Author: AUFTAU

Digital Learning: TAU 1st in Israel According to International Ranking

Written by AUFTAU on 12 July 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

Tel Aviv University ranked first in Israel and among the leading international institutions for higher education in the 2021 rankings.

While American and European universities dominate the Emerging ratings, the group notes “the outstanding performance of Israel, notably disrupting the tables with institutions present in all digital categories”.

The aim of the ratings is to help ‘”shine a light on the global institutions who are championing digital education studies worldwide”, looking to identify higher education institutions with a strong focus on digital expertise and that are teaching transferable digital skills across the curriculum.

TAU secured the 22nd place out of 150 on the list of the world’s “Best Universities for Digital Learning 2021”. The Technion the second Israeli higher education institution to feature, as number 31. The Hebrew University follows, on 42nd place. Ben-Gurion University is number 60 and Bar-Ilan University number 81.

In addition to the overall ranking, the institutions were also ranked for:

Their digital entrepreneurship programs: Tel Aviv University was ranked 6thin the world, and first in Israel. Technion is number 25, The Hebrew University number 18, Ben Gurion University number 26 and Bar Ilan is not listed among the top 30.
Best data science degrees: TAU is listed as number 10, following The Hebrew University on 7th place. The Technion is listed as number 27 on the list (Bar Ilan University and Ben Gurion University are not listed among the top 30).
Best universities for online professional training and executive programs: Tel Aviv University is number 4, followed by The Technion on 20nd place, Ben-Gurion University on 21st place, Hebrew University on 22nd and Bar-Ilan on 27th place.
Best universitites for digital transformation: TAU is number 11, and is the only Israeli university to be listed among the top 30.

Methodology

According to the website, “This study is based on the data and results obtained from a vote of 3,400 digital professionals in nine countries (US, UK, Germany, Spain, France, China, India, Sweden and Japan), such as IT corporate executives, start-up executives, and young professionals who recently started their digital career. This is combined with a premium specific database providing precise information on higher education received by the 10,000 most active and influential executives of the world’s leading digital companies. Each institution is scored across six metrics covering the full scope of digital education (computer degrees, data science and AI degrees, digital training formats, digital entrepreneurship programs, online professional training and executive programs, and institutions with the most innovative learning formats) to determine its position in the ranking.”

New nanotech from TAU produces “healthy” electric current from the human body itself

Written by AUFTAU on 9 July 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

Approach allows for the charging of cardiac pacemakers using only the heartbeat, eliminating the need for batteries

A new nanotechnology development from an international research team led by Tel Aviv University researchers will make it possible to generate electric currents and voltage within the human body itself through the activation of various organs using mechanical force. The development involves a new and very strong biological material, similar to collagen, which is non-toxic and causes no harm to the body’s tissues.

The researchers believe that this new nanotechnology has many potential applications in medicine, including harvesting clean energy to operate pacemakers and other devices implanted in the body through the body’s natural movements, eliminating the need for batteries and the surgery required to replace them.

The study was led by Professor Ehud Gazit of TAU’s Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research at the George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences, the Department of Materials Science and Engineering at the Fleischman Faculty of Engineering and the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology, along with his lab team, Dr. Santu Bera and Dr. Wei Ji.

Researchers from the Weizmann Institute and a number of research institutes in Ireland, China and Australia also took part in the study, which was published in Nature Communications.

“Collagen is the most prevalent protein in the human body, constituting about 30% of all of the proteins in our body,” Professor Gazit, who is also Founding Director of TAU’s Blavatnik Center for Drug Discovery, explains. “It is a biological material with a helical structure and a variety of important physical properties, such as mechanical strength and flexibility, which are useful in many applications. However, because the collagen molecule itself is large and complex, researchers have long been looking for a minimalistic, short and simple molecule that is based on collagen and exhibits similar properties.

“About a year and a half ago our group published a study in which we used nanotechnological means to engineer a new biological material that meets these requirements,” Professor Gazit continues. “It is a tripeptide — a very short molecule called Hyp-Phe-Phe consisting of only three amino acids — capable of a simple process of self-assembly of forming a collagen-like helical structure that is flexible and boasts a strength similar to that of the metal titanium.

“In the present study, we sought to examine whether the new material we developed bears piezoelectricity, another feature that characterizes collagen. Piezoelectricity is the ability of a material to generate electric currents and voltage as a result of the application of mechanical force, or vice versa, to create a mechanical force as the result of exposure to an electric field.”

The researchers created nanometric structures of the engineered material, and with the help of advanced nanotechnology tools applied mechanical pressure on them. The experiment revealed that the material does indeed produce electric currents and voltage as a result of the pressure.

Moreover, tiny structures of mere hundreds of nanometers demonstrated one of the highest levels of piezoelectric ability ever discovered, comparable or superior to that of the piezoelectric materials commonly found in today’s market, most of which contain lead and are unsuitable for medical applications.

According to the researchers, the discovery of piezoelectricity of this magnitude in a nanometric material is of great significance, as it demonstrates the ability of the engineered material to serve as a kind of tiny motor for very small devices. Next, the researchers plan to apply crystallography and computational quantum mechanical methods (density functional theory) in order to gain an in-depth understanding of the material’s piezoelectric behavior and thereby enable the accurate engineering of crystals for the building of biomedical devices.

