Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: health – Page 6

Shall we Dance in Free-Space? a Choice of Freedom!

Humanity stands at a crossroads. Our beautiful Earth, cradle of all we know, is straining under the weight of nearly 8.5 billion people. Environmental degradation, social inequity, and resource scarcity deepen by the day. We are reaching the limits of a single-planet civilization. We can face this challenge in two ways. Some will cling to the old patterns—fighting over dwindling resources and defending narrow borders. Others will rise above, expanding into space not to escape Earth, but to renew and sustain it. These pioneers—the Space Settlers —will carry the next chapter of civilization beyond our home planet.

The Humanist Path: Living in Free Space. When people imagine living beyond Earth, they often picture Lunar or Martian colonies. Yet, from a humanist perspective, a better path exists: rotating free space habitats, as envisioned by Gerard K. O’Neill. These are vast, spinning structures orbiting Earth or the Moon, or standing at Lagrange Libration Points, designed to simulate Earth’s gravity and sustain full, flourishing communities. Unlike planetary colonies bound to weak gravity, dust, or darkness, O’Neill habitats offer: 1g simulated gravity to preserve human health; continuous sunlight and abundant solar energy; freedom of movement, as habitats can orbit safely or relocate if needed. More than technical achievements, these habitats embody the Enlightenment spirit—the belief that reason, ethics, and creativity can design environments of dignity, beauty, and freedom.

Freedom and Human Dignity in Space. Freedom is at the heart of humanity’s destiny. Consider a lunar settler who finds his bones too fragile to withstand Earth’s gravity—trapped by biology, after a few years living on the Moon. In contrast, inhabitants of a rotating habitat retain the freedom to return on Earth, at will. Simulated gravity safeguards their health, ensuring that space settlement remains reversible and voluntary. Freedom of movement leads naturally to freedom of culture. In a habitat like “New Gaia”, thousands of people from all nations live together: Russians celebrating Maslenitsa, Indians lighting Diwali lamps, and space-born storytellers sharing ancient myths. New traditions also emerge—festivals, music, and art inspired by life between worlds. These habitats can become beacons of a new Renaissance —a rebirth of cultural and creative freedom beyond the constraints of geography and politics.

Global lead exposure still costs trillions and endangers children, study finds

Lead poisoning was once thought to largely be a problem of the past, as the globe gradually weaned itself off leaded gasoline in road vehicles in 2021. But has global lead pollution truly been resolved?

A new study led by Dr. Chen Mengli, a Research Fellow from the Tropical Marine Science Institute at the National University of Singapore (NUS), in collaboration with researchers from Imperial College London, University of Warwick, University of Oxford, Jadavpur University, University of Michigan, Ann Arbor, Hebrew University of Jerusalem, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, and University of Bristol, showed the answer is not yet: Lead exposure remains a pressing public health and economic challenge in the 21st century.

The researchers estimated that ongoing childhood lead exposure costs the world more than US$3.4 trillion in lost economic potential each year, with disproportionate impacts on low-and middle-income countries.

The Role of Artificial Intelligence in Early Cancer Diagnosis

Diagnosing cancer at an early stage increases the chance of performing effective treatment in many tumour groups. Key approaches include screening patients who are at risk but have no symptoms, and rapidly and appropriately investigating those who do. Machine learning, whereby computers learn complex data patterns to make predictions, has the potential to revolutionise early cancer diagnosis. Here, we provide an overview of how such algorithms can assist doctors through analyses of routine health records, medical images, biopsy samples and blood tests to improve risk stratification and early diagnosis. Such tools will be increasingly utilised in the coming years.

Scientists Discover Food Molecules That Trick Cells Into Staying Young

Researchers at the University of Basel in Switzerland have discovered that certain nutrients in food can cause a mild stress reaction in nematodes. Surprisingly, rather than harming the organisms, this slight stress appears to boost their overall health and help them maintain vitality as they grow o

Genetically encoded biosensor tracks plants’ immune hormone in real time

From willow bark remedies to aspirin tablets, salicylic acid has long been part of human health. It also lies at the heart of how plants fight disease. Now, researchers at the University of Cambridge have developed a pioneering biosensor that allows scientists to watch, for the first time, how plants deploy this critical immune hormone in their battle against pathogens.

