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May 10, 2021

This company is developing tech to produce oxygen in space

Posted by in categories: Elon Musk, space travel

Entrepreneurs like Jeff Bezos and Elon Musk are determined to get human beings to the Moon and Mars. This company, which has found a way to produce oxygen from soil on the Moon, may help them to get us there.

May 10, 2021

Here’s a cool green way to upcycle millions of old tires

Posted by in categories: augmented reality, sustainability, transportation

EcoTech Recycling’s patented thermodynamic process turns waste rubber into a nontoxic synthetic material for new tires, auto parts and insulation.


If you’ve ever seen a tire graveyard piled high with trashed rubber, you can easily understand that Israeli company EcoTech Recycling has a green gem of an idea.

EcoTech’s nontoxic process produces a unique material, Active Rubber (AR), from end-of-life tires. With1.6 billion tires manufactured annually, and 290 million tires discarded each year in the United States alone, tires are the world’s largest source of waste rubber.

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May 10, 2021

Reversing a Genetic Cause of Poor Stress Tolerance

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

Stress management.


Everyone faces stress occasionally, whether in school, at work, or during a global pandemic. However, some cannot cope as well as others. In a few cases, the cause is genetic. In humans, mutations in the OPHN1 gene cause a rare X-linked disease that includes poor stress tolerance. Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) Professor Linda Van Aelst seeks to understand factors that cause specific individuals to respond poorly to stress. She and her lab studied the mouse gene Ophn1, an analog of the human gene, which plays a critical role in developing brain cell connections, memories, and stress tolerance. When Ophn1 was removed in a specific part of the brain, mice expressed depression-like helpless behaviors. The researchers found three ways to reverse this effect.

To test for stress, the researchers put mice into a two-room cage with a door in between. Normal mice escape from the room that gives them a light shock on their feet. But animals lacking Ophn1 sit helplessly in that room without trying to leave. Van Aelst wanted to figure out why.

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May 10, 2021

‘It’s like the embers in a barbecue pit.’ Nuclear reactions are smoldering again at Chernobyl

Posted by in category: futurism

Chernobyl is a looming threat as reactions continue due to rain water.


Slow rise in neutrons stirs concerns about possible “criticality” accident.

May 10, 2021

Blind Patients Hope Landmark Gene-Editing Experiment Will Restore Their Vision

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics

The unprecedented study involves using the gene-editing technique CRISPR to edit a gene while it’s still inside a patient’s body. In exclusive interviews, NPR talks with two of the first participants.

May 10, 2021

Autism-related conditions linked to altered visual perception

Posted by in categories: genetics, neuroscience

Autistic people tend to switch between images more slowly than non-autistic people do, a previous study shows. And they spend more time seeing a combination of the two images.


Children with genetic conditions linked to autism perform atypically on a test of binocular rivalry, according to a new unpublished study.

Researchers presented the work virtually today at the 2021 International Society for Autism Research annual meetin g. (Links to abstracts may work only for registered conference attendees.)

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May 9, 2021

Stars made of antimatter could exist in the Milky Way

Posted by in category: space

Astronomers try to solve the mystery of antihelium by searching for antistars.

May 9, 2021

IBM’s New Chip Technology Shows Off the Next Big Step in Moore’s Law

Posted by in category: computing

The process could yield 50 billion transistors on fingernail-sized chips that are 75 percent more efficient or 45 percent faster than today’s designs.

May 9, 2021

Apple Watch 7 glucose monitoring gets hinted at

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

The most recent Apple user survey suggests that a blood glucose monitoring feature is definitely on the table.

May 9, 2021

Could digital currencies put banks out of business? | The Economist

Posted by in categories: bitcoin, business, cryptocurrencies, economics, finance

Cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin have been billed as a major disruptor to finance. But digital currencies issued by governments might be even more radical—they may even threaten the future of traditional banking.

Read our special report, “The Future of Banking” : https://econ.st/3tuTT8y.

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