“Most of the piezoelectric materials that we know of today are toxic lead-based materials, or polymers, meaning they are not environmentally and human body-friendly,” Professor Gazit says. “Our new material, however, is completely biological and suitable for uses within the body.

“For example, a device made from this material may replace a battery that supplies energy to implants like pacemakers, though it should be replaced from time to time. Body movements like heartbeats, jaw movements, bowel movements, or any other movement that occurs in the body on a regular basis will charge the device with electricity, which will continuously activate the implant.”

His current focus is on the development of medical devices, but Professor Gazit emphasizes that “environmentally friendly piezoelectric materials, such as the one we have developed, have tremendous potential in a wide range of areas because they produce green energy using mechanical force that is being used anyway. For example, a car driving down the street can turn on the streetlights. These materials may also replace lead-containing piezoelectric materials that are currently in widespread use, but that raise concerns about the leakage of toxic metal into the environment.”

Introducing the world’s thinnest technology – only two atoms thick

Written by AUFTAU on 2 July 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

Technological breakthrough from Tel Aviv University

The research team

The new technology, enabling the storage of information in the thinnest unit known to science, is expected to improve future electronic devices in terms of density, speed, and efficiency.
The allowed quantum-mechanical electron tunneling through the atomically thin film may boost the information reading process much beyond current technologies.
The technology involves laterally sliding one-atom-thick layers of boron and nitrogen one over the other – a new way to switch electric polarization on/off.

A scientific breakthrough: Researchers from Tel Aviv University have engineered the world’s tiniest technology, with a thickness of only two atoms. According to the researchers, the new technology proposes a way for storing electric information in the thinnest unit known to science, in one of the most stable and inert materials in nature. The allowed quantum-mechanical electron tunneling through the atomically thin film may boost the information reading process much beyond current technologies.

The research was performed by scientists from the Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Physics and Astronomy and Raymond and Beverly Sackler School of Chemistry. The group includes Maayan Vizner Stern, Yuval Waschitz, Dr. Wei Cao, Dr. Iftach Nevo, Prof. Eran Sela, Prof. Michael Urbakh, Prof. Oded Hod, and Dr. Moshe Ben Shalom. The work is now published in Science magazine.

“Our research stems from curiosity about the behavior of atoms and electrons in solid materials, which has generated many of the technologies supporting our modern way of life,” says Dr. Ben Shalom. “We (and many other scientists) try to understand, predict, and even control the fascinating properties of these particles as they condense into an ordered structure that we call a crystal. At the heart of the computer, for example, lies a tiny crystalline device designed to switch between two states indicating different responses – “yes” or “no”, “up” or “down” etc. Without this dichotomy – it is not possible to encode and process information. The practical challenge is to find a mechanism that would enable switching in a small, fast, and inexpensive device.

Current state-of-the-art devices consist of tiny crystals that contain only about a million atoms (about a hundred atoms in height, width, and thickness) so that a million of these devices can be squeezed about a million times into the area of one coin, with each device switching at a speed of about a million times per second.

Following the technological breakthrough, the researchers were able, for the first time, to reduce the thickness of the crystalline devices to two atoms only. Dr. Ben Shalom emphasizes that such a thin structure enables memories based on the quantum ability of electrons to hop quickly and efficiently through barriers that are just several atoms thick. Thus, it may significantly improve electronic devices in terms of speed, density, and energy consumption.

In the study, the researchers used a two-dimensional material: one-atom-thick layers of boron and nitrogen, arranged in a repetitive hexagonal structure. In their experiment, they were able to break the symmetry of this crystal by artificially assembling two such layers. “In its natural three-dimensional state, this material is made up of a large number of layers placed on top of each other, with each layer rotated 180 degrees relative to its neighbors (antiparallel configuration)” says Dr. Ben Shalom. “In the lab, we were able to artificially stack the layers in a parallel configuration with no rotation, which hypothetically places atoms of the same kind in perfect overlap despite the strong repulsive force between them (resulting from their identical charges). In actual fact, however, the crystal prefers to slide one layer slightly in relation to the other, so that only half of each layer’s atoms are in perfect overlap, and those that do overlap are of opposite charges – while all others are located above or below an empty space – the center of the hexagon. In this artificial stacking configuration the layers are quite distinct from one another. For example, if in the top layer only the boron atoms overlap, in the bottom layer it’s the other way around.”

Dr. Ben Shalom also highlights the work of the theory team, who conducted numerous computer simulations “Together we established deep understanding of why the system’s electrons arrange themselves just as we had measured in the lab. Thanks to this fundamental understanding, we expect fascinating responses in other symmetry-broken layered systems as well,” he says.

Maayan Wizner Stern, the PhD student who led the study, explains: “The symmetry breaking we created in the laboratory, which does not exist in the natural crystal, forces the electric charge to reorganize itself between the layers and generate a tiny internal electrical polarization perpendicular to the layer plane. When we apply an external electric field in the opposite direction the system slides laterally to switch the polarization orientation. The switched polarization remains stable even when the external field is shut down. In this the system is similar to thick three-dimensional ferroelectric systems, which are widely used in technology today.”

