Pharmaceutical Alert page added
Some of the products we have analyzed do not contain active pharmaceutical ingredients and could be dangerous to patients.
Paper microscopes
Drug resistant malaria spreading in SE Asia
Gail Weaver honored with $2,000 Baxter Young Investigator Award
Graduate student Abigail Weaver was selected from over 100 applicants as a recipient of the Baxter Young Investigator Award. This award program was developed to stimulate and reward research that can be directly used for critical care therapies and the development of medical products that save and sustain patients’ lives. It carries a $2,000 honorarium. …
Nicholas Myers wins fellowship to help identify substandard antibiotics
The United States Pharmacopeia has selected Nick Myers as one of three USP Global Fellows in 2014-2015. Nick will develop a new type of paper-based test that can detect pharmaceuticals that don't contain the right amount of active ingredients. When a person buys an antibiotic, that product ought to contain the right quantity of medicine. But more than one in five of the samples from our field study site in western Kenya are substandard--mostly underdosed. …
Iodized salt test card featured
8,000 on the PADometer
We have made more than 8,000 PADs in the last two years--an amazing feat for our faithful spotting robot Dot the Bot and all the students who have participated in making the test cards.
Where are all the test cards going? Many are used for test development, internal validation studies, and demonstrations or lab experiments at conferences or in classes. Nearly a thousand have gone to Kenya for field trials, a hundred were used at the FDA, and 900 saltPADs were shipped to South Africa for an external validation study. …
Summer research students join PAD project
Summer is a great time for student research, and we are glad to welcome undergraduates Ivan Leung, Rebecca Ryan, Steven Froelich, Cameron Miller, and Esseabasi Etim, along with high school researchers Margaret Berta, Mike Dowd, and Myracle Newsome.
Ivan is a long time project member who has been helping Nick design and test the urinary iodide PAD. This summer he was awarded SURF funding. Rebecca and Steven are chemical engineers who answered the call for HPLC analysis of our 800 drug samples from Kenya; they will work with Margaret, Myracle, and Mike to conduct forensic packaging analysis, PAD testing, and "gold standard" HPLC quantification of active ingredients. Esseabasi is a student at Winthrop University who is doing an REU this summer; he will be working with Gail and CS graduate student Sandipan Banerjee to develop new chemical tests and build up the library of lane results for the image analysis program. Cameron is a student intern at Springboard Engineering; he is taking on some of the routine fabrication of PADs under the direction of Gail Weaver. Welcome all. …
Moving to market: Students argue for PADs in business plan competition
Improving access to high quality medicines is a huge global problem, and both technological and economic solutions are needed. Students Sean McGee, Luke Smith, Chase Lane, and Valeriano Lima have taken a hard look at the economics of paper analytical devices (PADs) for testing pharmaceuticals, and their business plan is now advancing in two national business plan competitions. Hop to the College of Science press release…
Dallas ACS meeting notes: Ivan Leung presents at Sci Mix
Fox National News highlights PAD project at St Mary's and Notre Dame
The PAD project was featured in "Check it out," a Fox News series about science and technology that's making people's lives better.
'
AD & T Funds Development of New Drug Characterization Tools
Detailed information about components of falsified pharmaceuticals helps to identify the types of fake medicines circulating in a country, and may shed light on the manufacturing processes and possible sources of the drug components. Dr. Mandal joins the PAD project in March of 2014 to develop new tools to analyze fake medicines found in low resource settings.
ND Magazine describes the vissicitudes of filming "What would you fight for?" ads
What do you do when the airport burns down and you have to get your film crew, expensive camera equipment, student, and professor out of the country?