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Amazon is shutting down Prime Now and folding two-hour deliveries into its main app

Amazon says it will be ‘even more seamless for customers’.


Amazon is shutting down its standalone Prime Now delivery app, with its speedy two-hour delivery options moving exclusively into the company’s main app and website, the company announced today. Prime Now services have already moved into the main app in India, Japan, and Singapore, while in other countries Amazon is already directing Prime Now users into its main app and website via a pop-up, CNBC notes. The standalone Prime Now app and website will be retired by the end of the year.

Originally launched in 2014, Prime Now was designed to offer deliveries of essential items within hours rather than days for Prime members. The service was initially available in just a small number of cities, but has since expanded to over 5000 locations around the world, CNBC notes. Writing in a blog post, Amazon’s vice president of grocery Stephenie Landry said shutting down the separate app will “make this experience even more seamless for customers.”

Mammals can breathe through their intestines

On a good day, things exit through the anus. But in rodents and pigs in respiratory distress, oxygen can be absorbed by tissues in the rectum, helping the animals recover, a new study suggests. The scientists behind the research propose that flushing oxygen into the rectum could one day help save human lives if conventional ventilation methods are unavailable.

“It looks like a crazy idea,” says Sean Colgan, a gastroenterologist at the University of Colorado, Boulder, who was not involved in the study. “But if you look at the data, it’s actually a very compelling story.”

Most mammals breathe through their mouths and noses and send oxygen to their body via the lungs. A few aquatic animals, including sea cucumbers and catfish, breathe through their intestines, and the intestinal tissues of humans can readily absorb pharmaceuticals. But no one knew whether oxygen could enter the bloodstream via mammalian intestines.

Adam Savage 3D Prints Titanium Iron Man Suit That’s Bulletproof

Adam Savage, one of the creators and hosts of the beloved show Mythbusters, collaborated with his friend Richard Browning, founder of Gravity, to demonstrate a flying, bulletproof Iron Man suit that was 3D printed from Titanium. This is a feat that has to be seen to be believed.

The creation of the suit will be featured on a new show that Savage is doing with the Science Channel. It all started when Savage visited the Colorado School of Mines and one of the engineers told him they had Titanium 3D printers, adding “if you want to print something weird, let us know.” To which Savage replied, “Really? How about a full suit of Iron Man armor?”

A Molecule That Shouldn’t Exist – “The Biggest Scientific Shock of My Life”

A variety of molecules protrude from the cell surface, including glycoproteins, glycolipids, and the newly discovered glycoRNAs. This illustration depicts RNA as a double-stranded stem and a loop, and the glycan as a Tinkertoy-like structure branching off it. Credit: Emily M. Eng/R. Flynn et al./Cell 2021.

Sugars attach to certain RNA molecules on the outside membrane of the cell. The newly discovered “glycoRNAs” may be involved in immune signaling.

In a surprise find, scientists have discovered sugar-coated RNA molecules decorating the surface of cells.

Sperm help ‘persuade’ the female to accept pregnancy

Conditions like recurrent miscarriage, preeclampsia, preterm birth and stillbirth are affected by the female’s immune response in ways that the partner’s sperm contribute to.


Sperm are generally viewed as having just one action in reproduction—to fertilize the female’s egg—but studies at the University of Adelaide are overturning that view.

Published in Nature Research journal Communications Biology, new research shows that sperm also deliver signals directly to the female reproductive tissues to increase the chances of conception.

Robinson Research Institute’s Professor Sarah Robertson, who led the project, said: This research is the first to show that the female immune response is persuaded by signals in sperm to allow the to fertilize her eggs and conceive a pregnancy.