she herself weighs only 32 kg. Doctors said she is recovering steadily after the 3D-printed titanium alloy skull was implanted, becoming the first person to have her cranium successfully reconstructed by by 3D printers. Han Han underwent the 17-hour surgery on Wednesday at the Second People's Hospital of central China's Hunan Province and is under observation, said neurosurgeon Kuang Weiping, who is in charge of her treatment. Han was admitted to the hospital two months ago. Since September last year, she has become bedridden as her head grew four times the normal size, taking up more than half of her total weight, Xinhua news agency reported. Due to the heavy weight, parts of her brain suffered serious infections and she lost sight because her optic nerve was affected. Kuang said they believed her skull was likely to rupture as infected parts became thinner and only the "brain-shrinking" operation could save her life. During the process,...

Read More........→July 18, 2015 Categories: Brain,Health,Kids,Science-Technology,Video

Doctors in Sweden have announced the first baby born to a mother with a womb transplant. This pioneering operation offers hope to thousands of couples who are unable to conceive children. In 2013, researchers at the University of Gothenburg completed a series of nine womb transplants on women in Sweden. Among the patients was an unnamed 36-year-old with Mayer-Rokitansky-Küster-Hauser syndrome (MRKH), a rare condition that prevents the uterus from developing. Her ovaries were intact, however, so she could ovulate. This female became the recipient of a uterus donation from her 61-year-old family friend, the latter having gone through the menopause around seven years earlier. Drugs were needed to suppress the immune system, which otherwise would have resulted in the organ being rejected. Alongside this, IVF was used to produce 11 embryos, frozen and stored for later use. In January 2014, a year after the transplant, doctors successfully implanted one of these embryos into the patient, transferring it to her new womb. There were concerns over how well a transplanted uterus would Credit: The Lancet cope with the strains of pregnancy, during which it swells greatly in size. The procedure had been attempted by scientists in the past – but in each case, it led to either a miscarriage or organ failure caused by disease. On this occasion,...