Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Blog – Page 7

Our brain is a complex organ. Billions of nerve cells are wired in an intricate network, constantly processing signals, enabling us to recall memories or to move our bodies.

Making sense of this complicated network requires a precise look into how these are arranged and connected. “LICONN,” a new microscopy method developed by scientists at the Institute of Science and Technology Austria (ISTA) and Google Research, now helps piece together this puzzle.

Light microscopes have been evolving for centuries. Scientists use light microscopy to—literally and figuratively—illuminate the most intricate biological structures. However, unraveling the complex details and architecture of the brain remains a seemingly impossible challenge, considering its billions of densely packed neurons, each linked to other cells via thousands of synapses.

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This Perspective discusses unresolved questions about how the chromatin modifier Polycomb repressive complex 2 (PRC2) binds RNA in vivo and the functional consequences of binding. The authors posit that RNA conformation is integral to PRC2 control and thus to regulation of chromatin state.

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IN A NUTSHELL 🔬 Scientists have measured the speed of quantum entanglement for the first time, marking a major milestone in quantum physics. 💡 The study uses attosecond precision to track electron motion, offering unprecedented insight into quantum dynamics. 🔗 Quantum entanglement shows how particles can be interconnected over vast distances, defying traditional physics. 🚀

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Engineers from Australia and China have invented a sponge-like device that captures water from thin air and then releases it in a cup using the sun’s energy, even in low humidity where other technologies such as fog harvesting and radiative cooling have struggled.

The water-from-air device remained effective across a broad range of humidity levels (30–90%) and temperatures (5–55 degrees Celsius).

Senior researcher Dr. Derek Hao, from RMIT University in Melbourne, said the invention relied on refined balsa wood’s naturally spongy structure, modified to absorb water from the atmosphere and release it on demand.

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A new study suggests that, in the case of global catastrophe, urban agriculture alone could sustain only about one fifth of the population of a temperate, median-sized city, but the whole city could be fed by also farming land within a short distance of the urban area.

Matt Boyd of Adapt Research Ltd, New Zealand, and Nick Wilson of the University of Otago, New Zealand, present these findings in PLOS One.

Abrupt global catastrophes—such as nuclear wars, extreme pandemics, or solar storms—could severely hamper . Shortages of resources like could disrupt food production and transport, possibly leading to famine. Prior research has suggested that this impact could be mitigated by , which includes such approaches as home, community, and rooftop gardens.

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Chirality—the property of an object that is distinct from its mirror image—has long captivated scientists across biology, chemistry, and physics. The phenomenon is sometimes called “handedness,” because it refers to an object possessing a distinct left- or right-handed form. It is a universal quality that is found across various scales of nature, from molecules and amino acids to the famed double-helix of DNA and the spiraling patterns of snail shells.

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Scientists from the Faculty of Physics and Applied Informatics at the University of Lodz have published an article on friction in the journal Small. Their research on “bismuth islands” moving on the surface of graphite confirmed the existence of a totally new form of so-called superlubricity—a friction-free contact between two solid bodies.

This discovery could revolutionize the way we design nanoscale machines, and even vehicles, in the future. By understanding these processes, we can create devices that can operate much more efficiently, saving on energy and resources.

Scientists led by Dr. Hab. Paweł Kowalczyk, associate professor at the University of Lodz, have discovered a new phenomenon related to the disappearance of friction—superlubricity. This special phenomenon was observed at the contact of two solid materials, bismuth and graphite.

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A team of Harvard researchers have unveiled a way to map the molecular underpinnings of how learning and memories are formed, a new technique expected to offer insights that may pave the way for new treatments for neurological disorders such as dementia.

“This technique provides a lens into the synaptic architecture of memory, something previously unattainable in such detail,” said Adam Cohen, professor of chemistry and and of physics and senior co-author of the research paper, published in Nature Neuroscience.

Memory resides within a dense network of billions of neurons within the brain. We rely on synaptic plasticity—the strengthening and modulation of connections between these neurons—to facilitate learning and memory.

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