Lifeboat Foundation

Researchers have discovered a group of soil bacteria that could yield alternatives to conventional fertilizers for enriching soil and improving crop yields.

A team of researchers from the Boyce Thompson Institute (BTI) has discovered a distinct group of bacteria that may help fungi and plants acquire soil nutrients. The findings could point the way to cost-effective and eco-friendly methods of enriching soil and improving crop yields, reducing farmers’ reliance on conventional fertilizers.

Researchers know that arbuscular mycorrhizal (AM) fungi establish symbiotic relationships with the roots of 70% of all land plants. In this relationship, plants trade fatty acids for the fungi’s nitrogen and phosphorus. However, AM fungi lack the enzymes needed to free nitrogen and phosphorus from complex organic molecules.

“This work confirms that there is a link between air pollution and how well the aging brain works,” senior study author and Columbia University researcher Andrea Baccarelli told The Guardian. “These shorter-term effects are reversible: when air pollution clears, our brain reboots and starts working back to its original level. However, multiple occurrences of these higher exposures cause permanent damage.”

Thankfully, it’s reversible.

Needless to say, DNA is the “instructions” via which our genes are transferred between us and our offspring. And RNA is in charge of regulating the production of proteins in a body, and its so-called “instructions” that it gives are for cellular structure.

To be clear: RNA and DNA serve different functions, and, as the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC) explains, mRNA vaccines don’t affect or even interact with our DNA at all.

In this week’s Pandemic Problems column, a reader asks how to explain mRNA vaccines to a worried family member.

The team went so far as to say that “black fungi-bacteria-like specimens also appeared atop the rovers.”

They didn’t stop there: the team also examined photos taken by NASA’s HiRISE, and found evidence for “amorphous specimens within a crevice” that “changed shape and location then disappeared.”

“It is well established that a variety of terrestrial organisms survive Mars-like conditions,” the team concludes. “Given the likelihood Earth has been seeding Mars with life and life has been repeatedly transferred between worlds, it would be surprising if there was no life on Mars.”

Next-gen processor tech gives more performance with less energy use, IBM claims.

Investing in inter-generational solutions for healthy aging — trent stamp, CEO, the eisner foundation.

Trent Stamp is the CEO of The Eisner Foundation (https://eisnerfoundation.org/), an organization founded by Jane and Michael D. Eisner (the former Chairman and CEO of The Walt Disney Company), that identifies, advocates for, and invests in high-quality and innovative programs that unite multiple generations for the enrichment of our communities. Trent has been in this role since 2008 and under his leadership, The Eisner Foundation became the only foundation in the U.S. investing solely in intergenerational solutions, garnering many honors and awards including Generation United’s Leadership Award.

Continue reading “Trent Stamp, CEO, The Eisner Foundation — Investing In Intergenerational Solutions For Healthy Aging” »

CHOP team treated patient with the condition, known as PU.MA, thanks to a bone marrow donation from the patient’s older brother.

When Luke Terrio was about seven months old, his mother began to realize something was off. He had constant ear infections, developed red spots on his face, and was tired all the time. His development stagnated, and the antibiotics given to treat his frequent infections stopped working. His primary care doctor at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia (CHOP) ordered a series of blood tests and quickly realized something was wrong: Luke had no antibodies.

At first, the CHOP specialists treating Luke thought he might have X-linked agammaglobulinemia (XLA), a rare immunodeficiency syndrome seen in children. However, as the CHOP research team continued investigating Luke’s case, they realized Luke’s condition was unlike any disease described before.

Researchers have demonstrated a record-high laser pulse intensity of over 10²³ W/cm² using the petawatt laser at the Center for Relativistic Laser Science (CoReLS), Institute for Basic Science in the Republic of Korea. It took more than a decade to reach this laser intensity, which is ten times that reported by a team at the University of Michigan in 2004. These ultrahigh intensity light pulses will enable exploration of complex interactions between light and matter in ways not possible before.

The powerful laser can be used to examine phenomena believed to be responsible for high-power cosmic rays, which have energies of more than a quadrillion (1015) electronvolts (eV). Although scientists know that these rays originate from somewhere outside our solar system, how they are made and what is forming them has been a longstanding mystery.

“This high intensity laser will allow us to examine astrophysical phenomena such as electron-photon and photon-photon scattering in the lab,” said Chang Hee Nam, director of CoReLS and professor at Gwangju Institute of Science & Technology. “We can use it to experimentally test and access theoretical ideas, some of which were first proposed almost a century ago.”

The pace of those improvements has slowed, but International Business Machines Corp on Thursday said that silicon has at least one more generational advance in store.

IBM introduced what it says is the world’s first 2-nanometer chipmaking technology. The technology could be as much as 45% faster than the mainstream 7-nanometer chips in many of today’s laptops and phones and up to 75% more power efficient, the company said.