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Dec 3, 2018

The Neurons That Tell Time

Posted by in category: neuroscience

The discovery of brain structures that apparently mark time has raised a larger question: What is time, anyway?

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Dec 3, 2018

Thousands of Unstudied Plants May Be at Risk of Extinction

Posted by in categories: existential risks, robotics/AI

Plants often get short shrift in conservation circles, but machine learning could help botanists save tens of thousands of species.

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Dec 3, 2018

Asteroid Sample-Return Mission Arrives to Collect Primordial Rocks of the Solar System

Posted by in category: space travel

As the OSIRIS-REx spacecraft arrives at its target asteroid Bennu, scientists on the ground prepare for a new bounty of planetary samples.

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Dec 3, 2018

Nvidia has created the first video game demo using AI-generated graphics

Posted by in categories: entertainment, robotics/AI

A first for video games.

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Dec 3, 2018

Scientists Just Made a Major Discovery

Posted by in categories: cosmology, physics

This discovery could help us answer some of the largest conundrums in physics today. Scientists know that matter and antimatter were created in about equal proportions after the Big Bang, as the universe cooled and expanded, but they can’t explain the asymmetry of matter and antimatter, or why antimatter, which annihilates anything it comes into contact with, didn’t just wipe out all matter.

“[W]e have yet to answer a central question of why didn’t matter and antimatter, which it is believed were created in equal amounts when the Big Bang started the Universe, mutually self-annihilate?” co-author Professor Mike Charlton said to Sci-News. “We also have yet to address why there is any matter left in the Universe at all. This conundrum is one of the central open questions in fundamental science, and one way to search for the answer is to bring the power of precision atomic physics to bear upon antimatter.”

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Dec 3, 2018

Knowing exactly what genes are saying – and where

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Scientists can now discover how the fine details of gene activity differ from one cell type to another in a tissue sample, thanks to a technique invented by Weill Cornell Medicine researchers.

The technique, described in a paper published Oct. 15 in Nature Biotechnology, will enable biologists to better understand the distinct molecular workings of different cell types in the body. It may also enable the improved understanding and treatment of diseases caused by abnormal gene activity.

“An individual gene can ‘say’ different things, and the true meaning often requires listening to entire phrases, rather than single words,” said senior study author Dr. Hagen U. Tilgner, assistant professor of neuroscience in the Feil Family Brain and Mind Research Institute at Weill Cornell Medicine. “Our new method essentially allows us to record complete phrases, called isoforms, that each gene expresses in each cell.”

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Dec 3, 2018

Evolution sans mutation discovered in single-celled archaea

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

I just love it when the reductionists are wrong…again. I can not help myself. bigsmile


University of Nebraska-Lincoln researchers have found revolutionary evidence that an evolutionary phenomenon at work in complex organisms is at play in their single-celled counterparts, too.

Species most often evolve through DNA mutations inherited by successive generations. A few decades ago, researchers began discovering that multicellular species can also evolve through epigenetics: traits originating from the inheritance of cellular proteins that control access to an organism’s DNA, rather than genetic changes.

Continue reading “Evolution sans mutation discovered in single-celled archaea” »

Dec 3, 2018

Rejuvenation Roundup November 2018

Posted by in category: life extension

‘Tis the season to be jolly, friends of healthy longevity! Time to dim the lights, gather around a crackling fireplace, cuddle up into a warm blanket, and recap the rejuvenation news of last November.

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Dec 3, 2018

Frauchiger-Renner Paradox Clarifies Where Our Views of Reality Go Wrong

Posted by in categories: computing, quantum physics

That quantum mechanics is a successful theory is not in dispute. It makes astonishingly accurate predictions about the nature of the world at microscopic scales. What has been in dispute for nearly a century is just what it’s telling us about what exists, what is real. There are myriad interpretations that offer their own take on the question, each requiring us to buy into certain as-yet-unverified claims — hence assumptions — about the nature of reality.

Now, a new thought experiment is confronting these assumptions head-on and shaking the foundations of quantum physics. The experiment is decidedly strange. For example, it requires making measurements that can erase any memory of an event that was just observed. While this isn’t possible with humans, quantum computers could be used to carry out this weird experiment and potentially discriminate between the different interpretations of quantum physics.

“Every now and then you get a paper which gets everybody thinking and discussing, and this is one of those cases,” said Matthew Leifer, a quantum physicist at Chapman University in Orange, California. “[This] is a thought experiment which is going to be added to the canon of weird things we think about in quantum foundations.”

Continue reading “Frauchiger-Renner Paradox Clarifies Where Our Views of Reality Go Wrong” »

Dec 3, 2018

‘The Pirate Bay of Science’ Continues to Get Attacked Around the World

Posted by in category: science

After publishers sued Sci-Hub, Russian ISPs are now preventing users from accessing the valuable scientific data repository and paywall killer.

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