685results about How to "Increase differentiation" patented technology

The invention relates to methods and compositions for the differentiation of stromal cells from adipose tissue into hematopoietic supporting stromal cells and myocytes of both the skeletal and smooth muscle type. The cells produced by the methods are useful in providing a source of fully differentiated and functional cells for research, transplantation and development of tissue engineering products for the treatment of human diseases and traumatic tissue injury repair.

There is provided a nuclear reprogramming factor for a somatic cell, which comprises a gene product of each of the following three kinds of genes: an Oct family gene, a Klf family gene, and a Myc family gene, as a means for inducing reprogramming of a differentiated cell to conveniently and highly reproducibly establish an induced pluripotent stem cell having pluripotency and growth ability similar to those of ES cells without using embryo or ES cell.

A method of increasing the growth of stem cells by mixing the stem cells with a growth medium that has been conditioned by an incubation with placental tissue. The method increases the expansion of the stem cell population.

The present invention provides processes for producing porous silk fibroin scaffold material. The porous silk fibroin scaffold can be used for tissue engineering. The porosity of the silk fibroin scaffolds described herein can be adjusted as to mimic the gradient of densities found in natural tissue. Accordingly, methods for engineering of 3-dimensional tissue, e.g. bone and cartilage, using the silk fibroin scaffold material are also provided.

There is provided a nuclear reprogramming factor for a somatic cell, which comprises a gene product of each of the following three kinds of genes: an Oct family gene, a Klf family gene, and a Myc family gene, as a means for inducing reprogramming of a differentiated cell to conveniently and highly reproducibly establish an induced pluripotent stem cell having pluripotency and growth ability similar to those of ES cells without using embryo or ES cell.

Methods, apparatus, and kits detect and / or treat vulnerable plaque of a blood vessel. A temperature differential can be sensed along a lumen surface with temperature sensors on a balloon filled with warm gas. Treatment methods include controlled and safe cryogenic cooling of vulnerable plaque to inhibit release of retained fluid within the vulnerable plaque so as to inhibit acute coronary syndrome and to help maintain patency of a body lumen.

In a minimally invasive surgical system, an image capture unit includes a prism assembly and sensor assembly. The prism assembly includes a beam splitter, while the sensor assembly includes coplanar image capture sensors. Each of the coplanar image capture sensors has a common front end optical structure, e.g., the optical structure distal to the image capture unit is the same for each of the sensors. A controller enhances images acquired by the coplanar image capture sensors. The enhanced images may include (a) visible images with enhanced feature definition, in which a particular feature in the scene is emphasized to the operator of minimally invasive surgical system; (b) images having increased image apparent resolution; (c) images having increased dynamic range; (d) images displayed in a way based on a pixel color component vector having three or more color components; and (e) images having extended depth of field.

A resource management apparatus for a cellular communication system is provided wherein the available radio resource is divided into separate partitions, each of which is allocated to a different operator, such as a Mobile Virtual Network Operator. Radio Network Controllers of the cellular communication system comprise independent resource controllers for each operator. The resource controllers allocate radio resource to a subscriber unit in response to an operator identity associated with a service of the subscriber unit, such that different quality of service is achieved for different operators. The resource is allocated from the resource partition of the operator identified. The resource controllers independently control one or more quality of service parameters of the radio access network, Hence, each operator may independently control and manage quality of service and is thereby enabled to differentiate from other operators.

The invention features compositions, methods, and kits for the treatment of metabolic disorders such as diabetes and obesity.

The invention provides a variety of surgical instruments for forming a liquid jet, which are useful for performing a wide variety of surgical procedures. In some embodiments, the invention provides surgical liquid jet instruments having a pressure tube and an evacuation tube, where the pressure tube includes at least one nozzle for forming a liquid jet and where the evacuation tube includes a jet-receiving opening for receiving the liquid jet when the instrument is in operation. In some embodiments, the surgical liquid jet instrument is constructed to minimize damage to the tissue surrounding the tissue that is desired to be removed. In some embodiments, the outer surface of the distal tip of the evacuation tube wall and / or the pressure tube wall is blunted to minimize tissue damage. The invention also provides surgical methods utilizing the inventive surgical liquid jet instruments for cutting or ablating a selected tissue within portions of a patient's spine, such as within the intervertebral disc.

A flow cytometry apparatus and methods to process information incident to particles or cells entrained in a sheath fluid stream allowing assessment, differentiation, assignment, and separation of such particles or cells even at high rates of speed. A first signal processor individually or in combination with at least one additional signal processor for applying compensation transformation on data from a signal. Compensation transformation can involve complex operations on data from at least one signal to compensate for one or numerous operating parameters. Compensated parameters can be returned to the first signal processor for provide information upon which to define and differentiate particles from one another.

The present invention provides processes for producing porous silk fibroin scaffold material. The porous silk fibroin scaffold can be used for tissue engineering. The porosity of the silk fibroin scaffolds described herein can be adjusted as to mimic the gradient of densities found in natural tissue. Accordingly, methods for engineering of 3-dimensional tissue, e.g. bone and cartilage, using the silk fibroin scaffold material are also provided.

