Lifeboat Foundation

CRISPR is now universally accessible. Learn how it will change everything from materials science to food science.

A new story out on Engadget, emphasizing the need to make government treat science and technology as a primary focus:

Zoltan Istvan didn’t have much of a chance at being president, but that didn’t stop him from campaigning as the Transhumanist Party’s candidate to promote his pro-technology and science positions. Now, he’s setting his sights a bit lower, and with a different party. Istvan announced this morning that he plans to run for governor of California in 2018 under the Libertarian Party.

“We need leadership that is willing to use radical science, technology, and innovation—what California is famous for—to benefit us all,” he wrote in a Newsweek article. “We need someone with the nerve to risk the tremendous possibilities to save the environment through bioengineering, to end cancer by seeking a vaccine or a gene-editing solution for it, to embrace startups that will take California from the world’s 7th largest economy to maybe even the largest economy—bigger than the rest of America altogether.”

Continue reading “Transhumanist politician wants to run for governor of California” »

The effects of a rapidly aging population have a number of serious economic and social implications.

What a rapidly aging populaton means to the economy and the workforce and why biotechnology is the answer.

#aging #economy

Continue reading “4 Main Economic Implications Of An Aging Population, And How Life Extension Technologies Could Solve Them” »

Plants take in carbon dioxide, water, and sunshine to create a sugary fuel. Now researchers have done the same, but even better.

A recent study in Science describes the system, named Bionic Leaf 2.0. In the “leaf,” solar energy splits up a water molecule, and bacteria turn hydrogen and carbon dioxide into liquid fuel, mainly isopropanol. The fuel could possibly be used to power a car’s engine or motor in the future.

The researchers, led by Daniel Nocera and Pamela Silver from Harvard University, have made advancements on their original Bionic Leaf, released last year. The system had some problems, mainly with the metal catalyst that helped the reaction. In the first edition, the catalyst also set off a reaction that attacked the bacteria’s DNA.

Continue reading “Bionic Leaf Is 10 Times Better At Photosynthesis Than Real Plants” »

Among bacteria’s many attributes, perhaps one of its most overlooked yet important ones is its ability to propel itself via flagellum, a unique appendage hanging off its end. This mechanism is a perfect example of a naturally occurring, biological wheel.

Now, for the first time, scientists were able to take a high resolution, 3D look at these wheels at work, using an electron microscope. Their work was published online yesterday in the journal, PNAS.

A flagella is like a tiny tail at the end of the bacteria, allowing it to move through various mediums. It generates torque (that’s twisting force) from stators, a ring of structures around the motor part of the organ. These act as the wheel providing the power.

Continue reading “Bacteria Have ‘Biological Wheels’ That We Can Finally See In 3D” »

It tells us something important about cancer.

A mysterious cell process named anastasis (Greek for “rising to life”) challenges our idea of life being a linear march towards death, and suggests that cell death can actually be reversed under certain conditions—essentially allowing cells to un-die.

Even as the cell is shrivelling up in response to radiation, toxins, or other stresses, it can in some cases undo the dying process and repair itself if the stress is taken away before the cell is completely gone, said cell biologist Denise Montell of the University of California, Santa Barbara.

Continue reading “Cell Death Might Be Reversible, and Scientists Are Trying to Find Out Why” »

Thanks to 3D printing, scientists can now recreate any organ in the human body.

In Brief:

Researchers found that an Antarctic sea sponge produces a compound that can effectively kill 98.4% of MRSA cells. The compound has been patented and is now undergoing lab synthesis in order to develop a treatment for the life-threatening infection.

Research published in Organic Letters shows a compound that can successfully kill Methicillin-resistant Staphylococcus aureus (MRSA) has been found, a mutated strain of Staphylococcus aureis that has developed resistance to most available antibiotics used in treatment of common staph infections.

Steven Pinker claims that will speed up progress.