In the absence of this gene the projections from the two eyes which see the same part of visual space are not aligned with each other in the brain. This has devastating functional consequences - animals that lack the gene behave as if blind.

Most remarkably, Dr Leamey has shown that the acute blockade of all activity in one eye of these animals can rescue vision in the other eye. The restoration of vision indicates that the "blindness" results from suppression, which arises as a consequence of the interocular mismatch.

This is the first time pharmacological blockade of a neural pathway has been shown to cause a gain in visual ability. This has important implications for the development of therapies for both visual and developmental brain disorders such as autism and mental retardation.

The award was made at a special function Friday, 28 November, which was jointly hosted by the Sir Zelman Cowen Universities Fund and the Australia/Israel Chamber of Commerce.

usyd.au

The sensor's "capture antibodies" grab specific cancer-related proteins as they float by and hold onto them. Then a second batch of antibodies is added to the mix. They latch onto magnetic nanoparticles as well as the cancer biomarkers that are being held captive by the sensors. Thus when the MagArray sensors detect the magnetic field of nanoparticles, they've found cancer markers as well.

In the paper, the researchers estimate that they could detect levels of the human chorionic gonadotropin protein at a level about 400 times lower than the level required for detection by current commercial kits known by the acronym ELISA, in which captured cancer proteins are tethered to color altering or fluorescent labels. At Stanford Medical Center, the detector is viewed as a potentially significant clinical advance, according to a diagnostics expert there.

"This work represents a giant leap forward in enabling technology for in vitro protein diagnostics with significant potential for many applications including cancer detection and management," said Dr. Sam Gambhir, the principal investigator of the Center of Cancer Nanotechnology Excellence at Stanford.

To properly prepare a patient's blood sample for use with the detector, a technician must use a centrifuge to separate out the serum, which contains the biomarkers. For this reason, the device must be located in a hospital or a private diagnostic lab, Wang said. But before then it must face clinical testing and trials to win regulatory approval. To see the detector through those steps, Wang has co-founded a startup company, MagArray Inc., in the Panorama Institute for Molecular Medicine, a not-for-profit incubator in Sunnyvale, Calif.

The nascent startup is also investigating the possible use of the detectors in emergency rooms to quickly check for heart attacks when patients arrive with chest pains. Like cancer, heart cell death is associated with the release of specific biomarker proteins.

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