Word: barriers
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...wonder Europe is terrified of bovine spongiform encephalopathy (BSE), better known as mad-cow disease. The illness started attacking British cattle in the mid-1980s. Then it crossed the species barrier; a human version of BSE has killed more than 80 Britons since 1995. Then it leaped across the Irish Sea and the English Channel, afflicting cows in 12 European nations. Last week Italy confirmed its first cases. Late last year, it hit Spain and Germany. Earlier this month, the German ministers of health and agriculture resigned in disgrace when their assurances that German beef was safe proved false...
...forget to give credit to Brady Merchant and Sam Winter for breaking the "dunk barrier" for all of those little kids who dream of growing up to play for the Crimson and one day establishing the Harvard chapter of the Phi Slamma Jamma fraternity...
...identified the old-fashioned way--by testing tens of thousands of compounds on cultures of growing cells. Among other things, they adjusted certain structural features to reduce the chance that the molecules would cause gastric distress and to increase the likelihood that they would cross over the blood-brain barrier. And all the while, they checked and rechecked to make sure that during this biochemical shuffling they did not lose the key property that made these particular molecules potentially so valuable: their ability to block the activity of gamma secretase, an enzyme thought to play a critical role...
...their pursuit of better systems, researchers are finding ingenious ways to bypass such natural body defenses as the blood-brain barrier and the macrophages of the immune system, which can block or gobble up newly administered drugs. Another problem, says M.I.T. professor of biomedical engineering Robert Langer, is adverse effects that result even when "people take prescription drugs exactly as prescribed...
...potential drugs because they are designed to kill or immobilize prey. Many contain dozens or even hundreds of potent, fast-acting toxins that home in on the muscles and nervous system. The molecules also tend to be small, which means they can easily slip across the blood-brain barrier, the network of tiny vessels in the brain that blocks larger compounds...