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Mar 30, 2023

Minnesota train carrying ethanol derailed, caught fire; evacuations ordered

Posted by in categories: materials, transportation

BNSF said about 22 rail cars carrying mixed freight, including ethanol and corn syrup, derailed at 1:02 a.m. local time Thursday. Four rail cars caught fire, the BNSF said. There are no other hazardous materials on the train and no injuries were reported, the company said.

“BNSF personnel are responding to assess the derailment site and will be working closely with local first responders,” company spokesperson Lena Kent said in a statement.

Mar 30, 2023

Astronomers Just Discovered a ‘Supermassive’ Black Hole. ‘Hard to Comprehend How Big This Thing Is.’

Posted by in category: cosmology

Scientists at Durham University say the black hole is 30 billion times the size of the sun.

Mar 30, 2023

AI can replicate voices in high-tech phone call scams, FTC warns

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

The FTC is sounding the alarm on artificial intelligence being used to simulate someone’s voice in imposter scams, which was the most commonly reported fraud in 2022. NBC News’ Emilie Ikeda spoke to one father who got a call that sounded like his daughter and said she was being held hostage.

Mar 30, 2023

Scientists identify cellular signaling pathway as key player in metastasis

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

A team of scientists at the Sloan Kettering Institute have identified the STING cellular signaling pathway as a key player in keeping dormant cancer cells from progressing into aggressive tumors months, or even years, after they’ve escaped from a primary tumor.

The findings, which were published in Nature on March 29, suggest that drugs to activate STING could help prevent the spread of cancer to new sites throughout the body—a process known as metastasis.

In mouse models of lung cancer, treatment that stimulated the STING pathway helped eliminate lingering cancer cells and prevent them from progressing to aggressive metastases. Known as micrometastases, these cells, which can be found individually and in , are too small to be detected with standard imaging tests.

Mar 30, 2023

The Xaver 1000 is a next-gen radar that can actually ‘see’ through walls

Posted by in category: energy

Camero-Tech, a firm based in Israel, has created a next-generation portable, high-performance imaging device that can actually “see” through walls. Called the Xaver 1,000, according to a press release from Camero-Tech, the company has now officially added this next-generation of the company’s product line.

Camero-Tech is a member of Samy Katsav Group (aka SK Group), and a world leader and pioneer in developing, producing, and marketing pulse-based UWB micro-power radar, like the Xaver 1000.

Mar 30, 2023

Transplantation of clinical-grade human neural stem cells reduces neuroinflammation, prolongs survival and delays disease progression in the SOD1 rats

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, cryonics, life extension, neuroscience

The hNSCs used in the study have been produced and characterised in the Cell Factory and Biobank of Santa Maria Hospital (Terni, Italy), authorised by the Italian Medicine Agency (AIFA) for the production of hNSCs to be used for clinical trials (aM 54/2018). The methodology applied to isolate, expand, characterise and cryopreserve the lines is based on the Neurosphere Assay26,41,54, and has been used for the production of the cells utilised in phase I trials for Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis patients (NCT0164006723) and for Secondary Progressive Multiple Sclerosis patients (NCT03282760, ongoing).

The entire production process, starting from tissue procurement to cryopreservation is compliant to cGMP guidelines and approved by AIFA. The hNSCs are obtained from foetal brain tissue derived from fetuses that underwent miscarriage or natural in utero death upon receiving the signed informed consent from the mother. Forty-eight hours prior to implantation, hNSCs were plated in the growth medium at a concentration of 10,000 cells/cm2. On the day of surgery, hNSCs were collected by centrifugation, viable cells were counted by Trypan blue exclusion criteria, and the correct number of cells were re-suspended in HBSS for the transplant.

SOD1 transgenic male rats were randomly divided into three experimental groups: (i) transplanted with hNSCs (hNSC rats, n = 15); (ii) treated with HBSS (HBSS rats, n = 15) and (iii) untreated (CTRL rats, n = 22). An additional group of non-transgenic littermates (wild-type, WT, n = 9) were used as controls for symptomatic evaluation of the colony. Tacrolimus (FK506) and cyclosporine (cyclosporin A) are the principal immunosuppressive drugs that have been applied for solid organ transplantation55,56 and have been translated to stem cell treatments for PD57 and ALS22. In animal models, despite differences in potency, both drugs showed excellent survival rates for grafts across many comparative studies58,59. Our previous results44,45 showed that hNSCs can survive—without signs of rejection—in the rat brain up to 6 months under transient immunosuppression treatment, with cyclosporin A. On the bases of these results, we applied the same immunosuppressive treatment with administration of cyclosporine A (15 mg/kg/day subcutaneous; Sandimmne, Novartis) that was initiated on the day of transplantation and continued for 15 days after surgery (for all animal groups).

Mar 30, 2023

Quantum on a Microgram Scale

Posted by in categories: particle physics, quantum physics

An experiment with an acoustic resonator demonstrates the quantum superposition of atoms—nearly matching the ability of matter interferometers to test quantumness on macroscopic scales.

Mar 30, 2023

We’re nowhere near reaching the maximum human life span, controversial study suggests

Posted by in category: life extension

Human longevity records may be broken in the next few decades, a new modeling study suggests.

Mar 30, 2023

Research confirms a big cause of Alzheimer’s disease

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Alzheimer’s disease is a very common illness that affects older people worldwide, and it is one of the main causes of dementia. Researchers have been working for more than twenty years to find out what causes Alzheimer’s, but they have not yet discovered the exact reason, and there is no cure for the disease.

Mar 30, 2023

College Students Are About to Put a Robot on the Moon Before NASA

Posted by in categories: robotics/AI, space travel

A commercial spaceflight in May will take a Carnegie Mellon-designed rover, named Iris, to the lunar surface.