“The ability to force a crystalline and electronic arrangement in such a thin system, with unique polarization and inversion properties resulting from the weak Van der Waals forces between the layers, is not limited to the boron and nitrogen crystal,” adds Dr. Ben Shalom. “We expect the same behaviors in many layered crystals with the right symmetry properties. The concept of interlayer sliding as an original and efficient way to control advanced electronic devices is very promising, and we have named it Slide-Tronics”.

Maayan Vizner Stern concludes: “We are excited about discovering what can happen in other states we force upon nature and predict that other structures that couple additional degrees of freedom are possible. We hope that miniaturization and flipping through sliding will improve today’s electronic devices, and moreover, allow other original ways of controlling information in future devices. In addition to computer devices, we expect that this technology will contribute to detectors, energy storage and conversion, interaction with light, etc. Our challenge, as we see it, is to discover more crystals with new and slippery degrees of freedom.”

The study was funded through support from the European Research Council (ERC starting grant), the Israel Science Foundation (ISF), and the Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST).

Want to Live a Long Life? Consider Investing in Your Marriage.

Written by AUFTAU on 2 July 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

Want to live a long and healthy life? For the men among us, TAU researchers’ best advice is to invest in our relationship.

As Harmful as Smoking

“Our study shows that the quality of marriage and family life has health implications for life expectancy. Men who reported they perceived their marriage as failure died younger than those who experienced their marriages as very successful. In other words, the level of satisfaction with marriage has emerged as a predictive factor for life expectancy at a rate comparable with smoking (smokers versus non-smokers) and physical activity (activity versus inactivity)”, said one of the study’s lead researchers, Dr. Shahar Lev-Ari, head of the Department of Health Promotion at TAU’s School of Public Health, Sackler Faculty of Medicine.

“Furthermore, it’s important to note that we observed a higher risk among relatively young men, under the age of 50. At a higher age, the gap is smaller, perhaps due to processes of adjustment that life partners go through over time.”

The study was based on extensive health data from more than 30 years of research that tracked the deaths of 10,000 Israeli men.

In addition to Dr. Lev-Ari, lead researchers from the School of Public Health at the Sackler Faculty of Medicine also included: Prof. Uri Goldbort from the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine, who initiated and managed the long-term study, and Dr. Yiftah Gapner, from the Department of Epidemiology and Preventive Medicine. The article was published in the Journal of Clinical Medicine.

As part of the study, the researchers conducted statistical analyses of a database launched in the 1960s. For 32 years, they tracked the health and behavior of 10,000 male Israel state employees, paying special attention to death from strokes and premature death in general.

At the beginning of the study, most of the participants were in their 40s. Since then, 64% died from a range of illnesses. “We wanted to analyze the data gathered longitudinally using various parameters to identify behavioral and psychosocial risk factors that can predict death from a CVA [a cerebrovascular accident or, in other words, a stroke] and premature death for any reason,” Dr. Lev-Ari explains.

Early in the 32-year-long study, participants were asked to rank their level of marriage satisfaction on a scale of 1 (marriage is very successful) to 4 (marriage is unsuccessful). To the researchers’ surprise, this scale would prove to be a predictive factor for life expectancy, highly similar to smoking and lack of physical activity. The number of deceased from a stroke was 69% higher among those who ranked their marriage satisfaction at 4 (i.e. marriage is unsuccessful) compared to those who ranked their marriage satisfaction very highly. The overall mortality was 19% higher among the unhappily married. The researchers note that the gaps were even larger among men who were relatively young (under 50) at the beginning of the study.

In addition, the researchers conducted a statistical analysis of all known risk factors contributing to death from cardiovascular diseases, such as diabetes, hypertension, excessive BMI, and socioeconomic status. Here, too, the data showed that the relative risk of death for any reason among the unhappily married was 1.21 higher than among those satisfied with their marriages. This rate is similar to data cited in medical literature regarding smokers and those leading a sedentary life.

Your list of healthy habits just got a bit longer, guys. But remember, knowledge is power – and next time you go to the gym, perhaps you could make it a date?

The Faculty of Engineering Predicts: A Greener and Safer Future

Written by AUFTAU on 2 July 2021. Posted in Magazine, Newsroom.

Graduates of TAU’s School of Mechanical Engineering present innovative projects.

Just like every year, graduates of the School of Mechanical Engineering of The Iby and Aladar Fleischman Faculty of Engineering recently presented the projects they have been working on throughout their final year of studying towards their degree. A lot of ground was covered, with one project promising those suffering from nightmares after trauma to sleep peacefully, another offering a robot capable of disinfecting aircrafts from viruses, and other teams have developed drones designed and developed to transport defibrillators and first aid kits through areas that are either difficult or downright impossible to access from the ground. Seeing these original ideas makes it clear how the faculty’s motto is befitting for those who enter (and perhaps even more so for those who exit) its gates: “Those who fall in love with a problem are the ones who will find a solution to it.”

Thinking Within the Box

We use them every day, usually multiple times a day, but how much thought do we dedicate to the garbage bins in our homes? And, while we’re on the subject, have you ever thought to calculate how many garbage bags you dispose of every year? As environmentally-conscious people, Tal Kelmachter and Nimrod Ben-Yehuda have given this more than a little thought, and got inspired to design their very own garbage can.

