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Using a series of more than 1,000 X-ray snapshots of the shapeshifting of enzymes in action, researchers at Stanford University have illuminated one of the great mysteries of life—how enzymes are able to speed up life-sustaining biochemical reactions so dramatically. Their findings could impact fields ranging from basic science to drug discovery, and provoke a rethinking of how science is taught in the classroom.
“When I say enzymes speed up reactions, I mean as in a trillion-trillion times faster for some reactions,” noted senior author of the study, Dan Herschlag, professor of biochemistry in the School of Medicine. “Enzymes are really remarkable little machines, but our understanding of exactly how they work has been lacking.”
There are lots of ideas and theories that make sense, Herschlag said, but biochemists have not been able to translate those ideas into a specific understanding of the chemical and physical interactions responsible for enzymes’ enormous reaction rates. As a result, biochemists don’t have a basic understanding and, therefore, have been unable to predict enzyme rates or design new enzymes as well as nature does, an ability that would be impactful across industry and medicine.
The words “optimal” and “optimize” derive from the Latin “optimus,” or “best,” as in “make the best of things.” Alessio Figalli, a mathematician at the university ETH Zurich, studies optimal transport: the most efficient allocation of starting points to end points. The scope of investigation is wide, including clouds, crystals, bubbles and chatbots.
Dr. Figalli, who was awarded the Fields Medal in math that is motivated by concrete problems found in nature. He also likes the discipline’s “sense of eternity,” he said in a recent interview. “It is something that will be here forever.” (Nothing is forever, he conceded, but math will be around for “long enough.”) “I like the fact that if you prove a theorem, you prove it,” he said. “There’s no ambiguity, it’s true or false. In a hundred years, you can rely on it, no matter what.”
The study of optimal transport was introduced almost 250 years ago by Gaspard Monge, a French mathematician and politician who was motivated by problems in military engineering. His ideas found broader application solving logistical problems during the Napoleonic Era — for instance, identifying the most efficient way to build fortifications, in order to minimize the costs of transporting materials across Europe.
A team of microbiologists, chemists and pharmaceutical specialists at Shandong University, Guangzhou Medical University, Second Military Medical University and Qingdao University, all in China, has developed an AI model that generates antimicrobial peptide structures for screening against treatment-resistant microbes.
In their study published in the journal Science Advances, the group developed a compression method to reduce the number of elements needed in training data for an AI system, which helped to reduce diversification issues with current AI models.
Prior research has suggested that drug-resistant microbes are one of the most pressing problems in medical science. Researchers around the world have been looking for new ways to treat people infected with such microbes—one approach involves developing antimicrobial peptides, which work by targeting bacterial membranes.
GPT-4.5 will arrive in “weeks,” then GPT-5 will meld conventional LLMs and reasoning models.
A cafe in Finland has created an AI-coffee blend. From bean selection to packaging design, watch this report to see how the future of coffee is brewing.
#techitout #technology #tech.
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Related: Firefly’s Blue Ghost lunar lander leaves Earth orbit to head for the moon
Blue Ghost launched Jan. 15 atop a SpaceX Falcon 9 rocket. The lander’s mission, called “Ghost Riders in the Sky,” is part of NASA’s Commercial Lunar Payload Services (CLPS) program. Blue Ghost is carrying 10 science and technology experiments for the agency, which wants to better understand the lunar environment before sending astronauts back to the moon via its Artemis program.
Blue Ghost will spend the next 16 days in lunar orbit, if all goes to plan. It will conduct additional engine burns to circularize its path around Earth’s nearest neighbor, then attempt a landing in the Mare Crisium (“Sea of Crises”) region of the moon’s near side on March 2.
A groundbreaking study reveals that Alpha Centauri’s particles are already making their way into our solar system, traveling across the cosmic highway that connects star systems. These particles, ejected from the nearest stellar neighbor to Earth, could be carrying valuable insights about distant worlds and the forces that shape our galaxy.
A new way of creating hydrogen, which eliminates direct CO2 emissions at source, has been developed by an international team of scientists.
The process reacts hydrogen-rich and sustainably sourced bioethanol taken from agricultural waste with water at just 270°C using a new bimetallic catalyst. Unlike traditional methods, which operate between 400°C and 600°C, are energy-intensive and generate large amounts of CO2, the catalyst shifts the chemical reaction to create hydrogen without releasing carbon dioxide as a byproduct.
Instead, the process co-produces high-value acetic acid, an organic liquid used in food preservation, household cleaning products, manufacturing and medicine, and has an annual global consumption exceeding 15 million tons.
Pandora will lift off atop a Falcon 9 rocket no earlier than this fall, according to NASA officials.
Pandora will head to low Earth orbit. Once there, the satellite will observe at least 20 known transiting exoplanets — worlds that cross the face of their parent star from the telescope’s perspective. It will observe these planets 10 separate times, staring at them for 24 hours on each occasion.