Peter Egelberg
CEO and founder
Ur 10-i-topp listan :
Emerging technologies look set to transform the healthcare industry. In this year's Global Innovation Index, Francis
Collins, Director of the National Institutes of Health (NIH), explores
some of the innovations that could have the biggest impact in the next
decade. Here's a summary of those findings from the report.
Every day, medical innovations lengthen and improve lives across the
globe. Over the course of the next decade, as twenty-first century
technologies combine and accelerate, healthcare is set for a revolution.
The
Global Innovation Index 2019
(GII), a report from the World Intellectual Property Organization and
its research partners Cornell University and INSEAD, identifies five
global trends driving this transformation: broadband access,
developments in artificial intelligence and the human genome, changing
business models, and the rise of consumerism.
These trends are leading to breakthroughs across a range of medical
frontiers. For this year’s GII, the NIH identified 10 of the
cutting-edge emerging technologies most likely to revolutionize
healthcare over the next decade.
Here’s a closer look at the technologies that made the list:
1. Single cell analysis
Likely to be one of the first of the 10 breakthroughs to come to
fruition, single-cell analysis will allow scientists to study individual
cells in their normal environment for the first time. The ability to
determine which genes are turned on or off in individual cells, and to
decode how immune cells attack healthy tissue, will transform how we
approach autoimmune diseases and how we combat the deadly process of
cancer metastasis.
2. Mapping the brain
The human brain remains one of science’s most daunting frontiers. The
NIH’s Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies
(BRAIN) initiative is accelerating our understanding of this most
complex and critical organ. Within a decade, researchers will have
mapped the circuits responsible for motor function, vision, memory and
emotion. This will lead to new approaches to a raft of neurological
disorders including autism, epilepsy, brain injuries, schizophrenia,
Parkinson’s, Alzheimer’s and spinal cord injuries.
3. Alzheimer’s Disease
Aided by new imaging techniques developed and optimized by the BRAIN
Initiative, NIH research indicates that within a decade we will be able
to identify individuals at high risk of Alzheimer’s before symptoms even
appear. Early interventions will slow or change the course of the
disease, providing profound human and economic benefits.
4. Spinal cord injuries
A decade from now we will have developed effective treatments for
spinal cord injuries. Already, ground-breaking research supported by NIH
has enabled several young men paralyzed from the waist down to move
their legs through the use of surgically implanted electrical
stimulators that bypass the severed spinal cord. Soon, many of the
millions of people worldwide coping with spinal cord damage could be
given back freedom of movement.
5. Pain management
Chronic pain is a serious and costly public health problem affecting
tens of millions of people worldwide. Unfortunately, current treatments
can be addictive, leading to tragic outcomes. The NIH recently launched
the Helping to End Addiction Long-Term (HEAL) initiative, harnessing
genomics, neuroscience and structural biology to uncover entirely new
targets for treating chronic pain.
6. Regenerative medicine
This exciting field of research looks at ways of replacing or
regenerating human tissues and organs when they are damaged. Methods
range from stimulating the body’s own repair mechanisms, to growing
tissues and organs in the laboratory. In a decade, regenerative medicine
could change the course of chronic diseases like diabetes, and
eliminate the problems associated with tissue and organ transplants,
including sourcing, waiting lists, tissue rejection and the need for
anti-rejection drugs.
7. Cancer immunotherapy
This radical new approach enlists the cancer patient’s immune system,
with one promising strategy involving collecting immune cells and
engineering them to produce special cancer-fighting warriors, called
chimeric antigen receptors. This work has already saved the lives of
adults and children with untreatable blood cancers, and sights are set
on tougher targets including breast, prostate, colon, ovarian and
pancreatic cancer.
8. New vaccines
In the next 10 years, important strides will be made in preventing HIV,
flu and other infectious diseases. NIH is funding research into a
universal flu vaccine that will provide long-lasting protection against a
wide range of flu strains. This will prepare us for the next overdue
worldwide pandemic, potentially saving millions of lives.
9. Gene editing to cure disease
Scientists have identified the molecular causes of nearly 6,500 human
diseases, yet treatments currently exist for only about 500 (see chart
below). By 2030, science will have begun to realize the promise of
genetic technologies to treat and cure diseases that once seemed out of
reach. Gene editing tools like Clustered Regularly Interspaced Short
Palindromic Repeats (CRISPR-Cas) allow the correction of gene mutations –
with a cure for sickle cell disease being one of its first targets.
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