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Xenotransplantation To Save And Extend Lives — Dr. David K.C. Cooper, MD, PhD, Massachusetts General Hospital, Harvard Medical School

Dr. David K. C. Cooper, MA, PhD, MD, MS, DSc (Med), FRCS, FACS, FACC, FAST, (https://researchers.mgh.harvard.edu/profile/27073950/David-Cooper) is a pioneering heart transplant surgeon and researcher in the field of xenotransplantation, which is defined as any procedure that involves the transplantation, implantation or infusion into a human recipient of live cells, tissues, or organs from a nonhuman animal source.

Dr. Cooper studied medicine in the UK at Guy’s Hospital Medical School (now part of King’s College London), and trained in general and cardiothoracic surgery in Cambridge and London.

Between 1972 and 1980, Dr. Cooper was a Fellow and Director of Studies in Medical Sciences at Magdalene College, Cambridge. In 1980 he took up an appointment in cardiac surgery at the University of Cape Town where, under Professor Christiaan Barnard, he had responsibility for patients undergoing heart transplantation.

In 1987, Dr. Cooper relocated to the Oklahoma Transplantation Institute in the USA where he continued to work in both the clinical and research fields.

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Quantum computers could cause unprecedented disruption in both good and bad ways, from cracking the encryption that secures our data to solving some of chemistry’s most intractable puzzles. New research has given us more clarity about when that might happen.

Modern encryption schemes rely on fiendishly difficult math problems that would take even the largest supercomputers centuries to crack. But the unique capabilities of a quantum computer mean that at sufficient size and power these problems become simple, rendering today’s encryption useless.

That’s a big problem for cybersecurity, and it also poses a major challenge for cryptocurrencies, which use cryptographic keys to secure transactions. If someone could crack the underlying encryption scheme used by Bitcoin, for instance, they would be able to falsify these keys and alter transactions to steal coins or carry out other fraudulent activity.

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How do you power a super advanced alien civilization? Soak up a star.

We harness the power of the sun using solar panels. What if you were to scale this idea to astronomical proportions? Surround an entire star with solar-collecting structures or satellites to power your sprawling alien galactic empire. Such massive structures are known as megastructures—in this case a “Dyson sphere.” We are already trying to detect possible megastructures in space using the dimming of a star and the glow of megastructure components in infrared light. But recent research provides a new detection method—a Dyson sphere may cause its host star to swell and cool.

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In the 1960s, American physicist Robert W. Bussard proposed a radical idea for interstellar travel: a spacecraft that relied on powerful magnetic fields to harvest hydrogen directly from the interstellar medium.

As it’s come to be known, the Bussard Ramjet has since been popularized by hard science fiction writers like Poul Anderson, Larry Niven, Vernor Vinge, and science communicators like Carl Sagan. Unfortunately, a team of physicists recently analyzed the concept in more detail and concluded that Bussard’s idea is not practical. At a time when interstellar travel looks destined to become a real possibility, this analysis might seem like a wet blanket but is more of a reality check.

This detailed analysis was led by Peter Schattschneider, a physicist and materials science specialist with the University of Vienna and a science fiction author. He was joined by Albert A. Jackson, a physicist with the Texas-based aerospace company Triton Systems, LLC. The study that describes their findings (“The Fishback ramjet revisited”) will appear in the scientific journal Acta Astronautica in February 2022.

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The COVID-19 pandemic brought about a seismic shift in the way organizations and offices operate. Working from home has become a preferred option for countless businesses and millions of employees around the globe. The work from home trend might continue in the future too, as it has proven not to affect business productivity adversely. Additionally, as per a McKinsey study, up to 278 business executives plan to reduce their office space by 30% even beyond the pandemic. Work from home is a seemingly viable option for employees for a variety of reasons, one of them being the possible arrival of the metaverse, a concept that will make traveling to a specific location for work redundant. This will affect one particular part of employees’ personal lives—domestic chores. There are more than a few reasons why IoT for smart cities and homes will play a significant role in optimizing household chores.

Domestic chores are an unavoidable yet necessary part of individuals’ personal lives. For instance, tasks such as cooking meals, managing laundry work and making timely lighting and plumbing repairs are hard to overlook, even if an important virtual business meeting is going on. In simple words, tasks such as cooking, cleaning, maintenance and task management act as distractions that stand in the way of remote organizational work. Resultantly, the productivity of remote employees is seriously affected by domestic chores. To state the obvious, remote working blurs the boundaries between the workspace and personal life. Work hours increasingly blend into the time that would normally be associated with completing household tasks. These are remote working problems that you probably know. The biggest problem of remote working is how it has regressed gender equality and the involvement of women in prominent positions at the workplace.

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