A review of the most interesting and impactful longevity related studies from December, including how gene therapy can increase telomere length and how the immune system can be used to clear senescent cells.
Contents:
1. Intro 0:00
2. Gene Therapy To Increase Telomere Length 0:48
3. Freeing The Immune System To Remove Senescent Cells 15:20
4. Using Probiotics To Help With Sarcopenia 27:39.
Canadian Content Study.
Convair’s Super-NEXUS—a visionary leap into spaceflight—was no ordinary vehicle. This partially reusable, Single-Stage-to-Orbit (SSTO) behemoth was designed to carry an astounding 2 million pounds of payload, making it a true giant of its time. Imagine a colossal structure that stood 400 feet tall, towering over even the mighty Saturn V, which itself reached a height of 363 feet. With a staggering diameter of 150 feet, the NEXUS would have dwarfed its predecessors in both size and capability.
But sheer size is only part of the story. In its largest proposed variant, the Super-NEXUS would have weighed an almost incomprehensible 48 million pounds when fully fueled—compared to the Saturn V’s comparatively modest 6.5 million pounds. This weight discrepancy highlights the ambitious scale of the project. The NEXUS wasn’t just a bigger rocket; it was an entirely new class of spacecraft, designed to deliver an unprecedented payload of 2 million pounds to low Earth orbit—more than eight times the capacity of the Saturn V.
And the innovation didn’t stop there. Unlike traditional one-and-done rockets, the Super-NEXUS was envisioned as a reusable marvel. It was designed not just to launch and land, but to land vertically on the ocean’s surface after each mission. Once safely aloft, the massive vehicle would be towed back to port by ships, ready to be refurbished and launched again. This ambitious dream, while never realized, pointed toward a future where space travel was as routine as any other form of transportation.
Such a vision was perhaps too far ahead of its time—but the audacity and scope of the Super-NEXUS continue to inspire, underscoring the boundless potential of human ingenuity in the quest to conquer the stars.
While the idea of a digital afterlife is fascinating, it raises some big questions. For example, who owns your online accounts after you die?
This issue is already being discussed in courts and by governments around the world. In the United States, nearly all states have passed laws allowing people to include digital accounts in their wills.
In Germany, courts ruled that Facebook had to give a deceased person’s family access to their account, saying that digital accounts should be treated as inheritable property, like a bank account or house.
Scientists have developed ‘entanglement microscopy,’ a technique that maps quantum entanglement at a microscopic level.
By studying the deep connections between particles, researchers can now visualize the hidden structures of quantum matter, offering new perspectives on particle interaction that could revolutionize technology and our understanding of the universe.
Quantum entanglement is a fascinating phenomenon where particles remain mysteriously linked, even when separated by vast distances. Understanding how this connection works, especially in complex quantum systems, has been a long-standing challenge in physics.
Recent studies challenge the long-held belief that the Milky Way.
The Milky Way is the galaxy that contains our Solar System and is part of the Local Group of galaxies. It is a barred spiral galaxy that contains an estimated 100–400 billion stars and has a diameter between 150,000 and 200,000 light-years. The name “Milky Way” comes from the appearance of the galaxy from Earth as a faint band of light that stretches across the night sky, resembling spilled milk.
For the first time in history, scientists using the James Webb Space Telescope (JWST) may have uncovered evidence of dark stars, colossal celestial objects powered not by nuclear fusion but by the enigmatic annihilation of dark matter. If confirmed, these mysterious entities could rewrite our understanding of the early universe and the nature of dark matter.
A new technology developed at MIT enables scientists to label proteins across millions of individual cells in fully intact 3D tissues with unprecedented speed, uniformity, and versatility. Using the technology, the team was able to richly label whole rodent brains and other large tissue samples in a single day.
In their new study in Nature Biotechnology, they also demonstrate that the ability to label proteins with antibodies at the single-cell level across whole brains can reveal insights left hidden by other widely used labeling methods.
Profiling the proteins that cells are making is a staple of studies in biology, neuroscience and related fields because the proteins a cell is expressing at a given moment can reflect the functions the cell is trying to perform or its response to its circumstances, such as disease or treatment.
Researchers at the University of Toronto’s Faculty of Applied Science & Engineering have used machine learning to design nano-architected materials that have the strength of carbon steel but the lightness of Styrofoam.
In a new paper published in Advanced Materials, a team led by Professor Tobin Filleter describes how they made nanomaterials with properties that offer a conflicting combination of exceptional strength, light weight and customizability. The approach could benefit a wide range of industries, from automotive to aerospace.
“Nano-architected materials combine high performance shapes, like making a bridge out of triangles, at nanoscale sizes, which takes advantage of the ‘smaller is stronger’ effect, to achieve some of the highest strength-to-weight and stiffness-to-weight ratios, of any material,” says Peter Serles, the first author of the new paper.