The exterior part of the bin does not distinguish itself much from your standard garbage bin. The secret is hidden within the box: the uniqueness of this product is that it does not require a plastic bag, which is an environmental hazard. Nimrod explains, “We designed it as a stand-alone solution which does not require any special infrastructure, like drainage, water supply and electricity. Once you have emptied the contents of the garbage bin, an integral rinsing mechanism cleanses it on the inside, easily and quickly. The water is contained in a clean water container, and a mechanical pump forces the water through a system of pipes with a no-return valve to a system of sprinklers that showers the sides of the tin from the inside. The dirty water then flows into a dedicated water drawer which is easy to empty. The result is a garbage bin that remains clean and free of bad odors and contaminants.”

Tal adds, “During the past few years there has been increased awareness which has led to a growing trend of reducing plastic use and recycling. And yet, there is currently no product on the market that completely prevents the use of garbage bags. Nimrod and I managed to find a solution to this problem.”

Tal Kelmachter and Nimrod Ben-Yehuda with their green garbage bin, ECOCAN

Enjoy the Ride

A few minutes into Aviv Halachmi’s motorcycle drive to his girlfriend in Beer Sheva, his headset ran out of battery. The annoying experience motivated Aviv to form the ChargElmet team together with fellow students Tal Belilty and Itay Shulman.

“Motorcyclists attach a variety of electronic components to their helmets, such as hands free and camera, in order to enhance their riding experience. These utilities have batteries that require charging. We designed and built a system which uses the wind and the sun to produce green energy to charge gadgets from motorcycle helmets while you travel”, says Aviv.

Did the project become a smoother ride than Aviv’s trip to his girlfriend? Not at all. The team ran into plenty of difficulties along the way: “The system we created is multidisciplinary and contains a lot of engineering elements from various fields, not all related to mechanical engineering, such as electrical diagrams, electrical design including the investigation and selection of the appropriate cards and components and much more. So, we were forced to learn a lot while on the job. That being said, solving issues that arose throughout the process and accomplishing the end product brought us tremendous satisfaction,” he shares.

Aviv concludes, “For now, our invention is geared towards motorcyclists and improving their lives. In the future, we plan to expand the project to address all two-wheelers (bicycles, scooters…). On a macro level, our vision is to improve public awareness of green energy and to take part in the global trend of promoting and transitioning to renewable energy.”

Itay Shulman, Tal Belilty and Aviv Halachmi found a way to improve other motorcyclists’ lives

Hover and Save

This year, the presence of the drone stood out in the Innovate project (a cooperation between TAU and Elbit Systems Ltd), which encompasses several complementary projects on the subject of detecting, rescuing and making life-saving first aid accessible to those trapped under earthquake ruins.

May Davidovich and Ariel Drizin tell us about their part in the project:” We presented a design and a preliminary prototype for a robotic first aid release arm system, installed on a drone and controlled by a dedicated control system, making it easier for the rescue forces to maneuver among the trapped and offer them first aid. In the future, the project can be advanced by allowing for larger systems capable of carrying heavier kits.”

“Our premise was that the system we were planning would be part of a swarm of drones, including one that would scan and photograph the area, a parent drone that would carry a large number of kits, and drones that would know how to receive kits from the parent glider, bring these to the person(s) trapped and then to release the kit. The system will be controlled by an operator from his control room, who will receive information about the trapped, put together a suitable kit, bring it to the disaster stricken area, and release it as close as possible to the trapped.”

May recounts sleepless nights: “The system worked fine up until a few days before the project was to be presented. As we were putting the parts together, we discovered that we had made some measurement errors prior to the printing of the parts, which meant the components didn’t work properly together.”

“We also had to make several design changes and print the model three times before we achieved the desired result. We learnt that when you print the prototype, you need to consider the system in its entirety, which is hard to do before all the components arrive. It is a time-consuming process which requires a lot of planning in advance.”

“We hope that our invention will help streamline the process of rescuing people who are trapped. For instance, by taking measures and signaling back to the control room the severity of the physical condition of victims, so the rescue can be prioritized accordingly. There are many more potential usages, not necessarily related to rescue, such as grocery delivery from the supermarket.”

Extending their robotic arm. Ariel Drizin and May Davidovich.

Saving the Black Box

Did you know that every plane crash is investigated in depth to determine the cause of the crash? Yaniv Alon, Dor Cohen and Ido Rosenzweig designed a system to be ejected from a plane in the event of a crash, and which transmits location details and additional data, significantly reducing the radius of the search for a plane when contact has been lost.

“The system includes a smart box with electronics and internal controllers. When it recognizes that the plane is about to crash, it is ejected from the plane at high speed with the help of mechanisms that we developed. It then falls to the ground with a parachute and can weather any condition, on land or sea.”, explains Yaniv. He clarifies that the system is not meant to replace the black box, but rather it is meant to offer a better alternative to the aircraft transmission systems that exist today, which tend not to be resilient or ejected, and usually vary according to the aircraft systems.

They started working on the project already last year. After a thorough examination of the system’s weaknesses and failures they undertook significant adjustments and enhancements before presenting the product this year. “We encountered quite a few complications along the way, when deciding how to operate the mechanism, examining various alternatives, finding suitable components, communication with suppliers, delivery delays and manufacturing glitches, requiring us to do ping-pong between the workshop and the production. However, thanks to our combined creativity, determination, efforts and our dedicated project manager Danny Barko, we were able to create a functioning product.”, he says.

