Lifeboat Foundation

Tau protein aggregation is associated with cellular senescence in the brain is the topic for the November Journal Club. This is an important paper as it shows how senescent cells contribute to Alzheimer’s disease and how removing them appears to improve the condition. We will see you live on our Facebook page at 13:00 EST for the Journal Club show with Dr. Oliver Medvedik.

Abstract

Tau protein accumulation is the most common pathology among degenerative brain diseases, including Alzheimer’s disease (AD), progressive supranuclear palsy (PSP), traumatic brain injury (TBI), and over twenty others.

Today, we want to point out a new study showing how senescent cells poison their healthy neighbors and that the more there are, the faster they make other cells become senescent.

What are senescent cells?

As you age, increasing numbers of your cells enter into a state known as senescence. Senescent cells do not divide or support the tissues of which they are part; instead, they emit a range of potentially harmful chemical signals that encourage nearby healthy cells to enter the same senescent state, which is known as the “bystander effect”. Their presence causes many problems: they reduce tissue repair, increase chronic inflammation, and can even eventually raise the risk of cancer and other age-related diseases.

When you shine a beam of light on your hand, you don’t feel much, except for a little bit of heat generated by the beam. When you shine that same light into a world that is measured on the nano- or micro scale, the light becomes a powerful manipulating tool that you can use to move objects around – trapped securely in the light.

An unusual SpaceX launch will carry several startups’ satellites, some of which will jockey to provide dirt-cheap internet for earthbound IoT sensors.

New pathogens emerge all the time. It’s becoming easier for small groups to create weaponized diseases. Bill Gates says a small group could build a deadlier form of smallpox in a lab. And people are always hopping on planes, making it possible for a disease to reach a new continent in a few hours.

From replacing basic protein sources to high-tech gourmet wizardry, we examine the culinary future.

Jewellery and grooming items found during summer excavation in Lincolnshire.

Electrical engineers in the accelerator physics group at TU Darmstadt have developed a design for a laser-driven electron accelerator so small it could be produced on a silicon chip. It would be inexpensive and with multiple applications. The design, which has been published in Physical Review Letters, is now being realised as part of an international collaboration.

IMAGE: The driving laser field (red) ‘shakes’ electrons in graphene at ultrashort time scales, shown as violet and blue waves. A second laser pulse (green) can control this wave and thus determine the direction of current. (Image credit: FAU/Christian Heide)

Being able to control electronic systems using light waves instead of voltage signals is the dream of physicists all over the world. The advantage is that electromagnetic light waves oscillate at petaherz frequency. This means that computers in the future could operate at speeds a million times faster than those of today. Scientists at Friedrich-Alexander University (FAU; Erlangen-Nurenberg, Germany) have now come one step closer to achieving this goal as they have succeeded in using ultra-short laser impulses to precisely control electrons in graphene. The scientists published their results in Physical Review Letters.

Current control in electronics that is one million times faster than in today’s systems is a dream for many. Ultimately, current control is one of the most important components as it is responsible for data and signal transmission. Controlling the flow of electrons using light waves instead of voltage signals, as is now the case, could make this dream a reality. However, up to now, it has been difficult to control the flow of electrons in metals as metals reflect light waves and the electrons inside them cannot be influenced by these light waves.

Continue reading “Ultrafast laser pulses control electrons in graphene, making ultrafast computing possible” »