Lifeboat Foundation

The human species has driven the planet’s biodiversity into an unprecedented decline, with as many as 1 million species at risk. Traditional conservation methods alone are struggling to offset the speed at which we’re losing species. Biotechnologies that have been developing in the wings are now being brought forward to potentially reverse the damage already done. Meet the scientist behind de-extinction.

#Moonshot #Science #BloombergQuicktake.
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Tensions are flaring between the powers of the world evoking many to ponder the worst. Yet some are already wondering how to manage a path to peace. Looks like that consideration needs a bit more work! Watch and find out!

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Is a postdoctoral scholar at Tufts University, where she conducts research in their Human Robot Interaction Lab (https://hrilab.tufts.edu/).

With a background in psychology and the social sciences, Dr. Chita-Tegmark is interested in topics at the intersection of technology and psychology, such as using artificial social agents in healthcare and the impact of such emerging technologies on human social interactions and well-being.

Continue reading “Dr. Mihaela Chita-Tegmark — Human Robot Interaction Lab, Tufts U — Co-Founder, Future of Life Inst” »

It is 100 seconds to midnight.

A team of scientists from the Leibniz Institute for Zoo and Wildlife Research (Leibniz-IZW) inGermany, Givskud Zoo–Zootopia in Denmark and the University of Milan in Italy succeeded in producing the very first African lionin-vitroembryos after the vitrification of immature oocytes. For this specific method of cryopreservation, oocytes are collected directly after an animal is castrated or deceased and immediately frozen at-196°C in liquid nitrogen. This technique allows the storage of oocytes of valuable animals for an unlimited time, so that they can be used to produce offspring with the help of assisted reproduction techniques. The aim is to further improve and apply these methods to save highly endangered species such as the Asiatic lion from extinction. The current research on African lions as a model species is an important step in this direction. The results are reported in the scientific journal Cryobiology.

Lion oocytes are presumed to be very sensitive to chilling due to their high lipid content, resulting in poor revival following slow cooling. Vitrification can circumvent this problem, as the cells are frozen at ultra-fast speeds in solutions with a very high concentration of cryoprotective agents. This method prevents the formation of ice crystals in the cells, which could destroy them, and enables them to remain intact for an unlimited time to allow their use later on.

For the present research, the scientists collected oocytes from four African lionesses from Givskud Zoo—Zootopia after the animals had been euthanised for the purpose of population management. Half of the oocytes (60) were vitrified instantly. After six days of storage in liquid nitrogen, the vitrified oocytes were thawed and subjected toin-vitromaturation in an incubator at 39°C for a total of 32–34 hours. The other half (59) were used as control group and directly subjected toin-vitromaturation without a step of vitrification. Mature oocytes of both groups were then fertilized with frozen-thawed sperm from African lion males. “We could demonstrate a high proportion of surviving and matured oocytes in the group of vitrified oocytes. Almost 50% of them had matured, a proportion similar to that in the control group,” says Jennifer Zahmel, scientist at the Department of Reproduction Biology at the Leibniz-IZW.

SAN FRANCISCO (AP) — The number of western monarch butterflies wintering along the California coast has plummeted precipitously to a record low, putting the orange-and-black insects closer to extinction, researchers announced Tuesday.

An annual winter count by the Xerces Society recorded fewer than 2000 butterflies, a massive decline from the tens of thousands tallied in recent years and the millions that clustered in trees from Northern California’s Marin County to San Diego County in the south in the 1980s.

Western monarch butterflies head south from the Pacific Northwest to California each winter, returning to the same places and even the same trees, where they cluster to keep warm. The monarchs generally arrive in California at the beginning of November and spread across the country once warmer weather arrives in March.

On Januray 25th, we will discuss different aspects of longtermism — a concept of effective altruism. To decide which ist the best action to take we usually consider the effects of our actions on the short-or medium-term future — whether we save someone’s life, or mitigate sexism or racism in the next generation. According to longtermism that is wildly mistaken. The value of our actions is determined almost exclusively by their effects on the future in the very long-run — the next millions and billions of years. Their effects on the next 100 or even 1000 years are just about irrelevant. Our everyday thinking is radically short-sighted, and common evaluations perhaps dramatically wrong. In this online meetup, we will look at a compelling justification for longtermism, at its historical roots, and some of its practical implications — e.g. concerning existential risks, or the idea that our time might be the most important in the history of humanity. Free discord session on 9:30 — 11:30 AM PST 11:30 — 13:30 AM DST.

What is the best action we can take? According to longtermism we should consider the effects on the future in the very long run — the next millions and billions of years — to answer this question.

Using the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) in Chile, an international team of astronomers has performed observations of HSC J120505.09−000027.9—the most distant red quasar so far detected and found that it showcases an extended emission of ionized carbon. The finding is reported in a paper published January 4 on arXiv.org.

Quasars, or quasi–stellar objects (QSOs), are extremely luminous active galactic nuclei (AGN) containing supermassive central black holes with accretion disks. Their redshifts are measured from the strong spectral lines that dominate their visible and ultraviolet spectra. Some QSOs are dust-reddened, hence dubbed red quasars. These objects have a non-negligible amount of dust extinction, but are not completely obscured.

Astronomers are especially interested in studying high-redshift quasars (at redshift higher than 5.0) as they are the most luminous and most distant compact objects in the observable universe. Spectra of such QSOs can be used to estimate the mass of supermassive black holes that constrain the evolution and formation models of quasars. Therefore, high-redshift quasars could serve as a powerful tool to probe the early universe.

Sir David Attenborough confronts viewers with some of the most shocking images of his 66-year BBC career as he outlines how animals are facing mass extinction because of humans.

Upsetting scenes in his new series A Perfect Planet, on TV in Britain now and airing on Channel 9 later this year, show a parched and psychologically damaged baby elephant – its adult relatives killed by extreme droughts – cry out as rescuers squirt water into its mouth.

Continue reading “David Attenborough’s grim extinction warning” »