Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
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Category: life extension – Page 72

During my pursuits, I’ve come across an increasing number of exciting nontraditional routes for funding scientific research. The efforts of Adam Marblestone and Benjamin Reinhardt have been particularly instrumental in stimulating this ecosystem, but many other great people have contributed as well. These new funding routes are a welcome relief since many of the most innovative and far-reaching projects are not especially suited for receiving governmental NIH, NSF, etc. funding. If you would like to find a more comprehensive list of such alternative funding sources, you should check out https://arbesman.net/overedge/. My own list (below) consists of funding sources that stand out to me as particularly promising. I hope you find this useful and feel free to reach out if you have any questions!

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Amaranthe Foundation https://amaranth.foundation/bottlenecks-of-aging “We outline initiatives which, if executed, could meaningfully accelerate the advancement of aging science and other life-extending technologies. The resulting document is a philanthropic menu, for which Amaranth is seeking both talent to execute on and co-funders. If you are a founder, researcher, or philanthropist interested in executing or co-sponsoring one or several of the projects or proposals below, please reach out to us”

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Cancer treatments, including chemotherapy, in addition to killing a large number of tumor cells, also result in the generation of senescent tumor cells (also called “zombie cells”). While senescent cells do not reproduce, they do, unfortunately, generate a favorable environment for the expansion of tumor cells that may have escaped the effects of the chemotherapy and eventually result in tumor regrowth.

An international team of researchers led by Dr. Manuel Serrano at IRB Barcelona has described in Nature Cancer how cells that have become senescent after chemotherapy activate the PD-L2 protein to protect themselves from the immune system while recruiting immune suppressor cells. The latter creates an inhibitory environment that impairs the ability of lymphocytes to kill cancer cells.

Based on these findings, scientists wondered what would be the effect of inactivating PD-L2. Interestingly, lacking PD-L2 are rapidly eliminated by the immune system. This intercepts the capacity of senescent cells to create an immunosuppressive environment and, as a result, lymphocytes retain their full capacity to kill those that may have escaped the effects of chemotherapy.

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We are witnessing a professional revolution where the boundaries between man and machine slowly fade away, giving rise to innovative collaboration.

Photo by Mateusz Kitka (Pexels)

As Artificial Intelligence (AI) continues to advance by leaps and bounds, it’s impossible to overlook the profound transformations that this technological revolution is imprinting on the professions of the future. A paradigm shift is underway, redefining not only the nature of work but also how we conceptualize collaboration between humans and machines.

Continue reading “The Professions of the Future (1)” | >

Engineers at MIT, Penn State University, and Carnegie Mellon University have devised a way to manipulate cells in three dimensions using sound waves. These “acoustic tweezers” could make possible 3D printing of cell structures for tissue engineering and other applications, the researchers say.

Designing tissue implants that can be used to treat human disease requires precisely recreating the natural tissue architecture, but so far it has proven difficult to develop a single method that can achieve that while keeping cells viable and functional.

“The results presented in this paper provide a unique pathway to manipulate biological cells accurately and in three dimensions, without the need for any invasive contact, tagging, or biochemical labeling,” says Subra Suresh, president of Carnegie Mellon and former dean of engineering at MIT. “This approach could lead to new possibilities for research and applications in such areas as regenerative medicine, neuroscience, tissue engineering, biomanufacturing, and cancer metastasis.”

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Tissue Nanotransfection (TNT), that can generate any cell type of interest for treatment within the patient’s own body. This technology may be used to repair injured tissue or restore function of aging tissue, including organs, blood vessels and nerve cells.

“By using our novel nanochip technology, injured or compromised organs can be replaced. We have shown that skin is a fertile land where we can grow the elements of any organ that is declining,” said Dr. Chandan Sen, director of Ohio State’s Center for Regenerative Medicine & Cell Based Therapies, who co-led the study with L. James Lee, professor of chemical and biomolecular engineering with Ohio State’s College of Engineering in collaboration with Ohio State’s Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center.

Researchers studied mice and pigs in these experiments. In the study, researchers were able to reprogram skin cells to become vascular cells in badly injured legs that lacked blood flow. Within one week, active blood vessels appeared in the injured leg, and by the second week, the leg was saved. In lab tests, this technology was also shown to reprogram skin cells in the live body into nerve cells that were injected into brain-injured mice to help them recover from stroke.

Continue reading “Regenerative nanochip restores ANY tissue with 98% success and clinical trials start next year” | >

For example, a video of a swinging pendulum would look the same if you played it backward. We see time as irreversible because of another law of nature, the second law of thermodynamics. This law says that the disorder in a system always increases. If the broken glass reassembled itself, the disorder would decrease.

The same law applies to the aging of materials. But physicists from Darmstadt have found out that this is not the case. They have discovered that the motion of molecules in glass or plastic can be reversed in time if you look at it from a special angle.

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MKUltra is not referenced explicitly on Stranger Things — the popular Netflix show — but the series seems to be inspired by the controversial CIA program. In the show, a government laboratory is conducting illegal experiments on a young girl and other persons, torturing them, and harnessing their special abilities for their own purposes. This is similar to the goals of the CIA human experimentation project, which was started 70 years ago.

Controversial and unethical experiments were conducted on human subjects by the Agency for the MKUltra project, including the use of mind control techniques and the administration of drugs such as LSD and other chemicals. Electroshock, hypnosis, sensory deprivation, verbal and sexual abuse, and other forms of torture were also part of the non-consensual experiments, which were created because the CIA was convinced that communists had discovered a way to control human minds. Its activities — which were hidden and classified before their files being destroyed after an investigation — remain a subject of concern and investigation to this day.

MKUltra was a CIA program involving the research and development of chemical and biological agents. According to official documents, it was “concerned with the research and development of chemical, biological and radiological materials capable of employment in clandestine operations to control human behavior.”

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The journey of aging brings with it an unavoidable reality for many: an increased accumulation of body fat.

Though much of society seems mostly focused on the aesthetics of being overweight, doctors look past any cosmetic concerns to focus on the health implications of fat byproducts in the body.

Fatty acids are one of the molecular building blocks that make up fats. Though essential for various bodily functions, excessive amounts of fatty acids in the body can be harmful, shortening a person’s health span and life span by increasing their risk of chronic disease, disrupting metabolic processes and promoting inflammation.

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