In a minimally invasive surgical system, an image capture unit includes a prism assembly and sensor assembly. The prism assembly includes a beam splitter, while the sensor assembly includes coplanar image capture sensors. Each of the coplanar image capture sensors has a common front end optical structure, e.g., the optical structure distal to the image capture unit is the same for each of the sensors. A controller enhances images acquired by the coplanar image capture sensors. The enhanced images may include (a) visible images with enhanced feature definition, in which a particular feature in the scene is emphasized to the operator of minimally invasive surgical system; (b) images having increased image apparent resolution; (c) images having increased dynamic range; (d) images displayed in a way based on a pixel color component vector having three or more color components; and (e) images having extended depth of field.

The invention is directed to novel compositions and methods utilizing virion derived protein nanoparticles for delivery of medical imaging agents and therapeutic agents for the diagnosis and treatment of malignant and systemic diseases. The nanoparticles of the present invention are designed to deliver radioactive isotopes suitable for imaging a tumor and its metastases. Additionally, the nanoparticles may deliver a radioisotope that is suitable for treating a tumor and its metastases by alpha, beta or gamma radiation. Alternatively, the virion derived nanoparticles may deliver a treatment agent for cancer or a combination of a radioisotope and a cancer treatment agent. Additionally the virion derived nanoparticle may include delivery of a drug that enhances the immune system's recognition of the tumor.

The invention is directed to novel compositions and methods utilizing virion derived protein nanoparticles for delivery of medical imaging agents and therapeutic agents for the diagnosis and treatment of malignant and systemic diseases.

Real-time and individualized disease monitoring is central to rapidly evolving medical sciences and technologies, but for the vast majority of patients, disease progression and treatment are monitored only in an irregular and discontinuous fashion. Consequently, disease progression and relapse are often allowed to proceed too far before they are detected, compromising the possibility of any effective treatment. For one patient, this can mean becoming refractory to the few early drug treatments that are available; for another, missing early detection may be deadly. This invention provides a method for the detection of early signals of disease and recovery thereof comprising a universal yet personalized health-monitoring solution using cell phones or other wearable smart device data that generate extensive real-time data. The invention further provides a system and method to provide answers to a variety of questions related to the patient health status and health trajectory. Its flexibility and generality is designed for a preferred application to rare disorders and rare questions for which other analytical system are lacking.

In a minimally invasive surgical system, an image capture unit includes a prism assembly and sensor assembly. The prism assembly includes a beam splitter, while the sensor assembly includes coplanar image capture sensors. Each of the coplanar image capture sensors has a common front end optical structure, e.g., the optical structure distal to the image capture unit is the same for each of the sensors. A controller enhances images acquired by the coplanar image capture sensors. The enhanced images may include (a) visible images with enhanced feature definition, in which a particular feature in the scene is emphasized to the operator of minimally invasive surgical system; (b) images having increased image apparent resolution; (c) images having increased dynamic range; (d) images displayed in a way based on a pixel color component vector having three or more color components; and (e) images having extended depth of field.

The present invention provides a self-assembling peptide comprising: (a) a first amino acid domain that mediates self-assembly, wherein the domain comprises alternating hydrophobic and hydrophilic amino acids that are complementary and structurally compatible and self-assemble into a macroscopic structure when present in unmodified form; and (b) a second amino acid domain that does not mediate self-assembly in isolated form, wherein the second amino acid domain comprises at least one minimal biologically active sequence. Such self-assembling peptides are described herein as “modified self-assembling peptides.” The present invention also provides pharmaceutical compositions, kits and matrices comprising a modified self-assembling peptide, and methods of using and making such compositions, kits and matrices.

Methods for modulating neurogenesis in vitro and in vivo have been disclosed. The methods comprise contacting neural stem cells with an effective amount of a FTY720 compound. The neurogenesis may involve the modulation of proliferation, differentiation, migration or survival of a non-embryonic neural stem cells or progenitor cells. Also disclosed are methods for the prevention or treatment of neurological disorders comprising administering to a subject a therapeutically effective amount of a FTY720 compound. The disorders that can be treated include various nervous system disorders.

The invention brings forward a traffic label identification method of vehicle-mounted laser scanning point cloud data. The method comprises the following steps: 1, point cloud real-time preprocessing; 2, point cloud structure feature obtaining; 3, multi-scale Markov random field point cloud clustering; and 4, traffic label identification. The method has the following advantages: "surface-shaped", "linear-shaped" and "scattered" features of point clouds are reinforced, differences between points are enhanced, and while under-segmentation is avoided, reasonable segmentation of the scale of a traffic label component can be rapidly realized; classification and identification of a traffic label can be conveniently realized from point cloud data of deficiency of a part of the traffic label, caused by ground object shielding or ground object self-occlusion; the method can effectively satisfy the requirements for rapid extracting, monitoring and identifying city components at present, can be conveniently promoted to the industry of manned or unmanned navigation and barrier avoiding based on computer vision, helps a driver to perform navigation and decision-making under complex road conditions, and effectively reduces the traffic accident probability.

