Lifeboat Foundation

In our 13.8 billion-year-old universe, most galaxies like our Milky Way form gradually, reaching their large mass relatively late. But a new discovery made with the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) of a massive rotating disk galaxy, seen when the universe was only ten percent of its current age, challenges the traditional models of galaxy formation. This research appears on 20 May 2020 in the journal Nature.

Galaxy DLA0817g, nicknamed the Wolfe Disk after the late astronomer Arthur M. Wolfe, is the most distant rotating disk galaxy ever observed. The unparalleled power of ALMA made it possible to see this galaxy spinning at 170 miles (272 kilometers) per second, similar to our Milky Way.

“While previous studies hinted at the existence of these early rotating gas-rich disk galaxies, thanks to ALMA we now have unambiguous evidence that they occur as early as 1.5 billion years after the Big Bang,” said lead author Marcel Neeleman of the Max Planck Institute for Astronomy in Heidelberg, Germany.

The scientists believe the twist at the center of the image marks the spot where the baby planet could be forming.

A couple years ago, scientists managed to take images of spiral arms of gas surrounding a star that scientists believe were early evidence of planet formation — but the “twist” at the center adds something new to the story.

“The twist is expected from some theoretical models of planet formation, ” Anne Dutrey, another co-author from the LAB, said in the statement. ” It corresponds to the connection of two spirals — one winding inwards of the planet’s orbit, the other expanding outwards — which join at the planet location.”

Apple’s AR glasses are supposedly called Apple Glass, a leaker revealed, and the product is set to be unveiled during the iPhone 12 launch event. The coronavirus health crisis might force Apple to postpone the reveal to the first quarter of next year.

SpaceX appears to have successfully fired up its fourth full-scale Starship prototype for the third time, although the Raptor engine test ended with the aft end of the ship catching fire and burning for quite some time.

Around May 7th, hours after Starship SN4 completed its second wet dress rehearsal and Raptor static fire in ~24 hours, SpaceX removed the SN18 Raptor engine it had used to support those tests, transporting it back to storage facilities a mile down the road. Three days later, SpaceX sent Raptor SN20 down the same same road and installed it on Starship SN4 – a swap made for unknown reasons.

Continue reading “SpaceX Starship rocket catches fire during third Raptor engine test” »

AURORA, Colo. (KDVR) — A man has been charged with attempted murder for allegedly shooting a Waffle House employee in Aurora one night after being asked to wear a face covering inside the restaurant.

Kelvin Watson, 27, was arrested Monday morning by the Aurora Police Department on a charge of attempted first-degree murder.

Employees at the Waffle House at 12880 E. Mississippi Ave. told police that Watson came to the restaurant shortly after midnight on May 14 and was not wearing a mask, according to an arrest affidavit. A waitress told Watson he needed to have a mask on or he could not be served, the court document says. The restaurant was offering carry-out orders.

(Reuters) — U.S. immunotherapy company Inovio Pharmaceuticals Inc (INO.O) said on Wednesday its experimental vaccine to prevent coronavirus infection produced protective antibodies and immune system responses in mice and guinea pigs.

Blood samples from the patient, who had SARS in 2003, contained an antibody that appeared to block the new coronavirus, SARS-CoV-2.

The pandemic COVID-19 has spread to all over the world and greatly threatens safety and health of people. COVID-19 is highly infectious and with high mortality rate. As no effective antiviral treatment is currently available, new drugs are urgently needed. We employed transcriptional analysis to uncover potential antiviral drugs from natural products or FDA approved drugs. We found liquiritin significantly inhibit replication of SARS-CoV-2 in Vero E6 cells with EC₅₀ = 2.39 μM. Mechanistically, we found liquiritin exerts anti-viral function by mimicking type I interferon. Upregulated genes induced by liquiritin are enriched in GO categories including type I interferon signaling pathway, negative regulation of viral genome replication and etc. In toxicity experiment, no death was observed when treated at dose of 300 mg/kg for a week in ICR mice. All the organ indexes but liver and serum biochemical indexes were normal after treatment. Liquiritin is abundant in licorice tablet (~0.2% by mass), a traditional Chinese medicine. Together, we recommend liquiritin as a competitive candidate for treating COVID-19. We also expect liquiritin to have a broad and potent antiviral function to other viral pathogens, like HBV, HIV and etc.

The authors have declared no competing interest.

A gene therapy trial performed on mice may foreshadow yet another way to hack fitness. In a study done by a team at Washington University in St. Louis’ medical school, mice quickly built muscle mass and reduced obesity after receiving the therapy, even while eating a diet high in fat and not exercising. The results were published last week in a paper in Science Advances.

The gene targeted was FST, which is responsible for making a protein called follistatin. In humans and most other mammals, follistatin helps grow muscle and control metabolism by blocking a protein called myostatin, which acts to restrain muscle growth and ensure muscles don’t get too big.

The researchers injected eight-week-old mice with a virus carrying a healthy FST gene (gene therapy involves adding healthy copies of a gene to cells, usually using a virus as a deliveryman).

Continue reading “Forget Exercise—These Mice Got Ripped With Gene Therapy” »