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Sep 25, 2015
Lab-grown kidneys shown to be fully functional in animal recipients
Posted by Shailesh Prasad in category: biotech/medical
The past few years have been marked by the proliferation of lab-grown organs, including limbs, livers, skin, heart tissue, and yep, even penises. But piecing together an organ, cell-by-cell, in a way that resembles the real thing is only half the challenge — you’ve actually got to make it work as part of several incredibly complex systems in a living, breathing organism. And that’s where most attempts fall flat.
But researchers in Japan have managed to grow fully functioning kidneys in the lab, and when transplanted into pigs and rats, they filtered out urine just like a natural kidney. Built using stem cells that had been extracted and then incubated in the animal recipients, the kidneys point to the possibility of lab-grown kidneys for humans in the future.
Led by Takashi Yokoo from the Jikei University School of Medicine in Tokyo, the team figured out how to overcome a challenge they’d faced previously with these lab-grown kidneys: they were good at processing urine, but instead of passing it into the natural ureter, they ballooned dangerously under the pressure.
Sep 24, 2015
Stephen Hawking speaks with virtually no muscular movement
Posted by Philip Raymond in categories: astronomy, biotech/medical, cosmology, gravity, physics, singularity, space, thought controlled
Next January Stephen Hawking will be 74 years old. He has lived much longer than most individuals with his debilitating condition. In addition to being an unquestionably gifted cosmologist, he has invited controversy by supporting the pro-Palestinian, Israel-BDS boycott and warning about the dangers of alien invaders who tap into our interstellar greetings
Antisemitism, notwithstanding, this man is a mental giant. He is Leonardo. He is Einstein. Like them, his discoveries and theories will echo for generations beyond his life on earth. He is that genius.
Forty years ago, when Stephen Hawking still had mobility, he delivered a paper on a mystery regarding information-loss for entities that cross the event boundary of a black hole.
In the mid 1970s, Astronomers were just discovering black holes and tossing about various theories about the event horizon and its effect on the surrounding space-time. Many individuals still considered black holes to be theoretical. Hawking’s analysis of the information paradox seemed extremely esoteric. Yet, last month (Aug 2015) , at Sweeden’s KTH Royal Institute of Technology, Hawking presented a possible solution to the paradox that he sparked.
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Sep 24, 2015
‘4-D’ printing technology allows self-folding of complex ‘transformer’ objects, using smart shape-memory materials
Posted by Sean Brazell in categories: 4D printing, materials
This image shows the self-folding process of smart shape-memory materials with slightly different responses to heat. Using materials that fold at slightly different rates ensures that the components do not interfere with one another during the process. (credit: Qi Laboratory)
Using components made from smart shape-memory materials (which can return to their original shape) with slightly different responses to heat, researchers have demonstrated a “four-dimensional” printing technology that allows for creating complex, self-folding structures.
The U.S. military is developing a real-life heat ray. CNN’s Thom Patterson explains this non-lethal “active denial system.”
Sep 24, 2015
Nobel Prize Predictions See Honors for Gene Editing Technology
Posted by Aleksandar Vukovic in category: biotech/medical
By Julie Steenhuysen.
(Reuters) — Scientists behind the discovery of a technology called CRISPR-Cas9 that allows researchers to edit virtually any gene they target are among the top contenders for Nobel prizes next month, according to an annual analysis by Thomson Reuters.
The predictions announced on Thursday come from the Intellectual Property & Science unit of Thomson Reuters (which also owns the Reuters news service). Since 2002, it has accurately identified 37 scientists who went on to become Nobel laureates, although not necessarily in the year in which they were named.
Sep 24, 2015
Don’t Worry, Artificial Intelligence Has A Long Way To Go: Baidu Scientist
Posted by Sean Cusack in categories: computing, employment, robotics/AI
Don’t get overly excited about computers and artificial intelligence replacing humans , at least not yet says Andrew Ng, chief scientist at the Chinese search giant Biadu. Computers are still in the “supervised learning” stage where human input is required to connect dots.
Sep 24, 2015
Banks Embrace Bitcoin’s Heart but Not Its Soul — By Tim Simonite | MIT Technology Review
Posted by Odette Bohr Dienel in category: bitcoin
“Major financial institutions like some technical features of Bitcoin but are building their own versions that leave out the digital cash and built-in economics.”
Sep 24, 2015
A colorful and dazzling view of Pluto
Posted by Philip Raymond in categories: astronomy, science, space
[From Engadget]…
While NASA has already shown us Pluto’s best images yet, the administration is anything but done blowing our minds. What you see above is an enhanced high-resolution color view of Pluto, created with a combination of blue, red and infrared images. NASA says this photo, taken by New Horizons spacecraft, highlights Pluto’s diverse landforms and shows us its complex geological and climatological story — as much as scientists have been able to figure out, anyway. Over the past few months, NASA’s shared many things related to Pluto, including a closer look at its desolate surface and icy mountain range.
