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We believe humanity’s future lays in the stars. Our future home will be different worlds as Government initiatives turn into.
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Smarter thread
Posted in biotech/medical, chemistry, computing, health, mobile phones, nanotechnology
I never get tired in circuitry thread and any new findings.
Tufts University engineers say that revolutionary health diagnostics may be hanging on a thread—one of many threads they have created that integrate nano-scale sensors, electronics and microfluidics into threads ranging from simple cotton to sophisticated synthetics. “We think thread-based devices could potentially be used as smart sutures for surgical implants, smart bandages to monitor wound healing, or integrated with textile or fabric as personalized health monitors and point-of-care diagnostics,” says Sameer Sonkusale, Ph.D., director of the interdisciplinary Nano Lab in the Department of Electrical and Computer Engineering at Tufts School of Engineering, Medford/Somerville, Mass.
Researchers dipped a variety of conductive threads in physical and chemical sensing compounds and connected them to wireless electronic circuitry. The threads, sutured into tissues of rats, collected data on tissue health (pressure, stress, strain and temperature), pH and glucose levels. The data helps determine how wounds are healing, whether infection is emerging or whether the body’s chemistry is out of balance. Thread’s natural wicking properties draw fluids to the sensing compounds. Resulting data is transmitted wirelessly to a cell phone and computer.
To date, substrates for implantable devices have been two-dimensional, expensive and difficult to process, making them suitable for flat tissue, such as skin, but not for organs. “By contrast, thread is abundant, inexpensive, thin and flexible, and can be easily manipulated into complex shapes,” says Pooria Mostafalu, Ph.D., postdoctoral research fellow with the Harvard-MIT Division of Health Sciences and Technology and former Tufts doctoral student.
“Wind power has transformed the heart of fossil-fuel country. Can the rest of the United States follow suit?”
In 2009, Carbon nanotube tethers with a strength of 9 N/Tex [9 million newton meters/kg] is over twice as strong as any fibers ever produced before.
In 2016, Jian Nong Wang and his colleagues made nanotubes with a process akin to glass blowing: Using a stream of nitrogen gas, they injected ethanol, with a small amount of ferrocene and thiophene added as catalysts, into a 50-mm-wide horizontal tube placed in furnace at 1,150–1,130 °C.
They packed the nanotubes even more densely by pressing the film repeatedly between two rollers.
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My new story for TechCrunch on why a new generation of kids might “really” love robots. What would Freud say?
Robots intrigue us. We all like them. But most of us don’t love them. That may dramatically change over the next 10 years as the “robot nanny” makes its way into our households.
In as little time as a decade, affordable robots that can bottle-feed babies, change diapers and put a child to sleep might be here. The human-machine bond that a new generation of kids grows up with may be unbreakable. We may end up literally loving our machines almost like we do our mothers and fathers.
I’ve already seen some of this bonding in action. I have a four-foot interactive Meccanoid robot aboard my Immortality Bus, which I’ve occasionally used for my presidential campaign. The robot can do about 1,000 functions, including basic interaction with people, like talking, answering questions and making wisecracks. When my five-year-old rides with me on the bus, she adores it. After being introduced to it, she obsessively wanted to watch Inspector Gadget videos and read books on robots.
More progress in repairing damage to the cornea which could have implications for aging research as well as for injury.
Media Contacts: Suzanne Day Media Relations, Mass. Eye and Ear 617−573−3897 [email protected]
New findings may pave the way for the development of pharmaceutical therapies to reverse corneal scarring
Boston, Mass. — In cases of severe ocular trauma involving the cornea, wound healing occurs following intervention, but at the cost of opaque scar tissue formation and damaged vision. Recent research has shown that mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) — which can differentiate into a variety of cells, including bone, cartilage, muscle and fat cells — are capable of returning clarity to scarred corneas; however, the mechanisms by which this happens remained a mystery — until now. In a study published online today in Stem Cell Reports, researchers from Schepens Eye Research Institute of Massachusetts Eye and Ear have identified hepatocyte growth factor (HGF), secreted by MSCs, as the key factor responsible for promoting wound healing and reducing inflammation in preclinical models of corneal injury. Their findings suggest that HGF-based treatments may be effective in restoring vision in patients with severely scarred corneas.
In Brief.
Researchers have published a paper demonstrating how they were able to create the first fully programmable and reprogrammable quantum computer in the world. Other quantum computers in existence at the moment can only run one type of operation.
While several other teams and companies, including computer technology giant IBM, are in on the race towards quantum computing, all the quantum computers presented thus far can only run one type of operation—which is ironic, seeing as quantum computers can theoretically run more operations than there are atoms in the universe.
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VR Odor Mask
Posted in virtual reality
