Wired has compiled a short list of the best scientific music videos on the Internet. Our favorite is The Model of a Psychopharmacologist from the Neuroscience Education Institute.

Drug eluting stents can have potential side effects when the chemical gets deposited downstream and causes blood clots to form. To help predict potential problems, MIT scientists developed a model to study how drugs from stents behave around arterial bifurcations.
From the article abstract in PLoS ONE:

Methods and Results
We constructed two-phase computational models of stent-deployed arterial bifurcations simulating blood flow and drug transport to investigate the factors modulating drug distribution when the main-branch (MB) was treated using a DES. Simulations predicted extensive flow-mediated drug delivery in bifurcated vascular beds where the drug distribution patterns are heterogeneous and sensitive to relative stent position and luminal flow. A single DES in the MB coupled with large retrograde luminal flow on the lateral wall of the side-branch (SB) can provide drug deposition on the SB lumen-wall interface, except when the MB stent is downstream of the SB flow divider. In an even more dramatic fashion, the presence of the SB affects drug distribution in the stented MB. Here fluid mechanic effects play an even greater role than in the SB especially when the DES is across and downstream to the flow divider and in a manner dependent upon the Reynolds number.
Conclusions
The flow effects on drug deposition and subsequent uptake from endovascular DES are amplified in bifurcation lesions. When only one branch is stented, a complex interplay occurs – drug deposition in the stented MB is altered by the flow divider imposed by the SB and in the SB by the presence of a DES in the MB. The use of DES in arterial bifurcations requires a complex calculus that balances vascular and stent geometry as well as luminal flow.

Image: Mural drug deposition is a function of relative stent position with respect to the side-branch and Reynolds number in arterial bifurcations. Snapshots of arterial drug deposition patterns for three different stent placement scenarios (upstream (A), midstream (B) and downstream (C)) and five different flow conditions are shown. All the simulated flow conditions were normalized using the mean Reynolds number (Re0) evaluated in the Methods section.
Article in PLoS ONE: Luminal Flow Amplifies Stent-Based Drug Deposition in Arterial Bifurcations
Press release: New computer model could lead to safer stents

A team of researchers from France and Spain managed to grow complete human skin epidermis from skin-derived stem cells on laboratory mice. The finding could lead to the rapid production of one’s own skin patches for people with burns and other severe skin problems.
From the article abstract in The Lancet:

Background
Cell therapy for large burns is dependent upon autologous epidermis reconstructed in vitro. However, the effectiveness of current procedures is limited by the delay needed to culture the patient’s own keratinocytes. To assess whether the keratinocyte progeny of human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) could be used to form a temporary skin substitute for use in patients awaiting autologous grafts, we investigated the cells’ capability of constructing a pluristratified epidermis.
Methods
hESCs from lines H9 and SA01 were seeded at least in triplicate on fibroblast feeder cells for 40 days in a medium supplemented with bone morphogenetic protein 4 and ascorbic acid. Molecular characterisation of cell differentiation was done throughout the process by quantitative PCR, fluorescence-activated cell sorting, and immunocytochemical techniques. Keratinocyte molecular differentiation and functional capacity to construct a human epidermis were assessed in vitro and in vivo.
Findings
From hESCs, we generated a homogeneous population of cells that showed phenotypic characteristics of basal keratinocytes. Expression levels of genes encoding keratin 14, keratin 5, integrin α6, integrin β4, collagen VII, and laminin 5 in these cells were similar to those in basal keratinocytes. After seeding on an artificial matrix, keratinocytes derived from hESCs (K-hESCs) formed a pluristratified epidermis. Keratin-14 immunostaining was seen in the basal compartment, with keratin 10 present in layers overlying the basal layer. Involucrin and filaggrin, late markers of epidermal differentiation, were detected in the uppermost layers only. 12 weeks after grafting onto five immunodeficient mice, epidermis derived from K-hESCs had a structure consistent with that of mature human skin. Human involucrin was appropriately located in spinous and granular layers and few Ki67-positive cells were detected in the basal layer.
Interpretation
hESCs can be differentiated into basal keratinocytes that are fully functional—ie, able to construct a pluristratified epidermis. This resource could be developed to provide temporary skin substitutes for patients awaiting autologous grafts.

Here’s a Lancet podcast discussing the research with two of the study authors, Marc Peschanski MD and Dr Christine Baldeschi PhD of the Institute for Stem Cell Therapy and Exploration of Monogenic diseases, Evry Cedex, France: