Equally significant acceleration is happening on the materials front. The
production of nanopowders, for example, which will
have many and powerful uses in medicine, is reaching industrial output
levels.

Acceleration in the development of AIDS vaccines means we
might actually get there, soon. We will certainly get to safe and effective
treatments for many diseases much faster as systems biology produces virtual patients for clinical trials (thereby “bankrupting”
the current costly, lengthy, and dangerous process.) The clinical trial could
also become a trial on a single virtual patient — a replica of a real patient
right down to the molecular level, when we can quickly map an individual’s
genome to create the replica. The fact that a biotech startup can already map an
individual’s genome in five days and is planning to get
that down to five hours then five minutes, puts that possibility squarely on
this side of the horizon.

It is less than a year since researchers managed to stop light in its tracks,
then let it resume normal light-speed progress. They have now achieved finer
control, and are able to decelerate and accelerate light passing through a
crystal. Esoteric for the moment, the new capability could make significant
contributions to the development of future communications, data storage, and
quantum computing.

Reference: Unknown (2003). “Crystal Slows and
Speeds Light.” Technology Research News, October 8.

Double Speed Internet

CERN (the European Organization for Nuclear Research, where the Web was born)
and Caltech have set a new world speed record of 5.44 gigabits per second for
sending data halfway around the world via the Internet. It more than doubles the
previous record, set only eight months ago, of 2.38 Gbps.

The new speed is enough to transmit a full-length movie in seven seconds or a
one-hour music CD in a second. That’s more than 20,000 times faster than a
typical home broadband connection, which takes about eight minutes to transfer a
CD and 15 minutes to transfer a 90-minute movie.

The achievement will accelerate global scientific collaboration, and its
developers are already looking to double the speed to 10 gigabits per second,
which they anticipate will be “commonplace in the relatively near future.”

Reference: Unknown (2003). “Data Faster
Than Speeding Bullet.” Reuters, in Wired News, October 15.

Nanomaterials in Production

Because Health Futures Digest is concerned with the future, much of
the technology we cover is still in the lab. The speed with which some
technologies are going from the lab to industrial-scale production is a strong
indicator of the rate of acceleration.

Take nanotechnology, for example. One company is already manufacturing
nanopowders on an industrial scale, with major and imminent implications for the
paper, polymers, paints/pigments, pharmaceuticals, sealants, adhesives, and
other industries. Nanopowders will make plastics stronger and stiffer, paint and
pigment more resistant to cracking and water penetration, paper more opaque and
glossy.

In healthcare, titanium dioxide nanopowder can be used in sunscreen lotions
to block harmful ultra-violet rays, and in pills and lotions to make them easier
to swallow and apply; and iron nanopowders mixed into “ferrofluids” will
facilitate targeted drug delivery, DNA tagging, and improved MRI imaging.

Reference: Unknown (2003). “Nano
Scale Molecular Robots May Change the Future of Healthcare.” Content Wire,
July 30.

AIDS Vaccine

Optimism is breaking out all over in a research field noted “more for its
failures than its successes,” thanks to accelerating biotechnology
breakthroughs, writes Washington Post reporter Paul Elias. Elias has run
the numbers, and found some two dozen potential vaccines currently being tested
by 12,000 human volunteers in experiments around the world, with several more
human trials about to start. Some AIDS research budgets are up, and at least a
dozen drug companies, including Merck, are developing AIDS vaccines. At this
accelerating rate, we will surely get there.

Reference: Elias, Paul (2003). “AIDS
Vaccine Trials To Include Humans.” Associated Press/Washington Post, October
5.

Virtual Clinical Trials

“Virtual” humans — computerized models of the human organism under
development by a growing number of systems biology companies — will eventually
stand in for real people in clinical trials of experimental drugs. An executive
at Sun Microsystems, which provides much of the computing power behind these
efforts, says they are “the future of drug development” and will “bankrupt the
[costly and time-consuming current] system of drug development.” Systems
biology, or biosimulation as it is sometimes called, provides better indicators
of success for a molecule identified as a potential drug than today’s trial and
error method.

Reference: May, Troy (2003). “‘Virtual
humans’ could test potential drugs: Computerized models would measure
effects.” Cincinnati Business Courier, October 17.

Genome While-U-Wait

A biotech startup has developed a fast way to map an individual human’s
genome. The map can then be compared with the maps of other people with known
medical conditions or known reactions to various drugs, enabling doctors to
prescribe drugs likely to work for the individual and avoid drugs likely to
produce a bad reaction.

The company plans to complete 2,000 maps of human genomes by the end of 2004,
and 20,000 within “about three years.” They can currently do one in about five
days, and want to get it down to five hours, then five minutes. At that point,
genetic analysis may be as routine as taking the patient’s temperature.

Reference: Gertzen, Jason (2003). “Fast-service DNA.”
Milwaukee Journal Sentinel, September 29.