Scripps Research Institute scientists may have overcome a significant drawback of vaccinations as a treatment strategy—the time lag from injection until immunity has developed.

They’ve named their new vaccination strategy “covalent immunization” and tested it on mice afflicted with either colon cancer or melanoma.

The technique involves injecting subjects with chemicals designed to stimulate an immune reaction, and following that with injections of other compounds, so-called “adapter molecules,” which recognize cancer cells.

The latter compounds then create covalent bonds with the antibodies generated by the first injection.
 
The newly formed molecules then lay low, bothering normal physiology not a bit while somehow not being metabolized or otherwise cleared from the body, until (in this case) a cancer cell pops up at which point they spring into action and the next thing you know you have a dead cancer cell.

Carlos Barbas and colleagues published their work in Proceedings of the National Academy of Science.

“The antibodies in our vaccine are designed to circulate inertly until they receive instructions from tailor-made small molecules to become active against a specific target,” Barbas told BurrillReport.

“Antibodies (would be) primed and ready to go. (The method) would apply whether the target is a cancer cell, flu virus, or a toxin like anthrax that soldiers or even civilian populations might have to face during a bioterrorism attack.”

Barbas wants to experiment with covalent immunization in cancers, HIV, and infectious diseases for which vaccines are not currently available.

“We believe that chemistry-based vaccine approaches have been underexplored and may provide opportunities to make inroads into intractable areas of vaccinology,” Barbas concluded.

Shirwa Ahmed, a Somali-born college student mysteriously disappeared from his Minneapolis home 15 months ago. Ten months later, he blew himself up along with 4 other suicide bombers in Somalia, in a coordinated attack orchestrated by al-Shabaab, an al-Qaeda splinter group.

That prompted several Somali American families from Minneapolis to come forward.

 What they said was that Ahmed was only the first of many in the Somali community there to leave town unexpectedly.

Eight left in one day last August. Seven more bolted on Election Day.

The men tended to be good students. They attended the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center mosque. Before leaving, they became less social and took their religious studies more seriously, according to the families.

In investigating the disappearance of his cousin, Ahmad Hassan found paperwork for a flight to Somalia. A travel agency told him an adult claiming to be a parent paid for the ticket.

“We believe a minority group is recruiting these kids, brainwashing them and financing and arranging the travel,” Hassan told the Washington Post. “Those who are recruiting kids here can harm us here.”

The FBI is on the case. Investigations are active in Boston, Columbus and Seattle.

CIA Director Leon Panetta said the Somali connection “raises concerns about the potential for terrorist activity” and “constitutes a potential threat to the security of this country.”

The men’s American passports would enable them to reenter the country with alacrity.

Al-Shabaab “presents U.S. authorities with the most serious evidence to date of a ‘homegrown’ terrorist recruitment problem in the American heartland,” Georgetown professor Bruce Hoffman told the Post. 

Mahir Sherif, a lawyer for the Abubakar As-Saddique Islamic Center said it “does not engage in political activities, has not and will not recruit for any political cause and never will be in support of terrorist philosophy or acts.”

When Massachusetts treasurer Tim Cahill floated the idea of licensing a trio of slot parlors in the state, mental health and gambling experts said he was asking for trouble.

For fun-seekers susceptible to gambling addiction, those new video slot games might as well be crack cocaine, they claim. 

The computer-driven sound-and-light extravaganzas create an allure so strong it has prompted some to wear adult diapers so they don’t have to worry about bladder control when they get on a roll.

Video slots let players gamble rapidly. There’s no more waiting for wheels to stop, cards to flip or horses to run. That’s been replaced by a mash-up of colors, bells, crowds cheering “Wheel of Fortune!” and just the right amount of payouts.

The slots also generate a disproportionate share of near-wins designed to convince players their luck is about to change.

“Slot machines (are) more problematic than other types of gambling in terms of addiction,” Mark Griffiths told the Boston Globe.

The professor of gambling studies at England’s Nottingham Trent University noted that nearly 90% of calls to gambling help-lines in Europe involve slots.

But Holly Thomsen, spokeswoman for the American Gaming Association says that despite recent growth in gambling outlets across the nation, gambling addiction rates remain flat at 1%.

And the pragmatic Cahill argues that people are going to gamble anyway, in Rhode Island and Connecticut for example.

“All we’re saying is, let Massachusetts people do what they want with their money in their state,” he told the Globe.