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As a group, simple creatures following simple rules can display a surprising amount of complexity, efficiency, and even creativity. Known as swarm intelligence, this trait is found throughout nature, but researchers have recently begun using it to transform various fields such as robotics, data mining, medicine, and blockchains.

Ants, for example, can only perform a limited range of functions, but an ant colony can build bridges, create superhighways of food and information, wage war, and enslave other ant species—all of which are beyond the comprehension of any single ant. Likewise, schools of fish, flocks of birds, beehives, and other species exhibit behavior indicative of planning by a higher intelligence that doesn’t actually exist.

It happens by a process called stigmergy. Simply put, a small change by a group member causes other members to behave differently, leading to a new pattern of behavior.

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Summary: Researchers discover what may be the key to stopping uncontrolled inflammation and the damage it causes in a multitude of chronic diseases. [This article first appeared on the website LongevityFacts.com. Author: Brady Hartman. ]

A discovery by researchers at the University of Queensland (UQ) could be the key to stopping the damage caused by uncontrolled inflammation in a range of chronic diseases including Alzheimer’s and liver disease.

Queensland scientists have uncovered how an inflammation process automatically switches off in healthy cells, and are now investigating ways to stop it when it runs amok. The finding may lead to a way to turn off chronic low-grade inflammation without interfering with the body’s natural defenses against infection.

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Summary: Researchers at the University of California discovered a key way that cancer manipulates the genetic code using DNA methylation that has important implications for the treatment of cancers. [This article first appeared on the website LongevityFacts.com. Author: Brady Hartman. ]

Up until now, scientists haven’t fully understood how DNA methylation causes changes in our genetic code that enable cancer to thrive.

Now, a team led by associate professor Jikui Song at the University of California Riverside have deciphered the crystal structure of an enzyme that plays a crucial role in DNA methylation that allows tumors to survive and grow.

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This image shows AAV therapy affecting pyramidal neurons in the hippocampus. Credit: Blake Albright, Asokan Lab Gene therapies promise to revolutionize the treatment of many diseases, including neurological diseases such as ALS. But the small viruses that deliver therapeutic genes can have adverse side effects at high doses. UNC School of Medicine researchers have now found a structure on these viruses that makes them better at crossing from the bloodstream into the brain – a key factor for administering gene therapies at lower doses for treating brain and spinal disorders. This structural…

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Eliminating disease is an admirable ambition but it seems it’s the lack of education, environment and lifestyle that is really holding people back and causing them to lose interest in life.


Is anti-aging technology and increasing the human mortality rates helping to create a more fulfilled, life worth living. Let’s look at this question…

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Second Sight Medical (NSDQ: EYES) today announced the first trial implantation of its Orion cortical visual prosthesis system and updated on implantations of its Argus device and enrollment in an upcoming study.

The first implantation procedure was performed late last month by Dr. Nader Pouratian at the Ronald Reagan UCLA Medical Center, the Sylmar, Calif.-based company said, as part of an FDA-cleared feasibility trial it won approval to launch last November.

The Orion cortical visual prosthesis system is designed to convert images captured by a miniature video camera, mounted on a patient’s glasses, into a series of electrical pulses which are transmitted wirelessly to an array of electrodes on the surface of the individual’s visual cortex.

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