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Why are the biggest and most influential tech companies making deals with oil companies that exacerbate one of the biggest threats to human civilisation?
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Why are the biggest and most influential tech companies making deals with oil companies that exacerbate one of the biggest threats to human civilisation?
Though it may not have the sting of death and taxes, presbyopia is another of lifeâs guarantees. This vision defect plagues most of us starting about age 45, as the lenses in our eyes lose the elasticity needed to focus on nearby objects. For some people reading glasses suffice to overcome the difficulty, but for many people the only fix, short of surgery, is to wear progressive lenses.
âMore than a billion people have presbyopia and weâve created a pair of autofocal lenses that might one day correct their vision far more effectively than traditional glasses,â said Stanford electrical engineer Gordon Wetzstein. For now, the prototype looks like virtual reality goggles but the team hopes to streamline later versions.
Wetzsteinâs prototype glassesâdubbed autofocalsâare intended to solve the main problem with todayâs progressive lenses: These traditional glasses require the wearer to align their head to focus properly. Imagine driving a car and looking in a side mirror to change lanes. With progressive lenses, thereâs little or no peripheral focus. The driver must switch from looking at the road ahead through the top of the glasses, then turn almost 90 degrees to see the nearby mirror through the lower part of the lens.
Researchers at Germanyâs Max Planck Institute for Intelligent Systems have developed a new type of self-assembling mobile micromachine that can be programmed to assemble into different formations â ranging from a tiny car to a miniature rocket. Hereâs whatâs next for the project.
Sirtuins can be activated by a lack of amino acids or of sugar, or through an increase in NAD. â David Sinclair If you have not heard of #davidsinclair then it is time you have. he is at the forefront of anti aging research and one of my heroes. While we wait for the miracle pills there are alot of thing we can do to help us age better already. #biohacking #biohacker
Can a single molecule extend lifespan?
Researchers may be closer to improving the lives of people with coronary artery disease and children born with pediatric congenital cardiovascular defects through the development of a new vascular graft created by Johns Hopkins engineers that takes less than one week to make and has regenerative properties.
Coronary artery disease, or CAD, is the leading cause of death worldwide and people with the disease often require surgery to repair damaged cardiovascular tissue. Bypass surgery, another common intervention, requires removing the damaged tissue and replacing it with blood vessels from another part of the body, such as the saphenous vein, which runs the length of the leg and is the longest vein in the body. This method puts substantial stress on the body and has other risk factors: it requires patients to have multiple surgical sites, and those in need of the surgery because of plaque build-up may also have plaque accumulation in the grafted vein, causing further complications.
Congenital cardiovascular defects, or CCD, occurs in 1% of live births worldwide, and children born with the condition often undergo repeated surgical reconstruction as they grow. But repeated surgeries reduce the amount of usable vascular tissue for reconstruction and synthetic grafts do not grow as the child grows.
Lurking behind Einsteinâs theory of gravity and our modern understanding of particle physics is the deceptively simple idea of symmetry. But physicists are beginning to question whether focusing on symmetry is still as productive as it once was.
Just a few months ago, AugustĂn Carstens, the general manager for the Bank for International Settlements (BIS), the so-called central bank for central banks, said his organization saw no value in the potential of central-bank-issued digital currencies. Well, heâs apparently had a change of heart, and the entrance of Facebook and other âbig techsâ into financial services appears to be the reason.
The news: Carstens told the Financial Times that the BIS is supporting the âmanyâ central banks currently developing or researching digital currencies. âAnd it might be that it is sooner than we think that there is a market and we need to be able to provide central bank digital currencies,â he said.
The context: Many other central bankers have dismissed cryptocurrencies like Bitcoin, which tend to be volatile and whose most popular use has been speculation. But Facebookâs proposed digital currency, Libra, will be backed by fiat money and designed to maintain a stable value.
* Scientists Took an M.R.I. Scan of an Atom * Former NASA Flight Director Gene Kranz Restores Mission Control In Houston * Jeff Hawkins: Thousand Brains Theory of Intelligence
* Googleâs robots.txt Parser is Now Open Source * Dear Agile, Iâm Tired of Pretending * 4 Ways to Debug your Deep Neural Network
* How 3D printing allows scientists to grow new human hairs * NASA is testing how its new deep-space crew capsule handles a rocket emergency * Fake noise will be added to new electric cars starting today in the EU .
Cancer cells use a bizarre strategy to reproduce in a tumorâs low-energy environment; they mutilate their own mitochondria! Researchers at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL) also know how this occurs, offering a promising new target for pancreatic cancer therapies.
Why would a cancer cell want to destroy its own functioning mitochondria? âIt may seem pretty counterintuitive,â admits M.D.-Ph. D. student Brinda Alagesan, a member of Dr. David Tuvesonâs lab at CSHL.
According to Alagesan, the easiest way to think about why cancer cells may do this is to think of the mitochondria as a powerplant. âThe mitochondria is the powerhouse of the cell,â she recites, recalling the common grade school lesson. And just like a traditional powerplant, the mitochondria create their own pollution.