When asked how they think their invention will contribute to change our lives, Yaniv replies, “The two main problems those who investigate plane crashes are faced with today, are that the black boxes are not ejected and that they are not resilient, which means that they mostly disappear along with the the aircraft. Unproductive field searches can reach sums of around $155 million. A system is required that will allow for swift and effective investigations and save us a lot of resources and money. Our solution meets these requirements and might even end up saving lives by helping locating crashed planes and their black boxes, advancing the investigation of the failures that led to the planes’ crash and preventing similar future cases.”

Will they help find the black box? Ido Rosenzweig, Dor Cohen and Yaniv Alon

A world first: Targeted delivery of therapeutic RNAs only to cancer cells, with no harm caused to healthy cells

Written by AUFTAU on 1 July 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

Tel Aviv University’s Groundbreaking Technology:

The “door-to-door service” that delivers therapeutic RNA payloads directly to cancer cells and other diseased cells

The groundbreaking technology may revolutionize the treatment of cancer and a wide range of diseases and medical conditions.
Researcher Prof. Peer: “Our development actually changes the world of therapeutic antibodies. Today we flood the body with antibodies that, although selective, also damage healthy cells. We have now removed the uninfected cells from the equation, and, via a simple injection, succeeded in targeting only the cells that are inflamed at that given moment.”
The study was published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.

Tel Aviv University’s groundbreaking technology may revolutionize the treatment of cancer and a wide range of diseases and medical conditions. In the framework of this study, the researchers were able to create a new method of transporting RNA-based drugs to a subpopulation of immune cells involved in the inflammation process, and target the disease-inflamed cell without causing damage to other cells.

The study was led by Prof. Dan Peer, a global pioneer in the development of RNA-based therapeutic delivery. He is Tel Aviv University’s Vice President for Research and Development, head of the Center for Translational Medicine and a member of both the Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research, George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences, and the Center for Nanoscience and Nanotechnology. The study was published in the prestigious scientific journal Nature.

Prof. Peer: “Our development actually changes the world of therapeutic antibodies. Today we flood the body with antibodies that, although selective, damage all the cells that express a specific receptor, regardless of their current form. We have now taken out of the equation healthy cells that can help us, that is, uninflamed cells, and via a simple injection into the bloodstream can silence, express or edit a particular gene exclusively in the cells that are inflamed at that given moment.”

As part of the study, Prof. Peer and his team were able to demonstrate this groundbreaking development in animal models of inflammatory bowel diseases such as Crohn’s disease and colitis, and improve all inflammatory symptoms, without performing any manipulation on about 85% of the immune system cells. Behind the innovative development stands a simple concept, targeting to a specific receptor conformation.

“On every cell envelope in the body, that is, on the cell membrane, there are receptors that select which substances enter the cell,” explains Prof. Peer. “If we want to inject a drug, we have to adapt it to the specific receptors on the target cells, otherwise it will circulate in the bloodstream and do nothing. But some of these receptors are dynamic – they change shape on the membrane according to external or internal signals. We are the first in the world to succeed in creating a drug delivery system that knows how to bind to receptors only in a certain situation, and to skip over the other identical cells, that is, to deliver the drug exclusively to cells that are currently relevant to the disease.”

Previously, Prof. Peer and his team developed delivery systems based on fatty nanoparticles – the most advanced system of its kind; this system has already received clinical approval for the delivery of RNA-based drugs to cells. Now, they are trying to make the delivery system even more selective.

According to Prof. Peer, the new breakthrough has possible implications for a wide range of diseases and medical conditions. “Our development has implications for many types of blood cancers and various types of solid cancers, different inflammatory diseases, and viral diseases such as the coronavirus. We now know how to wrap RNA in fat-based particles so that it binds to specific receptors on target cells,” he says. “But the target cells are constantly changing. They switch from ‘binding’ to ‘non-binding’ mode in accordance with the circumstances. If we get a cut, for example, not all of our immune system cells go into a ‘binding’ state, because we do not need them all in order to treat a small incision. That is why we have developed a unified protein that knows how to bind only to the active state of the receptors of the immune system cells. We tested the protein we developed in animal models of inflammatory bowel disease, both acute and chronic.”

Prof. Peer adds, “We were able to organize the delivery system in such a way that we target to only 14.9% of the cells that were involved in the inflammatory condition of the disease, without adversely affecting the other, non-involved, cells, which are actually completely healthy cells. Through specific binding to the cell sub-population, while delivering the RNA payload we were able to improve all indices of inflammation, from the animal’s weight to pro-inflammatory cytokines. We compared our results with those of antibodies that are currently on the market for Crohn’s and colitis patients, and found that our results were the same or better, without causing most of the side effects that accompany the introduction of antibodies into the entire cell population. In other words, we were able to deliver the drug ‘door-to-door,’ directly to the diseased cells.”

The study was led by Prof. Peer, together with Dr. Niels Dammes, a postdoctoral fellow from the Netherlands, with the collaboration of Dr. Srinivas Ramishetti, Dr. Meir Goldsmith and Dr. Nuphar Veiga, from Prof. Dan Peer’s lab. Professors Jason Darling and Alan Packard of Harvard University in the United States also participated. The study was funded by the European Union, in the framework of the European Research Council (ERC).

