Free Republic

A study from China has reported that Cordyceps sinensis (CS), a traditional Chinese medicinal fungus, can ameliorate idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis (IPF) in mice by inhibiting mitochondrion-mediated oxidative stress. Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis is a chronic and progressive lung disease characterized by a decline in lung function, ultimately leading to respiratory failure and a significantly reduced quality of life for patients. With a median survival duration of two to five years post-diagnosis, there is an urgent need for effective treatments beyond the current anti-fibrotic medications, which are associated with adverse effects. The study details how CS, known for its antioxidant and anti-inflammatory...

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis could become the first degenerative disease to be treated through the science of aging. It was known that this disease is associated with the aging process, but its molecular causes were unknown. The Telomeres and Telomerase Group has been working for years to unravel them. In their findings, they have narrowed down exactly which cells give rise to fibrosis when they undergo alterations due to the aging process: alveolar type II pneumocytes, the cells responsible for regenerating lung tissue. "The relevance of this finding is that it indicates which cells in particular should be targeted in any...

Jerry Lewis criticized President Obama and praised Donald Trump in an interview on World Over with Raymond Arroyo; the iconic comedian also slammed the Syrian refugee program, telling Arroyo "refugees should stay where the hell they are." "No one has worked harder for the human condition than I have, but they’re not part of the human condition," Lewis continued. "If 11 guys in the group of 10,000 are ISIS, how can I take the chance? I don't want to lose another Frenchman or another Englishman. That bothers me." Lewis suggested the United States take a military solution to ISIS. "Why...

Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis is a disease with unknown cause with a very severe prognosis; when detected, it is already in an advanced stage. Patients suffering from it cannot develop with normality pulmonary gas exchange, and have a very reduced quality of life. Because of lack of an effective treatment, they rarely survive 5 years after being diagnosed. Idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis affects 13 out of 100,000 men and 7 out of 100,000 women, normally over 40 years of age. Researchers from the Biomedical Research Institute of Barcelona CSIC (IIBB-CSIC), a centre developing research in the framework of the Institut d'Investigacions Biomèdiques...

Sheldon K. Friedlander, whose work in identifying the sources of particles in Southern California smog led to new ways of studying and regulating air pollution, has died. Friedlander died Feb. 9 at his home in Pacific Palisades of complications from pulmonary fibrosis, his family said. He was 79. While a professor at the California Institute of Technology in the 1970s, he was among the founders of aerosol science - the study of gases and particles in the air. Friedlander discovered a way to analyze the chemical makeup of smog particles and trace what was creating air pollution at any given...

NEW YORK -- Peter Benchley, whose novel "Jaws" terrorized millions of swimmers even as the author himself became an advocate for the conservation of sharks, has died at age 65, his widow said Sunday. Wendy Benchley, married to the author for 41 years, said he died Saturday night at their home in Princeton, N.J. The cause of death, she said, was idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis, a progressive and a fatal scarring of the lungs. Thanks to Benchley's 1974 novel, and Steven Spielberg's blockbuster movie of the same name, the simple act of ocean swimming became synonymous with fatal horror, of still...