Lifeboat Foundation

Is it possible to read a person’s mind by analyzing the electric signals from the brain? The answer may be much more complex than most people think.

Purdue University researchers—working at the intersection of artificial intelligence and neuroscience—say a prominent dataset used to try to answer this question is confounded, and therefore many eye-popping findings that were based on this dataset and received high-profile recognition are false after all.

The Purdue team performed extensive tests over more than one year on the dataset, which looked at the brain activity of individuals taking part in a study where they looked at a series of images. Each individual wore a cap with dozens of electrodes while they viewed the images.

The satellites Blue Canyon developed for DARPA’s Blackjack program — based on the company’s commercial X-SAT bus — passed a critical design review.

WASHINGTON — Small satellite manufacturer Blue Canyon Technologies has been cleared to produce its first two satellites for the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency’s Blackjack program, the company announced Dec. 14.

DARPA plans to deploy up to 20 spacecraft in low-Earth orbit that will be connected by optical inter-satellite links and provide communications, missile tracking and navigation services.

Continue reading “DARPA okays Blue Canyon’s satellites for Blackjack program” »

Researchers hope the material from Ryugu, an asteroid around 300 million kilometres away, will shed light on the formation of the universe and perhaps offer clues about how life began on Earth.

Might want to dig deeper.

Unraveling the links among obesity, aging, telomere lengths and metabolic diseases is the subject of the study published today in Nature Metabolism by a collaborative research team at The University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston (UTHealth).

Telomeres act as protective caps at the end of chromosomes to prevent them from replication errors during cell divisions. Every time a chromosome replicates itself, telomeres shorten. When the telomeres become too short, the cell can no longer replicate its chromosomes safely and becomes arrested, or senescent. That shortening has been linked to the aging process and development of degenerative diseases.

Continue reading “Aging, diet-induced obesity, and metabolic disease link explored in new research” »

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cYvvid3jWRs

In this important conversation on health, David Gornoski sits down with Jim O’Neill, CEO of the SENS Research Foundation and former managing director of Thiel Capital. How do we effectively fight viruses such as COVID-19? O’Neill brings attention to the urgency of strengthening our immune systems. Why should we look into anti-aging? Anti-aging research, O’Neill says, looks into the possibility of targeting senescent cells where many diseases take hold. How soon can we see the results of this research? Given our societal norms, is overcoming death through scientific means something that we should look into? How does Christian teaching relate to the idea of overcoming death in time and space?

Visit SENS Research Foundation here:
https://www.sens.org/
Follow Jim O’Neill on Twitter here:
https://twitter.com/regardthefrost/

Continue reading “Technologist Jim O’Neill Makes the Case for Dramatic Anti-Aging Medicine” »

As the first patient to receive an experimental treatment that relied on the gene-editing technique CRISPR continues to do well 17 months later, more patients seem to be benefiting, too.

I think I want non-gene hacked pigs for my supper. 😃

For the second time ever, the U.S. Food and Drug Administration (FDA) approved a gene-hacked animal for human consumption.

In this case, it’s the GalSafe pig, CNN reports, a genetically modified swine that’s safe even for people with allergies to eat. All in all, it’s a fresh sign that genetically-altered animals and sophisticated gene-hacking technology are now becoming commercially viable and entering the mainstream.

Continue reading “FDA Approves Gene-Hacked Pigs for Human Consumption” »

“While astronauts in space need to get creative with their water supply, that’s not to suggest that people ought to start drinking pee to access clean water. Rather, Aquaporin, the company behind the new system, suggests that the same kind of technology could be used to clean up other types of wastewater or filter existing drinking water supplies to the point that they could be used.”

As Above

Roughly 2 billion people don’t have access to clean drinking water, according to CNN, and a system like Aquaporin could help remove pollution and plastics from the supply.

Continue reading “Scientists Say Pee-Drinking Machine Could Save Lives” »

Circa 2008

Using superconducting nanowires and lasers, a new camera system can produce high-resolution 3D images of objects from up to a kilometer away.