New Type of Prehistoric Human Discovered in Israel

Written by AUFTAU on 28 June 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

A new discovery by Tel Aviv University researchers may change the story of human evolution. The bones of an early human, unknown to science, were found at an excavation site near the city of Ramla. Researchers believe the remains represent one of the “last survivors” of an ancient human group that lived here at the Levant alongside Homo sapiens (modern humans) between 140,000 and 120,000 years ago.

Two teams of researchers took part in the dramatic discovery, published in the prestigious Science journal: an anthropology team from Tel Aviv University headed by Prof. Israel Hershkovitz, Dr. Hila May and Dr. Rachel Sarig from the Sackler Faculty of Medicine and the Dan David Center for Human Evolution and Biohistory Research and the Shmunis Family Anthropology Institute, situated in the Steinhardt Museum of Natural History at Tel Aviv University; and an archaeological team headed by Dr. Yossi Zaidner from the Institute of Archaeology at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.

Until today, most researchers believed the small groups of Neanderthals arrived in the Levant from Europe about 70,000 years ago. The discovery of a new human group in this region, which resembles Pre-Neanderthal populations in Europe, challenges the prevailing hypothesis that Neanderthals originated from Europe, suggesting that at least some of the Neanderthals’ ancestors actually came from the Levant. In other words, TAU researchers are now suggesting instead that the famous Neanderthals of Western Europe are only the remnants of a much larger population that lived here in the Levant – and not the other way around.

Timeline: The Nesher Ramla Homo type was an ancestor of both the Neanderthals in Europe and the archaic Homo populations of Asia.

Another Piece to the Puzzle of Human Evolution

Prof. Israel Hershkovitz explains that the discovery of this new type of prehistoric human is of great scientific importance: “It enables us to make new sense of previously found human fossils, add another piece to the puzzle of human evolution, and understand the migrations of humans in the old world. Even though they lived so long ago, in the late middle Pleistocene (474,000-130,000 years ago), the Nesher Ramla people can tell us a fascinating tale, revealing a great deal about their descendants’ evolution and way of life.”

The important human fossil was found by Dr. Zaidner of the Hebrew University during salvage excavations at the Nesher Ramla prehistoric site, in the mining area of the Nesher cement plant (owned by Len Blavatnik) near the city of Ramla. Digging down about 8 meters, the excavators found large quantities of animal bones, including horses, fallow deer and aurochs, as well as stone tools and human bones. An international team led by the researchers from TAU and the Hebrew University of Jerusalem identified the morphology of the bones as belonging to a new type of earlier species, previously unknown to science. This is the first type of prehistoric human species to be defined in Israel, and according to common practice, it was named after the site where it was discovered – the Nesher Ramla Homo type.

WATCH: Researchers from TAU have identified a new type of early human at the Nesher Ramla site, dated to 140,000 to 120,000 years ago:

Neanderthals Made in the Middle East

“This is an extraordinary discovery,” notes Dr. Yossi Zaidner. “We had never imagined that alongside Homo sapiens, archaic Homo roamed the area so late in human history. The archaeological finds associated with human fossils show that Nesher Ramla Homo possessed advanced stone-tool production technologies and most likely interacted with the local Homo sapiens“. The culture, way of life, and behavior of the Nesher Ramla Homo are discussed in a companion paper also published in Science journal.

Furthermore, Prof. Hershkovitz explains that “Before these new findings, most researchers believed the Neanderthals to be a ‘European story’, in which small groups of Neanderthals were forced to migrate southwards to escape the spreading glaciers, with some arriving in the Land of Israel about 70,000 years ago. The Nesher Ramla fossils make us question this theory, suggesting that the ancestors of European Neanderthals lived in the Levant as early as 400,000 years ago, repeatedly migrating westward to Europe and eastward to Asia. In fact, our findings imply that the famous Neanderthals of Western Europe are only the remnants of a much larger population that lived here in the Levant – and not the other way around.”

Neanderthals and Sapiens Sharing Bed

Despite the absence of DNA in these fossils, the findings from Nesher Ramla offer a solution to a great mystery in the evolution of Homo: How did genes of Homo sapiens penetrate the Neanderthal population that presumably lived in Europe long before the arrival of Homo sapiens? Geneticists who studied the DNA of European Neanderthals have previously suggested the existence of a Neanderthal-like population which they called the ‘missing population’ or the ‘X population’ that had mated with Homo sapiens more than 200,000 years ago. In the anthropological paper now published in Science, the researchers suggest that the Nesher Ramla Homo type might represent this population, heretofore missing from the record of human fossils. Moreover, the researchers propose that the humans from Nesher Ramla are not the only ones of their kind discovered in the region, and that some human fossils found previously in Israel, which have baffled anthropologists for years – like the fossils from the Tabun cave (160,000 years ago), Zuttiyeh cave (250,000), and Qesem cave (400,000) – belong to the same new human group now called the Nesher Ramla Homo type.

