Lifeboat Foundation

A new study by Dr Constantine Evans of Maynooth University and researchers at the University of Chicago and California Institute of Technology, published in Nature, shows how the molecules that build structures can do both the thinking and the doing.

We tend to separate the brain and muscle – the brain does the thinking; the muscle does the doing. The brain takes in complex information about the world, makes decisions, while muscle merely executes.

This brain-muscle separation has also shaped how we think about the working within a single cell; some molecules within cells are seen as ‘thinkers’ that take in information about the chemical environment and decide what the cell needs to do for survival; separately, other molecules are seen as the ‘muscle’, building structures needed for survival.

Biologists from Konstanz have unveiled a unique and ancient phosphorus-based bacterial metabolism. Central to this discovery are four elements: an analytical calculation dating back to the 1980s, a modern sewage treatment facility, the identification of a novel bacterial species, and a remnant from around 2.5 billion years ago.

Our story begins at the end of the 1980s, with a sheet of paper. On this sheet, a scientist calculated that the conversion of the chemical compound phosphite to phosphate would release enough energy to produce the cell’s energy carrier – the ATP molecule. In this way, it should therefore be possible for a microorganism to supply itself with energy. Unlike most living organisms on our planet, this organism would not be dependent on energy supply from light or from the decomposition of organic matter.

The scientist actually succeeded in isolating such a microorganism from the environment. Its energy metabolism is based on the oxidation of phosphite to phosphate, just as predicted by the calculation. But how exactly does the biochemical mechanism work? Regrettably, the key enzyme needed to understand the biochemistry behind the process remained hidden – and thus the mystery remained unsolved for many years. In the following three decades, the sheet stayed in the drawer, the research approach was put on the back burner. Yet the scientist couldn’t get the thought out of his head.

People believe that exotic new propulsion systems are needed to reduce the one way trip times from Earth to Mars from 180–270 days down to 45 days each way. The slower mission times are for chemical rockets where we barely get out of Earth orbit with a small rocket engine. SpaceX Starship can refuel after reaching orbit to enable faster orbits (straighter and less looping paths) to go to Mars. This makes 90 day times each way easy with chemical Starship and even more wasteful but still chemical rockets to Mars in 45 days each way.

This is calculated by Ozan Bellik.

In 2033 there are opportunities to do a high thrust ~45 day outbound transit with a ~10.5km/s TMI (trans Mars injection). If you refill in an elliptical orbit that’s at LEO+2.5-3km/s then the TMI burn requirement goes down to 7.5-8km/s. A SpaceX Starship with 1,200 tons of fuel should be able to do with roughly 150 tons of burnout mass. This is enough for ship, residuals, and a crew cabin with enough consumables to last a moderately sized crew for the 45 day transit. The trouble is that once you get there, you are approaching Mars at ~15km/s.

A Northwestern University team has demonstrated a remarkable new way to generate electricity, with a paperback-sized device that nestles in soil and harvests power created as microbes break down dirt – for as long as there’s carbon in the soil.

Microbial fuel cells, as they’re called, have been around for more than 100 years. They work a little like a battery, with an anode, cathode and electrolyte – but rather than drawing electricity from chemical sources, they work with bacteria that naturally donate electrons to nearby conductors as they chow down on soil.

The issue thus far has been keeping them supplied with water and oxygen, while being buried in the dirt. “Although MFCs have existed as a concept for more than a century, their unreliable performance and low output power have stymied efforts to make practical use of them, especially in low-moisture conditions,” said UNW alumnus and project lead Bill Yen.

The possibility of direct interfacing between biological and technological information devices could result in a merger of mind and machine — Ultimate Computing. This book, a thorough consideration of this idea, involves a number of disciplines, including biochemistry, cognitive science, computer science, engineering, mathematics, microbiology, molecular biology, pharmacology, philosophy, physics, physiology, and psychology.

Silicon-based complementary metal-oxide semiconductors or negative differential resistance device circuits can emulate neural features, yet are complicated to fabricate and not biocompatible. Here, the authors report an ion-modulated antiambipolarity in mixed ion–electron conducting polymers demonstrating capability of sensing, spiking, emulating the most critical biological neural features, and stimulating biological nerves in vivo.

XRISM’s first high-resolution spectrum of supernova remnant N132D offers unprecedented insights into the chemical and physical properties of the aftermath of a star’s explosion, enhancing our understanding of the universe’s elemental composition.

This image is the first high-resolution energy spectrum from the Resolve instrument on JAXA’s XRISM mission. It shows the energy of X-rays being produced within the remains of a massive star exploding in the nearby Large Magellanic Cloud, creating a ‘supernova remnant’ known as N132D. Spectra such as this one will enable scientists to measure the temperature and motion of X-ray emitting gas with unprecedented sensitivity and accuracy.

The spectrum indicates which chemical elements exist in N132D. XRISM can identify each element by measuring the specific energy of X-ray light that it emits (the label ‘keV’ on the x axis of the graph refers to kiloelectronvolts, a unit of energy). The ‘energy resolution’ of XRISM (its capability to distinguish X-ray light arriving with different amounts of energy) is incredible. The faint grey line shows the same spectrum from the XIS instrument on JAXA ’s Suzaku X-ray telescope (source). The energy resolution from XRISM is more than 40 times better over the energy range shown in this spectrum.

Understanding why we overeat unhealthy foods has been a long-standing mystery. While we know food’s strong power influences our choices, the precise circuitry in our brains behind this is unclear. The vagus nerve sends internal sensory information from the gut to the brain about the nutritional value of food. But, the molecular basis of the reward in the brain associated with what we eat has been incompletely understood.

A study published in Cell Metabolism, by a team from the Monell Chemical Senses Center, unravels the internal neural wiring, revealing separate fat and sugar craving pathways, as well as a concerning result: Combining these pathways overly triggers our desire to eat more than usual.

“Food is nature’s ultimate reinforcer,” said Monell scientist Guillaume de Lartigue, Ph.D., lead author of the study. “But why fats and sugars are particularly appealing has been a puzzle. We’ve now identified nerve cells in the gut rather than taste cells in the mouth are a key driver. We found that distinct gut–brain pathways are recruited by fats and sugars, explaining why that donut can be so irresistible.”

Anthrobots: These remarkable spheroid-shaped multicellular biological robots, or biobots, are not the products of advanced robotics laboratories but are instead born from the inherent potential of adult human somatic progenitor seed cells.

Advanced Science is a high-impact, interdisciplinary science journal covering materials science, physics, chemistry, medical and life sciences, and engineering.