Lifeboat Foundation

Time to get the toothbrush out and brush for longevity!

For decades, research has suggested a link between oral health and inflammatory diseases affecting the entire body — in particular, heart attacks and strokes.

The results released today from a randomized trial of a novel plaque identifying toothpaste, (Plaque HD®), show statistically significant reductions in dental plaque and inflammation throughout the body. Inflammation throughout the body is accurately measured by high sensitivity C-reactive protein (hs-CRP), a sensitive marker for future heart attacks and strokes. These results, published today online ahead of print in the American Journal of Medicine, with an accompanying editorial by the editor-in-chief, show that Plaque HD®, produced statistically significant reductions in dental plaque and inflammation throughout the body as measured by hs-CRP.

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Humanized organs in gene-edited animals is one potential way medicine can deal with the demand for transplant organs.

One potential avenue for research and to help solve the organ shortage is to modify animals to be closer matched to humans in order to have organs capable of being used for transplant. This short paper is an interesting primer into the subject and touches upon the technical and ethical concerns involved here.

It is one possible solution to the problem, however, 3D bioprinting increases in sophistication and other methods are also being developed that would render this approach needless. Still this is an interesting insight into regenerative medicine and one possible path research might take.

#LifespanIO #aging #crowdfundthecure

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This is “10 Years of Technology” by on Vimeo, the home for high quality videos and the people who love them.

By using artificial tendons, motors and sensors for added muscle strength. The Swedish company is partnering with GM-NASA to develop a glove to be used in manufacturing and other industrial applications. Video provided by Reuters.

Athletes with disabilities have been competing in a range of challenges that use assistive technology to overcome day-to-day practical challenges.

Bionic arms, powered exoskeletons, brain-controlled computer interfaces and supercharged wheelchairs all featured at the world’s first Cybathlon, near Zurich, Switzerland.

One of the races saw functional electrical stimulation (FES) used to activate the leg muscles of paralysed competitors to ride bikes.

It’s impressive enough that our human brains are made up of the same ‘star stuff’ that forms the Universe, but new research suggests that this might not be the only thing the two have in common.

Just like the Universe, our brains might be programmed to maximise disorder — similar to the principle of entropy — and our consciousness could simply be a side effect.

The quest to understand human consciousness — our ability to be aware of ourselves and our surroundings — has been going on for centuries. Although consciousness is a crucial part of being human, researchers still don’t truly understand where it comes from, and why we have it.

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Heading to Russia anytime soon? Well, that cell tower that you see in Russia may actually be a missile jammer.

Missile jammers aren’t exactly new as far as technology is concerned, but Russia’s implementation of it might. According to a report from Motherboard, it seems that over in Russia, the government is apparently considering stepping up their military defense by equipping civilian cellphone towers with missile jammers.

According to a Russian Defense Ministry spokesman who spoke to the Izvestiya newspaper, “At the present time, the tests of the item have been completed and the system has been accepted into the inventory.” Dubbed Pole-21, these missile jammers can be mounted onto cellphone towers and given the spread of cellphone towers, the end result could be a dome-like defense system that can cover entire regions and protect it from satellite navigation signals.

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It seems that biofeedback is a thing of future. By having brain activity feedback, you can train meditation, attention, improve sleep, control gadgets, artificial limbs, carts for impaired, and even computer I/O. Everything starts with proper biosensor and controller. Biological signals are very low voltage – microvolts. In order to distinguish them from noisy environment, a precision electronics is required. Brain activity signals are somewhat different from myograms or ECG, they can be analyzed as power spectrum that represent brain activity phases like Alpha, Beta, Theta. There has be a numerous modules developed to acquire brain signals. If you want low to develop sensors by yourself, you could grab a Neurosky platform which is a small size PCB with sensor and microcontroller interfaces.

With it you can read raw EEG signals with sampling 512Hz and do with them what you want. USART interface enables you to connect it yo Arduino or Raspberry Pi where you can calculate all sort of things and extract control signals. Of course you can read processed power spectrum as well to detect activities like attention, meditation and other activities. Eye blink detection is also an option. Great thing is that you can use this module to read ECG activity as well. Module incorporates AC noise filter which can be configured for 50HZ or 60Hz.

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