Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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The standard gene-editing tool, CRISPR-Cas9, frequently produces a type of DNA mutation that ordinary genetic analysis misses, claims new research published in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences (PNAS). In describing these findings the researchers called such oversights “serious pitfalls” of gene editing (Skryabin et al., 2020). In all, the new results suggest that gene-editing is more error-prone than thought and, further, that identifying and discarding defective and unwanted outcomes is not as easy as generally supposed.

Gene-editing is more error-prone than thought, new findings suggest

CRISPR Enzyme on DNA (Photo: MIT News)

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Are you guys doing anything special to make sure you are still standing for when technological breakthroughs come along to help us stay alive for much longer?

We humans are social species. A primary reason we rose to the top of the food chain and built civilization is that our brains are optimized for collaborating with those around us. When we bond with our partners and friends, we realize one of our essential core needs as humans. That’s why people in solitary confinement tend to go a bit crazy. But although our progression from feeling our sense of connection, belonging, and community has expanded from the level of clan to village to city to country to, in some ways, the world, we are still not virtual beings. We may get a little dopamine hit whenever someone likes our tweet or Facebook post, but most of us still need a connected physical community around us in order to be happy and to realize our best potential. With all of the virtual options that will surround us – chatbots engaging us in witty repartee, virtual assistants managing our schedules, and even friends messaging from faraway lands among them – our virtual future must remain grounded in our physical world. To build your essential community of flesh and blood people, you must invest in deep and meaningful relationships with the people physically around you.

10. Don’t get stuck in today

Continue reading “Ten steps to prepare for an exponential future” | >

This is a great outline of how the outbreak could end (from best to worst-case scenario): 1. Public health interventions control the 2019 n-CoV 2. The virus burns itself out (I love this analogy of viruses to fires) like the Spanish flu 3. It becomes a common virus like ex-pandemic H1N1 (swine) flu.

The World Health Organization has declared the growing coronavirus outbreak in China to be a global health emergency. It’s a recognition that the outbreak — now with nearly 10,000 cases — may continue to spread beyond China, and that the nations of the world should lend their assistance and be prepared.

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At 35 meters, the wingspan of the new BAE Systems aircraft equals that of a Boeing 737, yet the plane weighs in at just 150 kilograms, including a 15 kg payload. The unmanned plane, dubbed the PHASA-35 (Persistent High-Altitude Solar Aircraft), made its maiden voyage on 10 February at the Royal Australian Air Force Woomera Test Range in South Australia.

“It flew for just under an hour—enough time to successfully test its aerodynamics, autopilot system, and maneuverability,” says Phil Varty, business development leader of emerging products at BAE Systems. “We’d previously tested other sub-systems such as the flight control system in smaller models of the plane in the U.K. and Australia, so we’d taken much of the risk out of the craft before the test flight.”

The prototype aircraft uses gallium arsenide–based triple-junction solar cell panels manufactured by MicroLink Devices in Niles, Ill. MicroLink claims an energy conversion efficiency of 31 percent for these specialist panels.

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The magnetic field in one zone on Mars is about 10 times stronger than scientists expected, and it’s changing rapidly.

New data gathered from NASA’s InSight lander, which has been on the Red Planet for a little over a year now, shows that the planet’s magnetic field fluctuates rapidly. InSight is the first landing mission to carry a magnetic sensor, which allows it to measure these fields from up close.

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Researchers at California Polytechnic State University have developed a low-cost approach that improves cell-free biotechnology’s utility for bio-manufacturing and portability for field applications.

Cell-free protein synthesis (CFPS) is a biotechnology that harnesses active in a without the presence of living cells, allowing researchers to directly access and manipulate biochemical processes. Scientists and engineers are looking to utilize cell-free biotechnology for numerous applications including on-demand biomanufacturing of biomaterials and therapeutics, point-of-care diagnostics of disease biomarkers and environmental pollutants, and transformative biochemical education platforms.

Cell-free biotechnology researchers have already made many of these applications a reality in the lab, but getting them to work in the field, clinic and classroom is more difficult. The cellular machinery extracted for use in cell-free biotechnology contains biomolecules such as proteins and RNAs, which break down at , greatly limiting the shelf life of the cellular machinery. Transporting it from one laboratory to another or taking it out of the lab for field applications requires refrigeration to maintain its activity. Being tethered to the “cold chain” is a fundamental limit to meeting cell-free biotechnology’s potential.

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