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Jun 3, 2021

Chinese fusion reactor sets world record

Posted by in categories: nuclear energy, physics, sustainability

China has announced a milestone in the development of clean, sustainable energy by setting a new world record for the longest duration of temperatures needed for fusion to occur.

The Experimental Advanced Superconducting Tokamak (EAST) located in Hefei, Anhui Province, is the successor to HT-7, China’s first superconducting tokamak, which retired in 2013. The Hefei Institutes of Physical Science (HIPS) is conducting the experiment for the Chinese Academy of Sciences (CAS).

Professor Gong Xianzu, a researcher at the CAS Institute of Plasma Physics (IPP) who is leading the project, announced the breakthrough. The reactor achieved not one but two milestones. Firstly it reached a plasma temperature of 120 million degrees Celsius for 101 seconds. This is 20% hotter and five times longer than last year, when EAST managed 100 million degrees Celsius for 20 seconds. Secondly, it reached an even higher peak temperature of 160 million degrees Celsius, lasting for 20 seconds.

Jun 3, 2021

New NASA Missions Will Study Venus, a World Overlooked for Decades

Posted by in categories: biological, space

One of the spacecraft will probe the hellish planet’s clouds, which could potentially help settle the debate over whether they are habitable by floating microbes.

Jun 3, 2021

Researchers: Culture drives human evolution more than genetics

Posted by in categories: biological, evolution, genetics

PROCEEDINGS OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY • JUN 3, 2021
Culture drives human evolution more than genetics

I wonder about the thought that only humans do this, and perhaps that somehow culture is separate in some way from biological evolution enmeshed with the rest of the planet?
by University of Maine

Culture is an under-appreciated factor in human evolution, Waring says. Like genes, culture helps people adjust to their environment and meet the challenges of survival and reproduction. Culture, however, does so more effectively than genes because the transfer of knowledge is faster and more flexible than the inheritance of genes, according to Waring and Wood.

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Jun 3, 2021

Neuralink Brain Chip Will End Language in Five to 10 Years, Elon Musk Says

Posted by in categories: computing, Elon Musk, neuroscience

In a recent interview, Elon Musk stated that the human language could possibly end within five to ten years. The CEO of Neuralink went to talk with Joe Rogan, implying that with the innovation of the brain chip the company is currently developing, humans won’t have to speak anymore using traditional languages.


Neuralink develops a chip that will soon be able to attach to the human brain. The chip’s invention aimed to communicate faster and conveniently. Through a single universal language, Elon Musk believes that the way we talk today will soon improve. The brain chip is expected to be completed to be developed within a few years, and by then, our communication could possibly evolve.

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Jun 3, 2021

A programmable fiber contains memory, temperature sensors, and a trained neural network program

Posted by in category: robotics/AI

MIT researchers have created the first fiber with digital capabilities, able to sense, store, analyze, and infer activity after being sewn into a shirt.

Jun 3, 2021

Jeff Bezos to step down as Amazon’s CEO in July

Posted by in category: economics

Amazon founder Jeff Bezos is officially stepping down from his role as the company’s CEO on July 5. CBSN tech reporter Dan Patterson joins CBSN to discuss the billionaire’s impact on the U.S. economy, politics and more.

CBSN is CBS News’ 24/7 digital streaming news service featuring live, anchored coverage available for free across all platforms. Launched in November 2014, the service is a premier destination for breaking news and original storytelling from the deep bench of CBS News correspondents and reporters. CBSN features the top stories of the day as well as deep dives into key issues facing the nation and the world. CBSN has also expanded to launch local news streaming services in major markets across the country. CBSN is currently available on CBSNews.com and the CBS News app across more than 20 platforms, as well as the Paramount+ subscription service.

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Jun 3, 2021

Stunning New Image of the Center of Our Galaxy Hints at Previously Unknown Interstellar Energy Source

Posted by in categories: energy, space

New image made using NASA ’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory hints at previously unknown interstellar energy source at the Milky Way center.

New research by University of Massachusetts Amherst astronomer Daniel Wang reveals, with unprecedented clarity, details of violent phenomena in the center of our galaxy. The images, published recently in Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society, document an X-ray thread, G0.17–0.41, which hints at a previously unknown interstellar mechanism that may govern the energy flow and potentially the evolution of the Milky Way.

“The galaxy is like an ecosystem,” says Wang, a professor in UMass Amherst’s astronomy department, whose findings are a result of more than two decades of research. “We know the centers of galaxies are where the action is and play an enormous role in their evolution.” And yet, whatever has happened in the center of our own galaxy is hard to study, despite its relative proximity to Earth, because, as Wang explains, it is obscured by a dense fog of gas and dust. Researchers simply can’t see the center, even with an instrument as powerful as the famous Hubble Space Telescope. Wang, however, has used a different telescope, NASA’s Chandra X-Ray Observatory, which “sees” X-rays, rather than the rays of visible light that we perceive with our own eyes. These X-rays are capable of penetrating the obscuring fog — and the results are stunning.

Jun 3, 2021

Elon Musk Files Trademark Papers For Tesla Restaurant: Report

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, food, law, sustainability

The applications are for trademarks for the company’s ‘T’ logo design “and two other iterations of ‘Tesla’ stylised logo for use in the food industry”, the report said.

Moneycontrol could not independently verify the report.

As per the report, the three applications are for “restaurant services, pop-up restaurant services, self-service restaurant services, take-out restaurant services” and are filed under a trademark law provision indicating that Tesla intends to use, but has not done so yet.

Jun 3, 2021

Tuberculosis drug causes “power failure” in ultra-fit cancer cells

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

This in turn led the team to an FDA-approved drug called Sirturo, which is used to treat tuberculosis and works by targeting this process in bacteria. In vivo animal experiments showed that the drug could target the fuel supply of these ultra-fit cancer cells and selectively create a “power failure” in them, while leaving healthy cells unharmed. This blocked 85 percent of metastasis in the animal experiments.


Leveraging a newfound ability to identify the “fittest” metastatic cancer cells, scientists at the UK’s University of Salford have discovered that an already approved drug can be deployed to cut off their fuel supply, while leaving normal healthy cells unharmed.

Metastatic cancer cells are dangerous, fast-moving cells cancer cells that have spread away from the primary site to other parts of the body where they can give rise to new tumors. These cells have often already survived chemotherapy and radiation treatments which makes tackling them difficult, though scientists continue to learn more about their behavior and how they might be targeted for better outcomes.

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Jun 3, 2021

Experimental vaccine forces bacteria down an evolutionary dead end

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, evolution, genetics

The team says that the technique could be used to develop new vaccines against antibiotic-resistant bacteria, and potentially even wipe out some dangerous strains in a similar way to how smallpox was eradicated.


Pathogens like bacteria and viruses are extremely good at evolving in response to drugs, which can render vaccines ineffective. But now, researchers at ETH Zurich have found a way to weaponize that ability against them, forcing the bugs down harmless evolutionary dead ends.

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