Could a pill make you more moral? Should you take it if it could?
Category: biotech/medical – Page 1,489
Robotic hand can crush beer cans and hold eggs without breaking them
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A highly dexterous, human-like robotic hand with fingertip touch sensors can delicately hold eggs, use tweezers to pick up computer chips and crush drink cans. The hand could eventually be used as a prosthetic or in robots that use artificial intelligence to manipulate objects.
Weighing 1.1 kilograms, the hand is 22 centimetres long and made of steel and aluminium. Each finger is driven by three small motors that fit within the palm and move metal parts that act like tendons around a total of 20 joints. This enables the digits to tilt sideways, to flex back and forth and to fold, giving the hand a range of movements comparable to that of a human hand.
Uikyum Kim at Ajou University in South Korea and his colleagues, who built the hand, say it can hold an egg without cracking it, pour drinks and crush aluminium cans.
Israeli study finds Pfizer COVID-19 booster protects against Omicron
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JERUSALEM, Dec 11 (Reuters) â Israeli researchers said on Saturday they found that a three-shot course of the Pfizer/BioNTech (PFE.N), (22UAy. DE) COVID-19 vaccine provided significant protection against the new Omicron variant.
The findings were similar to those presented by BioNTech and Pfizer earlier in the week, which were an early signal that booster shots could be key to protect against infection from the newly identified variant.
The study, carried out by Sheba Medical Center and the Health Ministryâs Central Virology Laboratory, compared the blood of 20 people who had received two vaccine doses 5â6 months earlier to the same number of individuals who had received a booster a month before.
Harnessing the power of mitochondria to beat Parkinsonâs
Boston-based biotech Vincere Biosciences is on a mission to combat neurodegenerative disease by improving the quality of the mitochondria in our cells. The company was spun out from AI drug discovery company NeuroInitiative in 2018 after its platform identified that modulation of certain enzymes to repair mitochondrial health âmay slow or stop the progression of Parkinsonâs disease and other age-related disorders.â
In addition to seed funding, Vincere has received grants from the National Institutes of Health and Michael J Fox Foundation, and the company is now gearing up for a Series A funding round in early 2022.
Longevity. Technology: Mitochondriaâs role in longevity is a hot topic. Often referred to as the âpowerhouse of the cellâ, these miniature organs within our cells play a key role in providing the energy needed for growth, repair and rejuvenation. As we age, our mitochondria begin to decline in function, and this decline is linked to a range of age-related diseases. We caught up with Vincereâs co-founder and CEO Dr Spring Behrouz to find out how her company aims to tap into the potential of these small but mighty biological players.
Split-Brains, Consciousness and Combining Minds | Waking Cosmos Documentary
One of the reasons branching identity is being accepted more seriously these days.
Beginning in the 1950s, experiments with split-brain patients revealed that consciousness could be divided between the two hemispheres of the brain. A surprising implication was that if consciousness could be divided, then it could also be combined. Evidence of this came in 2006, when conjoined twins Krista and Tatiana Hogan were born. The Hogan sisters were born with their brains connected by a thalamic bridge, which allowed a unique mental connection between them. We explore this surprising mental connection, and the possibility that we may one day connect our own minds with other conscious beings, together with what this might mean for our concept of self, identity, and the future of mind.
Please consider supporting my work on Patreon here ~ https://www.patreon.com/wakingcosmos.
Thank you!
This documentary is a non-profit, educational film. All footage used with permission, or in compliance with fair use/fair dealing.
Music by Scott Buckley and Aleks Michalski.
Can Mushrooms replace EVERYTHING? | Concrete, Plastic, Meat, Leather
One promising solution to plastic pollution is mycelium or mushroom packaging. It is made of 2 ingredients: mushrooms and hemp. Mycelium is the underground network of very durable, thread-like filaments called hyphae. It is mixed with agricultural waste like wood chips, oat hulls, cotton burrs or hemp hurds.
Link to my Patreon page: https://www.patreon.com/Belinda_Carr.
Chapters.
0:00 Introduction.
1:00 How its made.
2:43 Products.
4:32 Advantages.
5:30 Disadvantages.
6:19 Myths.
7:12 Conclusion.
One of the largest mushroom packaging manufacturers in the world is Ecovative Design, a New York based biotech company founded in 2006. They sent me these samples of their product. Their manufacturing process is pretty straight forward.
Their designers create a 3D CAD model of custom packaging.
A CNC machine routes the design into MDF.
Plastic trays are thermoformed around the MDF pieces.
The tray is filled with their proprietary hemp hurd and mycelium blend.
It is allowed to grow for 4 days in a controlled environment with regulated temperatures, airflow, CO2 and humidity levels.
It is popped out of tray and allowed to continue growing for 2 more days to create a velvety layer of overgrowth.
The packaging is then heat treated to dry out, kill spores and stop the growth process.
This material can last for 30 years in dry, temperature controlled indoor environments. It is also 100% biodegradable and a nutrient for soils and plants. When broken down into 1 cubic centimeter pieces, it will compost in just 45 days. In the ocean, it will compost in 180 days.