“People think in paradigms,” says Dr. Rachel Sarig. “That’s why efforts have been made to ascribe these fossils to known human groups like Homo sapiens, Homo erectus, Homo heidelbergensis or the Neanderthals. But now we say: No. This is a group in itself, with distinct features and characteristics. At a later stage small groups of the Nesher Ramla Homo type migrated to Europe – where they evolved into the ‘classic’ Neanderthals that we are familiar with, and also to Asia, where they became archaic populations with Neanderthal-like features. As a crossroads between Africa, Europe and Asia, the Land of Israel served as a melting pot where different human populations mixed with one another, to later spread throughout the Old World. The discovery from the Nesher Ramla site writes a new and fascinating chapter in the story of humankind.”

The Nesher Ramla research team (left to right): Prof. Israel Hershkovitz, Marion Prevost, Dr. Hila May, Dr. Rachel Sarig and Dr. Yossi Zaidner.

Featured image: TAU’s Dr. Rachel Sarig, Dr. Hila May, and Prof. Israel Hershkovitz holding the Nesher Ramla fossils (photo: Tel Aviv University)

Care for A Glass of Tel Aviv Air?

Written by AUFTAU on 24 June 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

The best things in life are allegedly free, and a first-of-its-kind study in the world conducted at Tel Aviv University supports this belief. Researchers have found that nature’s very own champagne, generated from the air in the heart of an urban area, the city of Tel Aviv, complies with all of the strict drinking water standards set both by the State of Israel and by the World Health Organization. Have we finally found a solution to the global drinking water scarcity?

Like the Air that We Breathe

The constantly growing global shortage of clean drinking water requires thinking outside the box – and developing new technologies for producing potable water. The Earth’s atmosphere is a vast and renewable source of water, which may be an alternative drinking water resource. Our atmosphere contains billions of tons of water, 98% of which is in a gaseous state – that is, water vapor.

The study was conducted by a team of experts from the hydrochemistry laboratory at the Porter School of the Environment and Earth Sciences at Tel Aviv University, led by graduate student Offir Inbar and supervised by Prof. Dror Avisar, Head of TAU’s Moshe Mirilashvili Institute for Applied Water Studies. Also participating in the study was Watergen’s research and development team, Prof. Alexandra Chudnovsky, and leading researchers from Germany. The study’s results were published in two leading journals: Science of the Total Environment and Water.

Wind Flavored Water

Offir Inbar explains that this is the first study in the world to examine air pollution through its effect on drinking water generated from the air. No filtration or treatment system was installed in the device used in the study; the water that was produced was the water that was obtained from the air. The researchers performed a wide range of advanced chemical analyses of the water, and found that in the vast majority of cases, including during different seasons and at different times of the day, the water extracted from the air in the heart of Tel Aviv was safe to drink. In addition, with the help of a variety of innovative technologies for monitoring the composition of the atmosphere and by applying advanced statistical methods, for the first time the researchers were able to quantitatively link the process the air goes through in the days leading up to the point of water production and the chemical composition of the dew.

Tel Aviv – a source of clean drinking water?

Offir Inbar explains: “The study showed that wind direction greatly affects water quality. When the wind comes from the desert, we find more calcium and sulfur – residues of desert dust aerosols – in the water. When the wind comes from the direction of the sea, we find higher concentrations of chlorine and sodium. We also found that the distant sources of the air, prior to when it reached the point of water production, can be identified in the water. Thus, water produced from air coming from the Sahara region differs in composition from water produced from air coming from Europe.”

Water quality is also affected by anthropogenic pollution from transportation and industry. “Using advanced methods, we found a direct link between the concentrations of ammonia, nitrogen oxides and sulfur dioxide in the air and the concentration of their decomposition products in water,” says Inbar. “We found low concentrations of copper, potassium, and zinc in the water, which probably come from manmade pollution.

Minerals Should be Added

The chemical link we found between the meteorological parameters and the composition of the water makes it possible for the first time to study the atmosphere using water extracted from it. This link allows us to know what minerals should be added to water extracted from air in order to provide people with quality drinking water. In general, we found that potable water from air does not contain enough calcium and magnesium – and it is advisable to add these minerals to the water, just like they are added to desalinated drinking water in some countries.”

A significant portion of the water we drink in Israel today is desalinated seawater – a solution which Inbar says is only a partial solution, and not one that can provide drinking water to the vast majority of the world’s population. “In order to desalinate seawater, you need a sea. The sea, however, is not accessible from every place in the world,” says Inbar. “After desalination, a complete infrastructure must be built to carry the desalinated water from the waterfront to the various towns, and large parts of the world don’t possess the engineering and economic means for that. Water from the air can be produced anywhere, with no need for expensive transport infrastructure and regardless of the amount of precipitation. From an economic perspective, the higher the temperature and humidity, the more cost-effective the production of water from the air is.”

Devices for generating water from the air that include water purification and treatment systems are already in use in a lot of countries, and provide quality drinking water to people living in distressed areas. “The concern in this case was that water produced from air in the heart of an urban area would not be suitable for drinking. We have proved that this is not the case,” Inbar concludes. “We are currently expanding our research to other areas in Israel, including the Haifa Bay and agricultural areas, in order to investigate in depth, the impact of various pollutants on the quality of water extracted from the air.”

Featured image:Offir Inbar enjoys a glass of Tel Aviv atmosphere derived water in the lab

Combating Antibiotic Resistance

Written by AUFTAU on 23 June 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

A new TAU study revealed a mechanism through which “good” viruses can attack the systems of “bad” bacteria, destroy them and block their reproduction.

