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Dec 26, 2017

The Pentagon’s New Artificial Intelligence Is Already Hunting Terrorists

Posted by in categories: drones, information science, military, robotics/AI, terrorism

After less than eight months of development, the algorithms are helping intel analysts exploit drone video over the battlefield.

Earlier this month at an undisclosed location in the Middle East, computers using special algorithms helped intelligence analysts identify objects in a video feed from a small ScanEagle drone over the battlefield.

A few days into the trials, the computer identified objects — people, cars, types of building — correctly about 60 percent of the time. Just over a week on the job — and a handful of on-the-fly software updates later — the machine’s accuracy improved to around 80 percent. Next month, when its creators send the technology back to war with more software and hardware updates, they believe it will become even more accurate.

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Dec 26, 2017

Physicists Track ‘Secret’ Particles, Thought Impossible

Posted by in category: particle physics

Forget everything you thought you knew about Schrödinger’s cat.

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Dec 26, 2017

The biggest scientific breakthroughs of the year, now in video form!

Posted by in categories: innovation, physics

Each year, Science’s editors and writers highlight a top research achievement as their Breakthrough of the Year. For 2017, the honor goes to the first full observation of a neutron-star merger, made possible by detecting gravitational waves created by the stars as they spiraled into each other. But there a lot of other advances to talk about, from the oldest ice to the newest ape. Check them all out in this video rundown.


A video compilation of some of the biggest advances of 2017.

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Dec 26, 2017

Graphene unlocks the promise of lithium sulfur batteries

Posted by in categories: energy, materials

Many battery scientists are interested in the potential of lithium sulfur batteries because, at least in theory, they offer a high energy density at relatively low cost. However, lithium sulfur batteries face a number of challenges, including the low electrical conductivity of sulfur and the tendency of the cathode to expand significantly in size during the discharge cycle—a tendency that prevents the cathode material from being packed as densely in the battery as scientists would like.

To combat these problems and bring lithium sulfur batteries closer to reality, researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy’s (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory, the University of Illinois at Chicago (UIC) and Oregon State University have developed a new made of that is encapsulated by graphene.

To make the material, Argonne chemists Jun Lu and Khalil Amine heated and then exposed it to carbon disulfide gas, a common industrial solvent. The creation of lithium sulfide, as well as the graphene encapsulation, happened spontaneously.

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Dec 25, 2017

Back to Immortality

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

Currently have telomerase which can immortalize human cells in a petri dish. Currently we have stem cells and we can take regular cells even from someone who is 100 years old and we can deprogram the cells back to a pluripotent stem cell state. This is effectively de-aging the cells. There is an effort by some researchers (not Dr West) to achieve partial reprogramming of cells. This would be to use the reprogramming mechanisms to de-age cells while retaining differentiation.

Dr West mentions in the fifth video that he strongly disapproves of current stem cell treatment centers.

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Dec 25, 2017

Nuclear drones are not technically challenging and could fly for years

Posted by in categories: drones, energy, military

https://youtube.com/watch?v=EaJ1RiQSt0g

From 2008–2011, Sandia National Labs and Northrop Grumman designed nuclear drones that would be able to fly for many months.

China has put $3.3 billion into making new highly compact nuclear reactors which would also use for nuclear powered drones.

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Dec 25, 2017

Breakthroughs for Diabetes Treatments

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

Recently pharma firms have released new diabetes treatments, including one in the past week. What’s more, a promising new therapy that attacks the cause of type 2 diabetes at its roots is in the development pipeline.


Summary: Recently pharmaceutical firms have released new diabetes treatments, including one in the past week. Moreover, a promising new therapy that attacks the root cause of type 2 diabetes is in the development pipeline. [This article first appeared on the LongevityFacts.com website. Author: Brady Hartman. ]

The CDC recently shocked the public when they reported that 40% of Americans walking around today would develop type 2 diabetes.

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Dec 25, 2017

FDA Approves First Ever Gene Therapy for Inherited Disease

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, genetics

The success of a gene therapy for blindness caused by a genetic mutation paves the way for gene therapies which treat other forms of blindness as well as similar treatments which treat other diseases.


FDA approves novel gene therapy to treat patients with a rare form of blindness. The first gene therapy approved for inherited disease.

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Dec 25, 2017

Breakthrough Cures for Respiratory Diseases and COPD in the Pipeline

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

In a paradigm shift, scientists are starting to regard respiratory disease as a disease of aging and scientists at the Mayo Clinic reversed symptoms of a lung disease in mice using age-reversing senolytic compounds. In addition to senolytics, researchers are developing other treatments for respiratory conditions such as gene therapy.


Summary: In a paradigm shift, scientists are starting to regard respiratory disease as a disease of aging and scientists at the Mayo Clinic reversed symptoms of a lung disease in mice using age-reversing senolytic compounds. In addition to senolytics, researchers are developing other treatments for respiratory conditions such as gene therapy. [This article first appeared on the website LongevityFacts.com. Author: Brady Hartman.]

All of us – both smokers and non-smokers alike – will lose significant lung capacity as we age. Scientists at the Mayo Clinic have developed a promising treatment that rejuvenates the damaged lungs of mice using anti-aging compounds called senolytics.

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Dec 25, 2017

Biotech boss backing gene therapy to solve ageing crisis seeks injection of urgency, but scientists preach patience

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, life extension

Elizabeth Parrish is a proponent of controversial ideas. Rankled by barriers to trials on potential life-enhancing treatments, she used herself as a guinea pig and says the results have borne fruit – but she has irked the science community in the process.


Experimenting on herself didn’t go down well with scientists, but Elizabeth Parrish is convinced gene therapy can increase the length and quality of our lives, and wants early approval for treatments to stem ‘planet’s biggest killer’.

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