Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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No, it’s not from a science fiction movie or from an episode of a popular kid’s television show. It’s real life. Researchers, in a proof-of-concept study, have made fish-shaped microrobots that are guided with magnets to cancer cells, where a pH change triggers them to open their mouths and release their chemotherapy cargo.

Scientists have previously made microscale (smaller than 100 µm) robots that can manipulate tiny objects, but most can’t change their shapes to perform complex tasks, such as releasing drugs. Some groups have made 4D-printed objects (3D-printed devices that change shape in response to certain stimuli), but they typically perform only simple actions, and their motion can’t be controlled remotely.

In a step toward biomedical applications for these devices, Jiawen Li, Li Zhang, Dong Wu and colleagues wanted to develop shape-morphing microrobots that could be guided by magnets to specific sites to deliver treatments. Because tumors exist in acidic microenvironments, the team decided to make the microrobots change shape in response to lowered pH.

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The first prize money has been awarded in the largest XPrize competition ever held, with 23 student teams getting financial injections to further their carbon removal technology.

Among the winners are a variety of forward-thinking initiatives addressing the issue of rising carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, as well as those that seek to address more than one environmental issue at the same time.

The US$100 million Carbon Removal XPrize was launched in February with the goal of developing technology that can remove CO2 from the seas and the atmosphere.

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The vaccine candidate was originally developed by the Israel Institute for Biological Research (IIBR), which operates under the auspices of the Prime Minister’s Office and works closely with the Defense Ministry.

The institute’s strategic and technical capabilities are shrouded in secrecy, but this week, The Jerusalem Post gained access to new data that show BriLife could be more effective against mutations and confer lasting immunity.

The Israeli vaccine could potentially address COVID better than other technologies, according to the CEO of NeuroRx.

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Oramed Pharmaceuticals, the developer of the Oravax oral COVID-19 vaccine candidate, has announced a partnership with Mexico’s Genomma Lab Internacional to help fast-track a Phase II clinical trial and gain emergency use authorization in the Latin American country.

Only about 58% of Mexico’s population has been jabbed with one dose of a coronavirus vaccine, averaging around 4,500 new cases per day.

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For the satellites spinning around Earth, using electricity to ionize and push particles of xenon gets them to go where they need to go. While xenon atoms ionize easily and are heavy enough to build thrust, the gas is rare and expensive, not to mention difficult to store.

Thanks to new research, we could soon have an alternative. Enter iodine.

Full in-orbit operation of a satellite powered by iodine gas has now been carried out by space tech company ThrustMe, and the technology promises to lead to satellite propulsion systems that are more efficient and affordable than ever before.

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“A combination of grassy notes with a tang of acids and a hint of vanilla over an underlying mustiness” is how an international team of chemists describes the unique odor of old books in a study. Poetic, sure, but what causes it?

Books are made up almost entirely of organic materials: paper, ink, glue, fibers. All these materials react to light, heat, moisture, and even each other over the years, and release a number of volatile organic compounds (VOCs). While the blend of compounds released by any one book is dependent on the exact things that went into making it, there’s only so much variation in materials.

The researchers tested 72 books and found some 15 compounds that came up again and again. They were reliable markers for degradation. These include acetic acid, benzaldehyde, butanol, furfural, octanal, methoxyphenyloxime, and other chemicals with funny-sounding names. A book’s smell is also influenced by its environment and materials it encounters over the course of its life (which is why some books have hints of cigarette smoke, others smell a little like coffee, and still others, cat dander).

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His team, he adds, has spent years refining the technology’s atmospheric sensing, mirror controls, and motion detection capabilities; Taara’s terminals can now automatically adjust to changes in the environment to maintain precise connections.

Project Taara aims to bridge a connectivity gap between the Republic of the Congo’s Brazzaville and the Democratic Republic of Congo’s Kinshasa. The cities lie just 4.8 kilometers (2.9 miles) apart, but between them is the Congo River —it’s the deepest river in the world (220 meters/720 feet in parts! Pretty terrifying, if you ask me), the second-fastest, and the only one that crosses the equator twice. That makes for some complicated logistics, and as such, internet connectivity in Kinshasa (which is on the river’s south bank) very expensive.

Local internet providers are putting down 400 kilometers of fiber connection around the river, but in a textbook example of leapfrogging technology, Project Taara used WOC to beam high-speed connectivity over the river instead.

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If you get a dense quantum gas cloud cold enough, you can see right through it. This phenomenon, called Pauli blocking, happens because of the same effects that give atoms their structure, and now it has been observed for the first time.

“This has been a theoretical prediction for more than three decades,” says Amita Deb at the University of Otago in New Zealand, a member of one of three teams that have now independently seen this. “This is the first time this been proven experimentally.”

Pauli blocking occurs in gases made up of a type of particle called a fermion, a category that includes the protons, neutrons and electrons that make up all atoms. These particles obey a rule called the Pauli exclusion principle, which dictates that no two identical fermions can occupy the same quantum state in a given system.

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