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Category: bioengineering – Page 72

A research team led by Rice University neuroengineers has created wireless technology to remotely activate specific brain circuits in fruit flies in under one second.

The team – an assemblage of experts in genetic engineering, nanotechnology, and electrical engineering – used magnetic signals to activate targeted neurons that controlled the body position of freely moving fruit flies in an enclosure.

The researchers first created genetically modified flies bred to express a special heat-sensitive ion channel in neurons that cause flies to partially spread their wings, a common mating gesture. They then injected magnetic nanoparticles that could be heated with an applied magnetic field.

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New research from Binghamton University, State University of New York offers a second life for CDs: Turn them into flexible biosensors that are inexpensive and easy to manufacture.

In a paper published this month in Nature Communications, Matthew Brown, Ph.D. ‘22, and Assistant Professor Ahyeon Koh from the Department of Biomedical Engineering show how a gold CD’s thin metallic layer can be separated from the rigid plastic and fashioned into sensors to monitor in human hearts and muscles as well as lactate, glucose, pH and oxygen levels. The sensors can communicate with a smartphone via Bluetooth.

The fabrication is completed in 20 to 30 minutes without releasing toxic chemicals or needing expensive equipment, and it costs about $1.50 per device. According to the paper, “this sustainable approach for upcycling provides an advantageous research-based that does not require cutting-edge microfabrication facilities, expensive materials or high-caliber engineering skills.”

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A scientific article just published by four Brazilian and two American scientists reports gains in electric and thermal energy obtained when brewer’s spent grain (barley bagasse), an abundant waste produced by the beer industry, is treated with ultrasound before undergoing anaerobic digestion, a microbiological process involving consumption of organic matter and production of methane.

Pre-treatment generated biogas with 56% methane, 27% more than the proportion obtained without use of ultrasound. After purification in methane, the biogas can be used as vehicle fuel with a very low carbon footprint compared to conventional fossil fuels. Moreover, in cogenerators, the methane can be burned off by the brewery to produce electricity and heat. The final waste can be used as biofertilizer instead of mineral fertilizer. The methodology is described in detail in the article, which is published in the Journal of Cleaner Production.

The innovative process was developed at the Laboratory of Bioengineering and Treatment of Water and Waste (Biotar) in the State University of Campinas’s School of Food Engineering (FEA-UNICAMP). The research group lead, T nia Forster-Carneiro, is principal investigator for a project supported by FAPESP.

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Ageless biomarkers and diagnostics company overview.

So proud of fellow Ageless Partners® coach Kamila Issabayeva for giving such an excellent overview of all the different Biomarkers currently on the market. Also, I had the pleasure of being a co-moderator together with Jason C. Mercurio of this wonderful intellectual presentation.

She talks about the ideal Aging biomarker panel, pricing, accuracy and which tests have the highest correlation Aging.

A highly informative presentation that you would not want to miss!

Continue reading “Ageless Biomarkers & Diagnostics Companies” | >

A recent study from the Singapore Centre for Environmental Life Sciences Engineering (SCELSE) at Nanyang Technological University (NTU) and published in Wa | Chemistry And Physics.

This study is intriguing since one of the results of climate change is increasing water temperatures, so removing phosphorus from such waters will prove invaluable in the future, with this study appropriately being referred to as a “future-proof” method.

Since phosphorus in fresh water often results in algal blooms, removing it from wastewater prior to it being released into fresh water is extremely important. This is because algal blooms drastically reduce oxygen levels in natural waters when the algae die, often resulting in the delivery of high levels of toxins, killing organisms in those waters.

Continue reading “New ‘future-proof’ method could remove phosphorus from wastewater using bacteria” | >

So, I think I uncovered a treasure. The Killing Star by Charles Pellegrino and George Zebrowski was originally published 1995 and it paints a dark and seemingly plausible depiction of humanity’s potential future. This book is about several things genetic engineering and cloning, it’s about the destructive power of fanaticism, It’s about the over confidence and hubris of humanity, and that gets really hammered home in this book with all it’s references to the titanic, which has for a very long time been thought of as one of the greatest symbols of human hubris, it’s about AI, and when it goes to far, it’s about our over dependence on technology, it’s about humanity’s indefinite survival outside of earth, and most importantly, it’s about the devastating annihilation of the vast majority of the human race.

Join Dune Club!
https://twitter.com/DanikaXIX/status/1540394079069999106

Music: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=63UR4xLiUNo.

Cover art: https://www.artstation.com/artwork/L3YP2w.

Continue reading “The Devastating Destruction of the Human Race | The Killing Star” | >

Because the heart, unlike other organs, cannot heal itself after injury, heart disease—the top cause of mortality in the U.S.—is particularly lethal. For this reason, tissue engineering will be crucial for the development of cardiac medicine, ultimately leading to the mass production of a whole human heart for transplant.

Researchers need to duplicate the distinctive structures that make up the heart in order to construct a human heart from the ground up. This involves re-creating helical geometries, which cause the heart to beat in a twisting pattern. It has long been hypothesized that this twisting action is essential for pumping blood at high rates, but establishing this has proven problematic, in part because designing hearts with various geometries and alignments has proven difficult.

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Motors are everywhere in our day-to-day lives—from cars to washing machines. A futuristic scientific field is working on tiny motors that could power a network of nanomachines and replace some of the power sources we use in devices today.

In new research published recently in ACS Nano, researchers from the Cockrell School of Engineering at The University of Texas at Austin created the first ever optical . All previous versions of these light-driven motors reside in a solution of some sort, which held back their potential for most real-world applications.

“Life started in the water and eventually moved on land,” said Yuebing Zheng, an associate professor in the Walker Department of Mechanical Engineering. “We’ve made these micro nanomotors that have always lived in solution work on land, in a solid state.”

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