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May 4, 2023

FDA approves first vaccine for RSV, a moment six decades in the making

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

After a 60-year scientific quest, the world has its first vaccine to protect against respiratory syncytial virus, or RSV – and more are on the way.

On Wednesday, the US Food and Drug Administration approved Arexvy, made by GSK, which is designed to be given as a single shot to adults 60 and older.

It could be available for seniors as soon as this fall, pending a recommendation for its use from the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention’s Advisory Committee on Immunization Practices, which next meets in June.

May 4, 2023

Plastic pollution fosters more microbial growth in lakes than natural organic matter Communications

Posted by in category: biological

face_with_colon_three 2022 Microbes can now clean up plastics in lakes, streams, and oceans eventually.


Ultra-high resolution mass spectrometry revealed that plastic bags leach labile compounds. Bioassays performed in Scandinavian lakes indicated that these compounds are incorporated into biomass faster and more efficiently than natural organic matter.

May 4, 2023

Mushrooms may ‘talk’ to one another with up to 50 words

Posted by in category: futurism

😗😁


Electrical signals could resemble conversations between fungi.

May 4, 2023

Scholarship and Internship

Posted by in category: futurism

Amazon Future Engineer students can boost their future for themselves and their community with the support of college funding, paid internships, and industry mentors.

May 4, 2023

Deep sleep may mitigate Alzheimer’s memory loss, research shows

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

A deep slumber might help buffer against memory loss for older adults facing a heightened burden of Alzheimer’s disease, new research from the University of California, Berkeley, suggests.

Deep sleep, also known as non-REM , can act as a “cognitive reserve factor” that may increase resilience against a protein in the brain called that is linked to caused by dementia. Disrupted sleep has previously been associated with faster accumulation of beta-amyloid protein in the brain. However, the new research from a team at UC Berkeley reveals that superior amounts of deep, slow-wave sleep can act as a protective factor against decline in those with existing high amounts of Alzheimer’s disease —a potentially significant advance that experts say could help alleviate some of dementia’s most devastating outcomes.

“With a certain level of brain pathology, you’re not destined for cognitive symptoms or memory issues,” said Zsófia Zavecz, a postdoctoral researcher at UC Berkeley’s Center for Human Sleep Science. “People should be aware that, despite having a certain level of pathology, there are certain lifestyle factors that will help moderate and decrease the effects.

May 4, 2023

Medical technology grows quickly in Southwest Florida

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, robotics/AI

SOUTHWEST FLORIDA — Robots are part of everyday life. They build cars, protect us and some even train us.

“Rosie the Riveter” has become “Rosie the Robot.”

But what about a robotic device that scrubs in to the operating room? NBC2 anchor Lisa Spooner found out how metal meets medical.

May 4, 2023

Gene therapy reverses vision loss in primates

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Not just mice anymore. The eyes of primates made young.


A Harvard study found that a new gene therapy that reprograms cells to their younger state can reverse NAION-caused vision loss in primates.

May 4, 2023

AI offers new tools for making games, but developers worry about their jobs

Posted by in categories: entertainment, robotics/AI

The early days of AI in game development have been full of questions and murky answers.

For the most part, AI is exceptionally bad at illustrating hands. They come out six-fingered or four-fingered or, even worse, just some wispy ends that fade into the background. AI has been programming large Western 1940s-era smiles onto people of various cultures. It’s been reshaping images we know and refitting them according to prompts. Depending on the data that it’s fed, though, sometimes AI has solutions, and sometimes it doesn’t. Video game developers and AI companies want to use these AI tools to streamline game development and make it faster.


As major video game publishers like Ubisoft start to utilize AI for their development workflows, developers are beginning to worry about future job prospects.

May 4, 2023

Slack updates aim to put AI at the center of the user experience

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Slack has evolved from a pure communications platform to one that enables companies to link directly to enterprise applications without having to resort to dreaded task switching. Today, at the Salesforce World Tour event in NYC, the company announced the next step in its platform’s evolution where it will be putting AI at the forefront of the user experience, making it easier to get information and build workflows.

It’s important to note that these are announcements, and many of these features are not available yet.

Rob Seaman says that rather than slapping on an AI cover, they are working to incorporate it in a variety of ways across the platform. That started last month with a small step, a partnership with OpenAI to bring a ChatGPT app into Slack, the first piece of a much broader vision for AI on the platform. That part is in beta at the moment.

May 4, 2023

Midjourney 5.1 Arrives — And It’s Another Leap Forward For AI Art

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

Midjourney 5.1 has been released, bringing another significant improvement in the quality of results from the generative AI art service. The company claims that version 5.1 of the engine is “more opinionated”, bringing it closer to the kind of results that you would get with version 4 of Midjourney, but at a higher quality. There’s also a “raw” mode, for those who don’t want images that are as strongly opinionated.

Other claimed improvements include greater accuracy, fewer unwanted borders or text artifacts in images, and improved sharpness.


See how Midjourney 5.1 delivers another huge improvement to the AI art service’s results with our test images.

Continue reading “Midjourney 5.1 Arrives — And It’s Another Leap Forward For AI Art” »