Botox injections may be replaced with something much smaller and longer- lasting, claims a chemical engineer, who says his new nanotechnology system may one day prevent your skin from buckling into wrinkles.

Ilsoon Lee, a professor at Michigan State University, has been exploring the use of nanoparticles in stopping layers of extremely thin polymer film from buckling. The films are increasingly used in high-tech systems such as electronic monitors. The thinner the films, the more prone they are to wrinkle.

Now he says he has realised that the same system of infinitessimally small chemical support may be used in human skin. Ilsoon suggests that the nano-thin films could be injected between the thinning outer layer of a person’s skin, the epidermis, which tends to stiffen and buckle with age, and the thicker dermis beneath it, which remains more pliable as we get older.

He says that his system, which is outlined in the American Chemical Society’s Nano Letters online journal, would not provide a full facelift, but could be used to prevent tiny wrinkles from growing into facial lines. It may also be used in nip-and- tucks such as eye-lifts, to shore up any improvements.

Ilsoon is testing his nanoparticles to ensure that they are not toxic, before trying them on living skin.

Parasites found: worms help MS patients

Parasitic stomach worms could help people with multiple sclerosis to live free from the effects of the disabling disease, claim researchers in Argentina.

The scientists report in the Annals of Neurology that they have discovered that patients with multiple sclerosis, who had also become infected with a form of water-borne parasitic worm, Schistosoma mansoni, suffer far fewer relapses of their MS.

Their study of 24 MS patients found that the 12 who had the parasite had a total of three relapses in the space of four years, while the parasite-free counterparts suffered 56. They saw a far more significant increase in their level of disability, too.

Why the difference? The doctors, at the Raúl Carrea Institute for Neurological Research, say that MS is an autoimmune disease, where a person’s immune defences attack their own body. Having a parasite at large in their bloodstream may serve to distract the immune system from self-destructing because it has a real job to do.

They speculate that the rise in autoimmune diseases such as MS in the modern world may be because of a decline in the prevalence of infectious diseases. If science can isolate the MS-dampening molecules that the parasite sparks, they may be on the road to a new therapy.

Look into my thighs

Face-reconstruction surgeons say they have found a better site for harvesting bone grafts than the hip bone, their normal source. It’s your pubic bone. Doctors at Rush University, Chicago, say that while taking grafts from your hip bone can be painful and cause scarring, pubic-bone grafts causes less trauma, and your pubic hair will grow neatly over the scar. Still, ouch.

Budget biotech

Modern biotechnology-based medicines are proving their worth on difficult diseases such as hepatitis. But they are costly devils to manufacture.

Now Dutch researchers say they have a way to make them for as little as a hundredth of the price. The secret is plant seeds. Biotech medicines are currently made by using genetically modified bacteria, yeasts or animal cells that can produce human proteins.

The Ghent University team says it has found how to make plant seeds produce proteins that should do the same job of boosting patients’ immunity by mimicking their antibodies.

Still burgered

Just as the world has begun to rid itself of evil, unhealthy trans fats, along comes their replacement, which is harder to pronounce and is possibly even more unhealthy.

New York City last month banned the use of trans fats, or partially hydrogenated oils, from all restaurants. They are widely used in convenience foods, but raise “bad” LDL cholesterol and lower “good” HDL cholesterol levels.

A new study in Nutrition and Metabolism reports that junkfood makers are replacing trans fats with a substance called interesterified fats because they help to extend their products’ shelf lives.

The study, by Brandeis University, Massachusetts, cautions that the replacement substance not only seems to cause the same cholesterol problems as trans fats, it also raises blood-sugar levels and lowers insulin. Mmm, mmm.

Load of old pony?

If your doctor’s busy, a horse might be available to diagnose you. Alliant International University’s Professor Ellen Gehrke is pioneering a stress test that requires no needles.

The patient only has to sit on a horse while its heart rate is monitored. Gehrke claims that horses are so empathetic that their heart rates match the patient’s stress levels, thus giving a diagnosis without the need to take blood for stress-hormone tests. And for all these lifestyle problems, it helps if your GP is a nag.