Researchers are busy analysing some of the final data sent back from the Cassini spacecraft which has been in orbit around Saturn for more than 13 years until the end of its mission in September 2017.
For the last leg of its journey, Cassini was put on a particularly daring orbit passing between Saturn and its rings which brought it closer to Saturn than ever before. This allowed scientists to obtain images of Saturn’s ultraviolet auroras in unprecedented resolution.
The new observations are detailed in two new studies published in Geophysical Research Letters and JGR: Space Physics.
A new study shows drinking low-fat milk—both nonfat and 1% milk—is significantly associated with less aging in adults.
Research on 5,834 U.S. adults by Brigham Young University exercise science professor Larry Tucker, Ph.D., found people who drink low-fat milk experience several years less biological aging than those who drink high-fat (2% and whole) milk.
“It was surprising how strong the difference was,” Tucker said. “If you’re going to drink high-fat milk, you should be aware that doing so is predictive of or related to some significant consequences.”
In 2017, researchers believed they had found evidence for the elusive Majorana fermion. Now, a new study found that the exotic class of particles may still be confined to theory.
In the past two decades, scientists have also starting looking at art as a way to keep people mentally and physically healthy. In a report, the World Health Organization points to just how powerful art can be as a therapy. The report has problems but could lend heft and credibility to the field.
How will learning and development cope with the growing trend of humans augmenting their basic capabilities with chemical, electronic, physical, and genetic enhancements?
We’ve been entertained by a never ending stream of Marvel and DC Comics characters with super powers ranging from x-ray vision to mind control. Many of us have also spent time fantasising about the additional capabilities we’d like to help see us through the day. But what happens when those boundaries blur between science fantasy and everyday reality?
The practice of human enhancement or augmentation is a phenomena well underway across society – although the concept may be new to many of us. Over the next 25 years, the integration of information and communications technologies (ICTs), cognitive science, new materials, and bio-medicine could fundamentally improve the human condition and greatly enhance human intellectual, physical, and psychological capacities. As a result, the notion of the “transhuman” could emerge. For example, we are well underway with the process of augmenting human beings’ cognitive and intellectual abilities through technological implants, such as memory storage. These enhancements mean humans could achieve heightened senses and biological capabilities that are largely the prerogative of other species (e.g. speed, resistance, adaptation to extreme conditions, etc.).
The speed of development is truly mind blowing. Advances in cognitive enhancement drugs and “nootropic” supplements, electronic brain stimulation techniques, genetic modification, age extension treatments, 3D printed limbs and organs, and body worn exoskeletons, have given rise to the notion of enhancing the human brain and body well beyond the limits of natural evolutionary processes. Indeed, many leaders in the field of AI are fierce advocates of Transhumanism as the next stage of human evolution—arguing that if humans want to keep up with AI, we ourselves will have to become machines—embedding technology in our brains and bodies to give us similar levels of processing power.
