Who Says You Need To Reduce Your Sugar Consumption?

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The World Health Organization (WHO) has just released a new recommendation regarding sugar consumption which is sure to get some deserved attention.  They reduced their previous recommendation by half saying that sugar in its various forms should be no more than 5% of your total caloric intake.

WHO reviewed around 9000 studies and came to the conclusion that reducing sugar intake to the 5% level will help to reduce both obesity and cavities.  The new guideline includes sugar added to foods, drinks, honey, all types of syrups, and even fruit juices.  However, it does not include sugar naturally found in whole fruits or vegetables.

This new target is definitely a move in the right direction but will be a major adjustment for most Americans and other westerners who consume an average of 15% of total calories in sugar right now.  We’re talking about a whopping 65% reduction to meet the new guideline.

WHO’s new recommendation was published online and they are asking the public for comments on their website until the end of March.  They’ll probably get plenty of feedback from lobbyists involved with the food industry since a bowl of typical processed breakfast cereal alone could put someone over the new daily guidelines.  In the United States, this industry lobby was extremely vocal about 10 years ago when WHO recommended a limit of 10%.

Like sodium, Americans get most of their sugar from processed foods like breakfast cereals, bread, soup, sauces, soda and common condiments.  Drinking just one can of sweetened soda would put someone over the daily sugar limit.

“Processed foods are the worst culprits when it comes excess sugar and sodium intake.  Studies have been concluding for awhile now that processed foods, with unnatural combinations of ingredients that have been specifically designed to stimulate our taste buds and appetites, are slowly but surely undermining our health”, according to Tom Griesel, co-author of TurboCharged: Accelerate Your Fat Burning Metabolism, Get Lean Fast and Leave Diet and Exercise Rules in the Dust (BSH 2011).

Even though numerous studies have confirmed the problem and most doctors now agree, there is still no universal agreement on how much sugar is too much.  The WHO recommendations are sure to result in a huge uproar and counter-claims by the multi-billion dollar processed food industry.

Griesel adds, “There’s no way around the fact that avoiding most processed food and focusing on a diet that is based around whole, natural, unprocessed foods is the key to good health.”

What Comes First: The Tools or the Discovery? Certainly the Right Tools Help

 Over the last 30 years, advances in medical research technology have come fast and furious. This is especially true for testing equipment used to diagnose or screen for particular conditions prior to treatment. This progress will no doubt continue since clinical laboratory technology plays an integral role in healthcare.

One particularly promising area is automation and robotics, which increasingly frees scientists from the need to micromanage their experiments and results in greater productivity, lower laboratory costs and more creative time for researchers. Consequently, scientists can often set up, run and analyze the results of experiments in a fraction of the time previously needed with far less hands-on intervention.

Automation offers major benefits beyond the lab as well. At the corporate level— particularly for firms involved in drug discovery and clinical diagnostics—getting maximum efficiency out of every department, especially the research lab, is a constant issue. Thankfully, automation and robotics have significantly increased productivity and lowered costs.

With so many equipment options to consider today, choosing what equipment to use requires careful consideration. For instance, an academic research lab might opt to increase productivity by using equipment that eliminates a tedious task; a drug discovery unit in a pharmaceutical company will probably want to automate most phases of its research. Meanwhile, laboratories that work with DNA sequencing and genomics might have an even more intensive need for automation. That’s why many laboratory managers have consulted with a company called Harvard Bioscience before making these critical equipment-purchasing decisions.

Headquartered in Holliston, MA, Harvard Bioscience is a global developer, manufacturer and marketer of a broad range of specialized products. The bulk of their products are scientific instruments used to advance life science research. These items are bought by thousands of researchers in over 100 countries through the convenience of their catalogs, their website and various distributors. Thanks to their manufacturing plants in the United States and internationally, Harvard Bioscience is able to work with customers worldwide.

Jeffrey A. Duchemin, President and CEO of Harvard Bioscience, says, “As one of the most comprehensive providers of research instrumentation, our goal is to make selection faster and easier, while providing laboratories with as many options as possible—thereby enabling them to do their jobs more effectively.”

The Most Interesting Advances in Regenerative Medicine

Regenerative medicine has been the subject of great attention in recent years, for its potential applications in repairing or replacing damaged human cells, tissues and organs. The field seems to be advancing at an increasingly rapid rate—its applications quickly becoming less a futuristic pipe dream, and more a tangible reality.

With such promising benefits, and now with so many researchers working in collaboration globally, regenerative medicine continues to transform the scope of human medicine.

Here are the 4 most interesting advances in regenerative medicine:

•  Regenerated Tracheas for Transplant– A major focus within regenerative medicine is on the development of regenerated or artificial organs for transplant. At the forefront of this arena is Harvard Apparatus Regenerative Technology, developer of regenerated tracheas for transplant in patients with damaged airways.  Its bioreactors have been used in 8 surgeries and five of those surgeries have used the Company’s synthetic regenerated tracheas–which consist of an artificial scaffold, seeded with the patient’s own cells to prevent rejection.   In 2011, Harvard Apparatus Regenerative Technology astonished the world with the first ever transplant of a regenerated airway using a synthetic scaffold.  Harvard Apparatus Regenerative Technology’s trachea technology could eventually lead to similar transplants for the lungs, heart and GI tract.

•  3D Bioprinting– 30 years after the invention of the 3D printer, bioprinting—the process of extracting a patient’s cells, growing them, and then loading them into a printer cartridge for the printing of live human tissue—has come to fruition. This technology is being utilized as a viable way for researchers to test potential drugs and treatments on human tissue, without having to use an actual patient. While currently, printed tissues are only being used in medical research, the ultimate goal is to create tissues for organ repair, or even the printing of whole functional organs for transplant.

•  Stem Cell Treatments for Vision Loss- Vision loss is thought to affect more than 20 million people over the age of 18 in the U.S.; it can be detrimental to an individual’s productivity, or even completely disabling. Thankfully, stem cell treatments are being studied for their ability to treat different forms of blindness. One consists of inducing embryonic stem cells into cells that normally reside in the retina, which could in turn, be transplanted into patients for retina regeneration. Similar advancements are being made in the cornea, where researchers have already successfully regenerated a damaged cornea in a laboratory setting.

•  Stem Cell Treatments for Heart Repair- Heart disease has been the number one killer of Americans for a very long time, accounting for approximately one in every four deaths. While advancements over the last few decades have improved some of the available treatments for heart disease, existing therapies do not have the ability to directly reverse some of the scarring and damage that can stem from it. Researchers are exploring various ways in which stem cells can be injected into patients to regenerate the tissues of the heart, and potentially ward off heart failure. Currently, different combinations of cells and cell types are being studied for their potential regenerative effects.

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