Lifeboat Foundation

The physicist Asimina Arvanitaki is thinking up ways to search gravitational wave data for evidence of dark matter particles orbiting black holes.

Volcanic super-eruptions are bad. Like really bad. Scientists warn of such a potentially civilization-ending catastrophe in our future, but as a new study shows, we’ll only have a year to prepare once the signs of an impending eruption become visible.

A new microscopic analysis of quartz crystals taken from the site of a massive volcanic eruption that occurred 760,000 years ago in eastern California suggests we’ll only have about a year’s worth of advance warning before a devastating super-eruption. In a paper published in PLOS ONE, Guilherme Gualda from Vanderbilt University and Stephen Sutton from the University of Chicago show that super-eruptions don’t require much time to blow their tops, even though they’re tens of thousands of years in the making.

I wonder, if NASA and/or SpaceX goes to Mars in the 2030’s as planned, by the time the 2050’s roll around a manned attempt to Ceres or Jupiter trojans might be attempted or perhaps an unmanned vehicle made on Mars beats this sail.

Japan’s space agency has its sights on unexplored asteroids as far away as Jupiter, a project that at one level draws on centuries of sail science.

Continue reading “Huge sail will power JAXA mission to Trojan asteroids and back” »

I do love biometrics for security; however, many know that we will not only leverage biometrics alone for certifying identification given how easy it is for folks to retrieve others DNA information, etc. from commercial DNA sites, etc.

In the world of security, there are many tools at the IT Staff’s disposal which can be used to fight Cybercrimes of all types and levels. Regarding Physical Access Entry, Smart Cards and FOB’s are available to help alleviate the probability of a Social Engineering attack. Regarding Logical Access Entry, Network Intrusion Devices, Firewalls, Routers, etc. are also all ready to be installed and used.

But, there is one problem with all of these tools above: To some degree or another, all of them can be hijacked, stolen, or even spoofed so that a real Cyber hacker can find their way into a corporation very quickly and easily. For instance, a Smart Card can be easily lost or stolen; or even malformed data packets can be sent to a router and tricking it that it is a legitimate employee trying to gain access.

Continue reading “BioCryptography and Biometric Penetration Testing” »

Dirty water has a use.

New technology doesn’t always look great, but researchers at Binghamton University are aiming to prove that function and style don’t have to be at odds with a new bacteria-powered battery that takes its design cues from origami.

Seokheun “Sean” Choi, an assistant professor of computer and electrical engineering at Binghamton, and two of his students recently published in the journal Biosensors and Bioelectronics a report on their invention of a microbial fuel cell that runs on nothing more than the bacteria found in just a few drops of dirty water.

Continue reading “This tiny foldable battery is powered by dirty water” »

Engineers have programmed cells to remember and respond to events. This approach to circuit design enables scientists to create complex cellular state machines and track cell histories.

Like Botox; another bacteria found a new usage in healthcare.

Researchers at MIT and the University of California at San Diego (UCSD) have recruited some new soldiers in the fight against cancer—bacteria.

In a study appearing in the July 20 of Nature, the scientists programmed harmless strains of bacteria to deliver toxic payloads. When deployed together with a traditional cancer drug, the bacteria shrank aggressive liver tumors in mice much more effectively than either treatment alone.

Continue reading “Engineers program E. coli to destroy tumor cells” »

Bacteria improving technology.

New research shows how adding memory to bacterial circuits could help us harness their computing power.

Wanted to share because I found this extremely interesting in what we’re discovery on implants and cells. I predict we are going to find out that in the next 7 to 10 years that we had some key things wrong as well as learned some new amazing things about cells especially with the synthetic cell & cell circuitry work that is happening for bio computing.

By Bikramjit Basu & his group Indian Institute of Science, Bangalore

For a variety of medical treatments these days, artificial, synthetic materials are inserted into the human body. Common examples include treatment for artery blockage and orthopaedic surgeries, like hip and knee replacements. Human bodies are not very receptive to foreign objects; most synthetic materials are rejected by the body. The choice of material that can be inserted, therefore, has to be very specific.

Continue reading “From the lab: Better biomaterials for medical implants” »