Lifeboat Foundation

A group of University of Chicago scientists has uncovered a previously unknown way that our genes are made into reality.

Rather than directions going one-way from DNA to RNA to proteins, the latest study shows that RNA itself modulates how DNA is transcribed—using a chemical process that is increasingly apparent to be vital to biology. The discovery has significant implications for our understanding of human disease and drug design.

“It appears to be a fundamental pathway we didn’t know about. Anytime that happens, it holds promise to open up completely new directions of research and inquiry,” said Prof. Chuan He, a world-renowned chemist.

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The Salt Americans wasted 31 percent of all food that was available in 2010, the USDA reports. For the first time, the agency calculated what that means in terms of calories, too.

AeroFarms has put $30m into a green revolution that seeks to produce more crops in less space, but whether it’s economically viable is an open question.

The IAmTranshuman (ist) web site is about the stories of transhumanists, from professors to artists and everything in between from all walks of life. IAmTranshuman is about helping humanity grow and be more then what we were through the responsible use of technology.

Human skin is a fascinating multifunctional organ with unique properties originating from its flexible and compliant nature. It allows for interfacing with external physical environment through numerous receptors interconnected with the nervous system. Scientists have been trying to transfer these features to artificial skin for a long time, aiming at robotic applications.

Robotic systems heavily rely on electronic and magnetic field sensing functionalities required for positioning and orientation in space. Much research has been devoted to implementation of these functionalities in a flexible, compliant form. Recent advancements in flexible sensors and organic electronics have provided important prerequisites. These devices can operate on soft and elastic surfaces, whereas sensors perceive various physical properties and transmit them via readout circuits.

To closely replicate natural skin, it is necessary to interconnect a large number of individual sensors. This challenging task became a major obstacle in realizing electronic skin. First demonstrations were based on an array of individual sensors addressed separately, which unavoidably resulted in a tremendous number of electronic connections. In order to reduce the necessary wiring, important technology had to be developed—namely, complex electronic circuits, current sources and switches had to be combined with individual magnetic sensors to achieve fully integrated devices.

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A new type of immune cell which kills most cancers has been discovered by accident by British scientists, in a finding which could herald a major breakthrough in treatment.

Researchers at Cardiff University were analysing blood from a bank in Wales, looking for immune cells that could fight bacteria, when they found an entirely new type of T-cell.

That new immune cell carries a never-before-seen receptor which acts like a grappling hook, latching on to most human cancers, while ignoring healthy cells.

A recent study has taken an in-depth look at the age-related changes that occur in the microbiome, particularly in regards to bacterial populations.

A detailed look at bacterial populations in the gut microbiome

The publication contains multiple graphs that track age-related changes to various bacterial populations in the gut. These graphs show a common trend: the abundance of these bacterial species increases with aging but then falls significantly in extreme old age. On these charts, Groups 1–5 contain various ages of children, Group 6 consists of 19- to 29-year-olds, and each following group is ten years older than the previous, with Group 14 containing 99- to 110-year-olds.