“Good” Viruses Kill “Bad” Bacteria

The researchers demonstrated that the “good” virus (bacteriophage) is able to block the replication mechanism of the bacteria’s DNA without damaging its own, noting that the ability to distinguish between oneself and others is crucial in nature. The discovery reveals one more fascinating aspect of the mutual relations between bacteria and bacteriophages and may lead to a better understanding of bacterial mechanisms for evading bacteriophages, as well as ways for using bacteriophages to combat bacteria. The study, published recently in PNAS – Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, was led by Prof. Udi Qimron, Dr. Dor Salomon, Dr. Tridib Mahata and Shahar Molshanski-Mor of the Sackler Faculty of Medicine. Other participants included Prof. Tal Pupko, Head of The Shmunis School of Biomedicine and Cancer Research and also of TAU’s new AI and Data Science Center; Dr. Oren Avram of The George S. Wise Faculty of Life Sciences; and Dr. Ido Yosef, Dr. Moran Goren, Dr. Miriam Kohen-Manor and Dr. Biswanath Jana of the Sackler Faculty of Medicine.

A Great Scientific Challenge

Prof. Qimron explains that the antibiotic resistance of bacteria is one of the greatest challenges faced by scientists today. One potential solution may lie in further investigation of the targeted eradication of bacteria by “good” bacteriophages; namely, understanding bacteriophage mechanisms for taking over bacteria as a basis for the development of new tools to combat bacterial pathogens. With this solution in mind, the current study unveiled the mechanism by which the bacteriophage takes control of the bacteria. The researchers found that a bacteriophage protein uses a DNA-repair protein in the bacteria to “cunningly” cut the bacteria’s DNA as it is being repaired. Since the bacteriophage’s own DNA has no need for this specific repair protein, it is protected from this nicking procedure. In this way the “good” bacteriophage does three important things: it distinguishes between its own DNA and that of the bacteria, destroys the bacteria’s genetic material, and blocks the bacteria’s propagation and cell division.

The process by which the bacteriophage destroys the bacteria’s genetic material Prof. Qimron explains that, “The ability to distinguish between oneself and others is of enormous importance in nature and in various biological applications. All antibiotic mechanisms identify and neutralize bacteria only, with minimal effect on human cells.” The researchers discovered the process by searching for types of bacterial variants not impacted by this bacteriophage mechanism – those that have developed “immunity” to it. This inquiry led them to the specific bacterial mechanisms affected by the bacteriophage takeover. “Shedding more light on the ways in which bacteriophages attack bacteria, our findings may serve as a tool in the endless battle against antibiotic-resistant bacteria,” concludes Prof. Qimron. Featured image: Illustrative: Bacteriophage or phage virus attacking and infecting a bacterium

Leading the Global Yiddish Renaissance

Written by AUFTAU on 22 June 2021. Posted in Newsroom.

TAU’s Jona Goldrich Institute for Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture boasts vibrant, diverse curriculum and student body.

What do scholars, teachers, translators and aficionados of Yiddish have in common? They all flock to TAU’s influential Jona Goldrich Institute for Yiddish Language, Literature and Culture, which promotes academic depth and creativity in the field of Yiddish studies.

Founded in 2005 as the Goldreich Family Institute by TAU benefactor Jona Goldrich (1927-2016), today the Institute is supported by his two daughters, TAU Governor Melinda Goldrich and Andrea Goldrich, who chose to rename the Institute in honor of their late father and his leadership. The Institute’s summer program, supported by the Naomi Prawer Kadar Foundation since 2011, has hosted 995 participants from 33 countries. The Goldrich Family Foundation Advanced Yiddish Studies Forum brings top scholars to TAU from around the world.

“For me, the Institute is not only a place of advanced research, but a forum where my ideas can be put into practice,” says Mika Cohen, a first-year student in the Yiddish Studies MA Program, jointly supported by Yad Hanadiv. A creative writing workshop she’s running explores the theme of the shtetl as a way to think about modern notions of community. Participants read works by Sholem Aleichem and other legendary writers, and then produce their own vision of community with their 21st century literary voices.

Institute Director Dr. Hannah Pollin-Galay of TAU’s Department of Literature, Entin Faculty of Humanities, enthuses, “Students are eager to ask new questions about Jewish culture and to understand the experiences of their grandparents and great-grandparents.” Her own research combines Yiddish and Holocaust Studies, while the work of Prof. Hana Wirth-Nesher, the Institute’s Founding Director, focuses on multilingualism in Jewish and mainstream American writing. Other research conducted at the Institute explores the interplay between Yiddish and other languages and cultures in Europe, Israel and beyond.

“The Yiddish poet Avrom Sutzkever asked, in reference to Yiddish culture after the Holocaust, Ver vet blaybn? Vos vet blaybn? (‘Who will remain? What will remain?’),” says Dr. Pollin-Galay. “I think Sutzkever would be very proud to see my young students working hard to answer his question in a positive way. It is thanks to them, and to the support of the Goldrich family, that a beautiful Yiddish legacy will not only remain, but blossom and grow in the future.”

Featured image: Credit: Chen Galili

Author: AUFTAU