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I always enjoy the perspective of David Wood, and in this session of the London Futurists there is a panel discussion about genetic engineering in the future.

Our DNA is becoming as readable, writable, and hackable as our information technology. The resulting genetic revolution is poised to transform our healthcare, our choices for the characteristics of the next generation, and our evolution as a species. The future could bring breathtaking advances in human well-being, but it could also descend into a dangerous genetic arms race.

These claims are made in the recent book “Hacking Darwin: Genetic Engineering and the Future of Humanity”, https://hackingdarwin.com/ by Technology Futurist Jamie Metzl, https://jamiemetzl.com/

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Circa 2019

The OBSBOT Tail is an AI camera that has the ability to track and record a subject without you having to do anything. A self-tracking camera can be used for a wide variety of applications. It’s important to note that the unit I am reviewing is not the shipping version, but a lot of the features are still working. The OBSBOT Tail is expected to start shipping in April.

OBSBOT Tail

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Maryland reported its highest number of new COVID-19 cases on Tuesday—just four days after the state began easing public health restrictions aimed at thwarting the spread of disease.

Though state officials note that an increase in testing and a backlog of test results may partly explain the spike, the case counts overall suggest that disease transmission has not declined in the lead-up to re-opening—and transmission could very easily increase as residents begin venturing into public spaces more frequently.

Maryland’s outcome may hold lessons for other states attempting their own reopening. As of today, May 20, all 50 states have begun easing restrictions at some level, according to The Washington Post.

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(WHDH) — Scientists at NASA have reportedly uncovered evidence of a bizarre parallel universe where the rules of physics and time appear to be operating in reverse.

Researchers conducting an experiment in Antarctica discovered particles from a universe that was born during the same Big Bang the created the one we live in, according to NewScientist.

A NASA team was using a giant balloon to carry electronic antennas into the sky above the frozen wastes of Antarctica when they encountered a “wind” of particles from outer space that were “a million times more powerful” than anything they had seen before, the news outlet reported.

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Before there were animals, bacteria or even DNA on Earth, self-replicating molecules were slowly evolving their way from simple matter to life beneath a constant shower of energetic particles from space.

In a new paper, a Stanford professor and a former post-doctoral scholar speculate that this interaction between ancient proto-organisms and cosmic rays may be responsible for a crucial structural preference, called chirality, in . If their idea is correct, it suggests that all life throughout the universe could share the same chiral preference.

Chirality, also known as handedness, is the existence of mirror-image versions of molecules. Like the left and , two chiral forms of a single molecule reflect each other in shape but don’t line up if stacked. In every major biomolecule—amino acids, DNA, RNA—life only uses one form of molecular handedness. If the mirror version of a molecule is substituted for the regular version within a biological system, the system will often malfunction or stop functioning entirely. In the case of DNA, a single wrong handed sugar would disrupt the stable helical structure of the molecule.

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From testing drugs to developing vaccines, the close study of the immune system is key to improving real-world health outcomes. T-cells are integral to this research, as these white blood cells help tailor the body’s immune response to specific pathogens.

With lattice light-sheet microscopy (LLSM), scientists have been able to closely examine , such as T-cells, in 4D. But with limited data points, there wasn’t an effective way to analyze the LLSM data.

A new paper by researchers from the Pritzker School of Molecular Engineering (PME) at the University of Chicago, published May 20 in the journal Cell Systems, introduces a solution—a pipeline for lattice light-sheet microscopy multi-dimensional analyses (LaMDA).

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Strong coupling between cavity photon modes and donor/acceptor molecules can form polaritons (hybrid particles made of a photon strongly coupled to an electric dipole) to facilitate selective vibrational energy transfer between molecules in the liquid phase. The process is typically arduous and hampered by weak intermolecular forces. In a new report now published on Science, Bo Xiang, and a team of scientists in materials science, engineering and biochemistry at the University of California, San Diego, U.S., reported a state-of-the-art strategy to engineer strong light-matter coupling. Using pump-probe and two-dimensional (2-D) infrared spectroscopy, Xiang et al. found that strong coupling in the cavity mode enhanced the vibrational energy transfer of two solute molecules. The team increased the energy transfer by increasing the cavity lifetime, suggesting the energy transfer process to be a polaritonic process. This pathway on vibrational energy transfer will open new directions for applications in remote chemistry, vibration polariton condensation and sensing mechanisms.

Vibrational energy transfer (VET) is a universal process ranging from chemical catalysis to biological signal transduction and molecular recognition. Selective intermolecular vibrational energy transfer (VET) from solute-to-solute is relatively rare due to weak intermolecular forces. As a result, intermolecular VET is often unclear in the presence of intramolecular vibrational redistribution (IVR). In this work, Xiang et al. detailed a state-of-the-art method to engineer intermolecular vibrational interactions via strong light-matter coupling. To accomplish this, they inserted a highly concentrated molecular sample into an optical microcavity or placed it onto a plasmonic nanostructure. The confined electromagnetic modes in the setup then reversibly interacted with collective macroscopic molecular vibrational polarization for hybridized light-matter states known as vibrational polaritons.

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