The invention discloses a stereoscopic vision-based real low-texture image reconstruction method, which is implemented by the following steps: (1) shooting images by two cameras at two proper angles at the same time, respectively, wherein one image is used as a reference image and the other image is used as a registered image; (2) calibrating the inside and outside parameter matrixes of the two cameras respectively; (3) performing epipolar line correction, image transformation and Gauss filtration according to the calibrated data; (4) calculating a self-adaptive polygonal prop window of each point in the two calibrated images, and calculating the matching of pixel points to obtain a parallax space diagram; (5) completing dense matching by executing a tree dynamic programming algorithm pixel by pixel in the whole diagram; (6) extracting error matching points according to a left and right consistency principle, and performing parallax correction to obtain a final parallax diagram; and (7) calculating the three-dimensional coordinates of actual object points according to the calibrated data and a matching relationship to construct the three-dimensional point cloud of an object.

An edge lighting control for a television set. A television set includes a display, an edge lighting bezel surrounding the display, a processor, and a memory component. The edge lighting bezel is operable to output light and its operation is user controllable, e.g., interaction between a GUI and a remote control. The processor controls the operation of the edge lighting bezel, e.g., dimming the output light and its color pattern, in response to user input. The memory component stores instructions and data for controlling the operation of the edge lighting bezel when processed by the processor. The edge lighting bezel may include a ring of light emitting diodes (LEDs) surrounding the display and a light pipe surrounding the ring. The ring is operable to emit light responsive to the user input and the light pipe is operable to transmit light emitted from the ring.

A system for deriving benefits from the reception and processing of composite video signals by a hand-held device, such as a smart card. Video signals are modulated with auxiliary data creating composite video signals. The composite video signals are then transmitted to and received by a hand-held device. The auxiliary data is then detected in the modulated video signal by circuitry of the hand-held device. The user receives benefits resulting from the reception of the auxiliary data.

A method for single photon counting transmission computed tomography (CT) is described. The method is based on an apparatus consisting of a radiation source and detectors on an opposite side of the subject from the source. The radiation source is for example an X-ray tube. The detectors are independently connected to parallel, fast, low-noise processing electronics capable of recording and counting individual X-ray photons at very high rate. In one embodiment of the invention, said detector is made of a scintillator coupled to a photodetector. The photodetector can be an avalanche photodiode (APD). The method comprises the steps of: directing the low energy radiation source toward the subject; detecting the radiation transmitted through the subject towards the detectors and recording the position and energy of each individual X-ray photon; rotating the radiation source and detectors around the subject; recording data for each position of the radiation source and detectors around the subject to form projections; and creating a CT image from the recorded projection data. The proposed method allows enhancing CT image contrast and reducing radiation dose to the patient by counting individual X-ray photons.

The invention relates generally to ion mobility based systems, methods and devices for analyzing samples and, more particularly, to sample pre-separation and amplification.

A system for and methods of processing non-traditional payment transactions on a traditional payment network is disclosed. More specifically, a payments system includes one or more payment program managers (PPMs), which are the providers of alternative payment products, in combination with one or more payment program processors (PPPs), which serve as processors for the PPMs. The PPMs and PPPs operate on a payment network, such as a traditional payment network. The payments system includes the utilization of traditional bank identification numbers (BINS) in order to process non-traditional transactions on a traditional payment network. Surrogate numbers are issued on BIN ranges to the non-traditional transactions in order to process them on the traditional payment network. Additionally, the payments system includes pricing structures that are associated with alternative payment products. These pricing structures are implemented and processed on the payment network, alongside the pricing structures of traditional payment products.

The present invention is directed to methods and agents for modulating the differentiation potential and / or proliferation of preadipocytes. More particularly, the present invention discloses methods and agents for modulating a fibroblast growth factor (FGF) signaling pathway, especially the FGF-1 or FGF-2 signaling pathway, for treating or preventing adiposity-related conditions including, but not limited to, obesity, lipoma, lipomatosis, cachexia or lipodystrophy or the loss of adipose tissue in trauma or atrophic conditions.

The invention relates generally to ion mobility-based systems, methods and devices for analyzing samples.

An alert management apparatus (100) comprises a presentation item data store (107) providing first description data associated with a plurality of presentation items, such as audio clips. The alert management apparatus (100) further comprises an alert data store (103) storing second description data associated with an alert, such as an alert for a content item. An association processor (109) is coupled to the presentation item data store (107) and the alert data store (103) and is arranged to select a presentation item of the plurality of presentation items for the alert in response to the first description data and the second description data. For example, a presentation item matching the genre, artist and or title of a content item of the alert may be selected. A presentation processor (111) then presents the selected presentation item to a user when the alert is activated. The invention may allow an automatic customisation of alert notifications.