Lifeboat Foundation

One day we may live in a world without disease.

A yarn-like material made from human skin cells could be used for surgery and complex tissue reconstruction without triggering an immune response.

Pre-historic times and ancient history are defined by the materials that were harnessed during that period.
We have the stone age, the bronze age, and the iron age.
Today is a little more complex, we live in the Space Age, the Nuclear Age, and the Information Age.
And now we are entering the Graphene Age, a material that will be so influential to our future, it should help define the period we live in.
Potential applications for Graphene include uses in medicine, electronics, light processing, sensor technology, environmental technology, and energy, which brings us to Samsung’s incredible battery technology!
Imagine a world where mobile devices and electric vehicles charge 5 times faster than they do today.
Cell phones, laptops, and tablets that fully charge in 12 minutes or electric cars that fully charge at home in only an hour.
Samsung will make this possible because, on November 28th, they announced the development of a battery made of graphene with charging speeds 5 times faster than standard lithium-ion batteries.
Before I talk about that, let’s quickly go over what Graphene is.
When you first hear about Graphene’s incredible properties, it sounds like a supernatural material out of a comic book.
But Graphene is real! And it is made out of Graphite, which is the crystallized form of carbon and is commonly found in pencils.
Graphene is a single atom thick structure of carbon atoms arranged in a hexagonal lattice and is a million time thinner than a human hair.
Graphene is the strongest lightest material on Earth.
It is 200 times stronger than steel and as much as 6 times lighter.
It can stretch up to a quarter of its length but at the same time, it is the hardest material known, harder than a diamond.
Graphene can also conduct electricity faster than any known substance, 140 times faster than silicone.
And it conducts heat 10 times better than copper.
It was first theorized by Phillip Wallace in 1947 and attempts to grow graphene started in the 1970s but never produced results that could measure graphene experimentally.
Graphene is also the most impermeable material known, even Helium atoms can’t pass through graphene.
In 2004, University of Manchester scientists Andre Geim and Konstantin Novoselov successfully isolated one atom thick flakes of graphene for the first time by repeatedly separating fragments from chunks of graphite using tape, and they were awarded the Nobel Prize in Physics in 2010 for this discovery.
Over the past 10 years, the price of Graphene has dropped at a tremendous rate.
In 2008, Graphene was one of the most expensive materials on Earth, but production methods have been scaled up since then and companies are selling Graphene in large quantities.

Sources:
http://www.graphene.manchester.ac.uk/explore/the-story-of-gr…rly-years/
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/History_of_graphene
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Potential_applications_of_graphene
http://luratia.com/graphene/category/graphene-facts#sthash.3…mEmGp.dpbs
https://blogs.windows.com/devices/2013/02/07/hero-material-1…-graphene/
https://news.samsung.com/global/samsung-develops-battery-mat…ging-speed

But CRISPR editing — at least as a therapeutic technique in people — has turned out to be more difficult than initially thought. Researchers have documented ways that Cas9, one of the enzymes used in CRISPR gene editing, could trigger immune responses, or cause accidental changes to the genome that would be permanent. RNA editing, by contrast, could allow clinicians to make temporary fixes that eliminate mutations in proteins, halt their production or change the way that they work in specific organs and tissues. Because cells quickly degrade unused RNAs, any errors introduced by a therapy would be washed out, rather than staying with a person forever.

Making changes to the molecular messengers that create proteins might offer flexible therapies for cancer, pain or high cholesterol, in addition to genetic disorders.

A team of researchers at the French National Institute of Health and Medical Research in Bordeaux have grown yarn from human skin cells that they call a “human textile” — and they say it could be used by surgeons to close wounds or assemble implantable skin grafts.

“These human textiles offer a unique level of biocompatibility and represent a new generation of completely biological tissue-engineered products,” the researchers wrote in a paper published in the journal Acta Biomaterialia.

The key advantage of the gruesome yarn is that unlike conventional synthetic surgical materials, the material doesn’t trigger an immune response that can complicate the healing process, according to New Scientist.

Bloom Science and Duke University have entered into an exclusive licensing agreement that provides the biopharmaceutical company access to the intellectual property and technology related to unique strain isolates and genetic variants of Akkermansia genus bacteria.

This type of bacteria has been demonstrated to slow disease progression and prolong survival in animal models of amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS).

In a historic decision, the US Food and Drug Administration has issued emergency authorization for public use of a new test for the novel coronavirus. The exemption makes the diagnostic test available to any qualified lab in the world.

The FDA has given emergency authorization to a new test that promises to help public health labs meet a potential surge in cases.

AI cancer detection may be able to provide doctors the ability to recognize and treat the disease before it spreads.

It’s no secret that artificial intelligence (AI) has been rapidly developing over the past few years.

With Siri and Amazon Alexa, self-driving cars, targeted advertisements, chatbots, and automated customer service representatives, the infiltration of AI into our daily lives is anything but subtle.

It could be a welcome alternative to skin grafts for burn victims.