The dream of having robots do household chores inched a little closer to reality last week.
Figure, an OpenAI-backed robotics artificial intelligence (AI) startup, showed off humanoid robots that can understand voice commands and can grab objects they had never seen before.
In a Figure video, a guy holding a bag of groceries starts unloading eggs, apple, ketchup, cheese, cookies and other items on a counter.
Mars – dusty, dry, and desert-clad – was once so rich in water it had not just lakes, but oceans, according to a new study.
Observations using ground-penetrating radar have revealed underground features consistent with beaches on the red planet, 4 billion years ago. It’s some of the best evidence to date that Mars was once so soggy as to host a northern sea.
The research team has named that sea Deuteronilus.
Smart bullets are real—and they might already be in use. From DARPA’s EXACTO to Russia’s secretive programs, guided bullets have come a long way since The Fifth Element. Here’s what we know.
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A groundbreaking cancer ‘vaccine’ developed by a Yale University scientist has reversed the disease in nine patients.
All patients enrolled in the study between March 2019 and September 2021 were free from kidney cancer at the three-year follow-up in July 2023, marking a major milestone.
The type of kidney cancer they had — stages three and four clear cell renal cell carcinoma (ccRCC) — kills between 85 and 90 percent of patents.
Have you ever questioned the deep nature of time? While some physicists argue that time is just an illusion, dismissing it outright contradicts our lived experience. In my latest work, Temporal Mechanics: D-Theory as a Critical Upgrade to Our Understanding of the Nature of Time (2025), I explore how time is deeply rooted in the computational nature of reality and information processing by conscious systems. This paper tackles why the “now” is all we have.
In the absence of observers, the cosmic arrow of time doesn’t exist. This statement is not merely philosophical; it is a profound implication of the problem of time in physics. In standard quantum mechanics, time is an external parameter, a backdrop against which events unfold. However, in quantum gravity and the Wheeler-DeWitt equation, the problem of time emerges because there is no preferred universal time variable—only a timeless wavefunction of the universe. The flow of time, as we experience it, arises not from any fundamental law but from the interaction between observers and the informational structure of reality.
Dr. Douglas Colquhoun: “Inhaled anesthetics are a natural area to pursue reductions in emissions because, as greenhouse gases, they are so disproportionately bad for the environment.”
How can greener anesthesia help both patients and the environment? This is what a recent study published in The Lancer Planetary Health hopes to address as a team of researchers at the University of Michigan (U-M) Medical School investigated a multitude of benefits regarding the use of anesthesia free of pollutants and greenhouse gases, which they are traditionally known to contain. This study has the potential to help researchers, medical professionals, legislators, and the public better understand the benefits of providing patients with “greener” anesthesia, along with the environmental benefits, as well.
For the study, the researchers started the Green Anesthesia Initiative (GAIA) in March 2022 to monitor the use of pollutant-free—such as nitrous oxide—anesthesia aged 1 year and older between March 1, 2021, and February 28, 2023. The goal of GAIA was to ascertain patient health and environmental impact resulting from this new anesthetic treatment. In the end, the researchers monitored 45,692 patients (50.8 percent women and 49.2 percent men) before GAIA and 47,199 patients (also 50.8 percent women and 49.2 percent men) after GAIA, with results showing a 14.38 kilograms (31.7 pounds) per patient reduction in carbon dioxide emissions.
“Tens of thousands of people undergo general anesthesia at Michigan Medicine every year,” said Dr. Douglas Colquhoun, who is an assistant professor of anesthesiology at U-M Medical School and lead author of the study. “Inhaled anesthetics are a natural area to pursue reductions in emissions because, as greenhouse gases, they are so disproportionately bad for the environment. We’ve shown that small changes in our practice lead to big changes for the environment and, importantly, no changes for the patients.”
Exosomes are small vesicles with diameters ranging from 30 to 150 nm. They originate from cellular endocytic systems. These vesicles contain a rich payload of biomolecules, including proteins, nucleic acids, lipids, and metabolic products. Exosomes mediate intercellular communication and are key regulators of a diverse array of biological processes, such as oxidative stress and chronic inflammation. Furthermore, exosomes have been implicated in the pathogenesis of infectious diseases, autoimmune disorders, and cancer. Aging is closely associated with the onset and progression of numerous diseases and is significantly influenced by exosomes. Recent studies have consistently highlighted the important functions of exosomes in the regulation of cellular senescence.
Working in the field of genetics is a bizarre experience. No one seems to be interested in the most interesting applications of their research.
We’ve spent the better part of the last two decades unravelling exactly how the human genome works and which specific letter changes in our DNA affect things like diabetes risk or college graduation rates. Our knowledge has advanced to the point where, if we had a safe and reliable means of modifying genes in embryos, we could literally create superbabies. Children that would live multiple decades longer than their non-engineered peers, have the raw intellectual horsepower to do Nobel prize worthy scientific research, and very rarely suffer from depression or other mental health disorders.
The scientific establishment, however, seems to not have gotten the memo. If you suggest we engineer the genes of future generations to make their lives better, they will often make some frightened noises, mention “ethical issues” without ever clarifying what they mean, or abruptly change the subject. It’s as if humanity invented electricity and decided the only interesting thing to do with it was make washing machines.
Pancreatic cancer is closely linked to the nervous system, according to researchers from the German Cancer Research Center (DKFZ) and the Heidelberg Institute for Stem Cell Technology and Experimental Medicine (HI-STEM). Their recent study, published in Nature, reveals that pancreatic tumors actively reprogram neurons to support their growth.
