Listen to this episode from Mind Chat on Spotify. Keith and Philip interview David Papineau (Professor of Philosophy at King’s College London) about his recent book ‘The Metaphysics of Sensory Experience’. David is also a materialist who believes in consciousness, so there’ll probably be a big old fight about that too. Link to David’s book: https://global.oup.com/academic/product/the-metaphysics-of-s…b&lang=en&
NASA has developed a gravity-defying drive that achieves 1G thrust without propellant, potentially revolutionizing space propulsion technology Questions to inspire discussion What is the NASA gravity-defying drive? —The NASA gravity-defying drive is a propulsion system that achieves 1G thrust without the need for propellant, potentially revolutionizing space propulsion technology.
Harvanek ZM, Fogelman N, Xu K, Sinha R. Psychological and biological resilience modulates the effects of stress on epigenetic aging. Transl Psychiatry. 2021;11:1–9.
Scientists have discovered that CAR T cells, traditionally used in cancer treatment, can be engineered to fight aging by eliminating senescent cells, offering a promising single-dose, lifelong treatment against aging-related diseases.
The fountain of youth has eluded explorers for ages. It turns out the magic anti-aging elixir might have been inside us all along.
Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) Assistant Professor Corina Amor Vegas and colleagues have discovered that T cells can be reprogrammed to fight aging, so to speak. Given the right set of genetic modifications, these white blood cells can attack another group of cells known as senescent cells. These cells are thought to be responsible for many of the diseases we grapple with later in life.
IceCure Medical, an Israeli company that developed a way to freeze and destroy tumors (cryoablation) as alternative to surgery, says an interim analysis of its current kidney cancer trial shows the platform is a safe and effective treatment for malignant renal tumors, with 89.5 percent recurrence-free rate.
The data from the analysis for the trial of the ProSense platform was presented at the Annual Israeli Conference on Interventional Radiology in Tel Aviv on June 10.
Cryoablation is not a new process, but IceCure’s system allows physicians to perform the procedure at their own office, with no need for hospitalization. It also uses liquid nitrogen instead of a mixture of argon and helium gasses, which is cheaper, can be frozen faster, and is easier to maintain at sub-zero temperatures, shortening the treatment time.
Physicists at the University of Vienna have experimentally measured the rotation rate of our planet using maximally path-entangled quantum states of light in a large-scale interferometer.
Posted in entertainment, space travel
Grapene’s unusually high conductivity and favorable mechanical properties could further the development of flexible electronics, new batteries, and innovative composite materials for aeronautics and space flight. However, the development of elastic and tough films remains a challenge.
In the journal Angewandte Chemie (“A Stretchable and Tough Graphene Film Enabled by Mechanical Bond”), a research team has now introduced a method to overcome this hurdle: they linked graphene nanolayers via “extendable” bridging structures.
Cartoon representations of the fabrication process of RBG films and toughening mechanism of mechanical bond. Upon applied force, the hidden chain of [2]rotaxane was released due to intramolecular motion, resulting in an increased interlayer slip distance. It follows that the mechanical performance of RBG films were improved when mechanical bond was introduced.
Stored as heat in a bath of molten material, extra energy could be tapped when needed.
Delicious.
Science publisher Springer Nature has developed two new AI tools to detect fake research and duplicate images in scientific papers, helping to protect the integrity of published studies.
The growing number of cases of fake research is already putting a strain on the scientific publishing industry, according to Springer Nature. Following a pilot phase, the publisher is now rolling out two AI tools to identify papers with AI-generated fake content and problematic images — both red flags for research integrity issues.
The first tool, called “Geppetto,” detects AI-generated content, a telltale sign of “paper mills” producing fake research papers. The tool divides the paper into sections and uses its own algorithms to check the consistency of the text in each section.
Scientists from the Berlin Institute of Health at Charité (BIH) and Open Targets together with colleagues from the University of Cambridge, and Addenbrooke’s Hospital in Cambridge, U.K., uncovered mechanisms driving regeneration of the liver during chronic liver disease. This regenerative process allows the liver to repair itself when chronically injured but could also result in progression toward cancer.
The researchers were able to demonstrate this first by performing single-cell analyses on many biopsies obtained from patients with progressive metabolic dysfunction-associated steatotic liver disease (MASLD).
The results obtained in vivo were validated using cultured organoids in the laboratory. The scientists have now published their results in the journal Nature.