Published in Science, Dr. Alexander Jones’s group at the Sainsbury Laboratory, Cambridge University (SLCU) presents SalicS1, a genetically encoded biosensor that can detect and track the dynamics of the plant immune hormone (SA) with exquisite precision inside living plants.

Salicylic acid is a central regulator of plant immunity, triggering defense responses against a huge diversity of invaders. Until now, however, scientists have lacked the tools to measure SA at high enough spatial and to understand how plants balance growth with immune defense.

Research highlights solutions to critical gaps in dementia and childhood cancer care

In the United States, significant numbers of adults with dementia require long-term care services. For example, around 750,000 people who live in nursing homes have a diagnosis of dementia. However, transportation insecurity for this population has not received sufficient attention. Although long-term care facilities provide basic medical services, residents with dementia often need external, preventative, and follow-up care such as specialist visits, diagnostics, and dental or vision services. Without reliable nonemergency medical transportation, these needs may go unmet.

To demonstrate the extent of this problem, Postdoctoral Research Scientist Soojeong Han, Ph.D., and her colleagues reviewed existing literature on non-emergency medical for individuals with living in long-term care (LTC) facilities. The study, “Transportation Services in Society for Individuals Living With Dementia in Long-Term Care Facilities: A Scoping Review,” was published in the Journal of the American Medical Directors Association.

Their review found only five publications that mentioned this topic, and even then, only briefly. Across these studies, caregivers, health care professionals, and people with dementia consistently described nonemergency medical transportation as a critical need. Reported barriers included financial strain, rural-urban disparities, lack of continuity among transportation vendors, and dementia-specific challenges such as , stigma, and the need for caregiver accompaniment.

Our Future in Imaging Comes Into Focus

Pushing the bounds of imaging isn’t new for the San Francisco Biohub and Imaging Institute. Both organizations have already taken down barriers to research by building imaging tools that don’t exist anywhere else, as well as creating pioneering cell atlases that have redefined how we understand health and disease.

One example is the San Francisco Biohub’s research on how zebrafish embryos develop over time. In order to capture video images of whole zebrafish embryos through various developmental stages, Biohub scientists built a custom microscope, along with novel software that can find and track the movement of each cell in the videos. The “Google Earth” of embryology resulting from this research is Zebrahub, which brings a new vision to developmental biology and helps us understand our own cellular origins.

Projects like Zebrahub require scientists from a host of different disciplines. Teams across the Biohub, along with interdisciplinary partners, worked to build the microscope, develop the cell tracking software and interpret the resulting images. The collaborative nature of this project isn’t unique to our research on zebrafish — it’s part of our philosophy, and we believe collaboration is critical to drive scientific advancement in all of our work.

Bird flu persists in raw milk cheese, study demonstrates

Raw milk cheese products contained infectious avian influenza virus when made with contaminated raw milk, creating potential health risks for consumers, according to a new study.

At the same time, no virus was detected in test samples of highly acidic raw milk cheese. Feta cheese is an example of a more acidic variety.

The study is published in Nature Medicine.

Scientists are collecting toenail clippings to reveal radon exposure and lung cancer risk

At 47 years of age, Emi Bossio was feeling good about where she was. She had a successful law practice, two growing children and good health. Then she developed a nagging cough. The diagnosis to come would take her breath away.

“I never smoked, never. I ate nutritiously and stayed fit. I thought to myself, I can’t have lung cancer,” says Bossio. “It was super shocking. A cataclysmic moment. There are no words to describe it.”

Bossio had to give up her law practice to focus on treatment and healing. As part of that journey, she’s taken on a new role as an advocate to increase awareness about lung cancer. She still has no idea what caused her lung cancer. Trying to answer that question is how Bossio became interested in the research Dr. Aaron Goodarzi, Ph.D., is doing at the University of Calgary.

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