Lifeboat Foundation

The SENS Research Foundation science team is taking the next step in their work on moving mitochondrial genes into the cell nucleus, a process called allotopic expression. Having proven that they can carry out this task with the ATP8 gene in cells, they are now aiming at proof of principle in mice. This will require the production of transgenic mice, using a novel technology funded by the SENS Research Foundation called the maximally modifiable mouse. This mitochondrial project is being crowdfunded at Lifespan.io: you, I, and everyone else can contribute to advancing the state of the art one step further towards eliminating mitochondrial DNA damage as a cause of aging.

Mitochondria are the power plants of the cell, a herd of organelles descended from ancient symbiotic bacteria. They reproduce by replication and are recycled when damaged by cellular maintenance processes. Mitochondria carry the remnant of the original bacterial DNA, encoding thirteen genes vital to the process by which mitochondria package chemical energy store molecules. Unfortunately mitochondria generate reactive molecules as a byproduct of their operation, and this DNA is less well protected than the DNA of the cell nucleus. Some forms of damage to this DNA can break mitochondrial function in ways that allow the broken mitochondria to outcompete their functional peers, leading to dysfunctional cells that export massive quantities of damaging, oxidative molecules into the surrounding tissue. This contributes to conditions such as atherosclerosis, via the production of significant amounts of oxidized cholesterol in the body.

Allotopic expression of mitochondrial genes will work around this issue by providing a backup source of the proteins necessary to mitochondrial function. It has been demonstrated to work for ND4, and that project has been running for some years at Gensight Biologics to produce a therapy for inherited conditions that involve mutation of that gene. This work must expand, however, to encompass all thirteen genes of interest. So lend a hand, and help the SENS Research Foundation team take the next step forward in this process.

EVANSTON, Ill. — A new Northwestern University study finds that despite human’s close genetic relationship to apes, the human gut microbiome is more similar to that of Old World monkeys like baboons than to that of apes like chimpanzees.

These results suggest that human ecology has had a stronger impact in shaping the human gut microbiome than genetic relationships. The results also suggest the human gut microbiome may have unique characteristics compared to other primates, including increased flexibility.

“Understanding what factors shaped the human gut microbiome over evolutionary time can help us understand how gut microbes may have influenced adaptation and evolution in our ancestors and how they interact with our biology and health today,” said Katherine Amato, lead author of the study and assistant professor of anthropology in the Weinberg College of Arts and Sciences at Northwestern.

A trio of researchers from the U.S. and the UK has won the 2019 Nobel Prize in Medicine, the first of five prizes to be announced this week. On Monday in Sweden, the Nobel committee announced that Americans William Kaelin Jr. and Gregg Semenza, along with Peter Ratcliffe, would split the nearly million-dollar prize for their work in unraveling a fundamental aspect of life: how our cells keep track of and respond to fluctuating oxygen levels.

This year’s prize was decades in the making.

Though we’ve long known that our cells need oxygen to produce energy and keep us alive, we were largely in the dark on how cells sensed oxygen, or how they managed to adapt in times of low oxygen, a state known as hypoxia. In the early 1990s, Gregg Semenza, currently of Johns Hopkins University, and his team discovered some of the key genetic machinery that cells use to detect hypoxia and then respond by producing a hormone called erythropoietin (EPO).

Circa 2017

The cells are converted by a small microchip, similar in size to a penny, which injects genetic code into skin cells, transforming them into other types of cell.

Gut microbiome affect metabolic and neural diseases through alterations in epigenetic expressions by DNA methylation and miRNA modulations.

One of the most astonishing revelations might be that information equals reality. In other words, the basis for our material reality is actually immaterial information. Pattern and flow of information is what defines our experiential reality.

Everything boils down to the binary code of Nature. This is a basic tenet of Digital Physics which is the science of information. Nature computes. Deep down we are information technology. We run on genetic, neural and societal codes. Our DNA-based biology is clearly code-theoretic. We are alphabetic all the way down. We communicate intersubjectively mind-to-mind via language-structured exchange of information.

A recent study shows that human speech is transmitted at about 39 bits a sec. Idealist philosopher Terence McKenna used to say that “The world is made of language and if you know the words the world is made of you can make of it whatever you wish.”

At SynBioBeta, entrepreneurs making plant-based foods and genetically engineered bacteria rallied to promote the idea that it’s biology’s century.

Scientists at the University of California, Berkeley have used the CRISPR gene-editing tool to give fruit flies an evolutionary advantage they’ve never had before. By making just three small changes to a single gene, the team gave the flies the ability to effectively eat poison and store it in their bodies, protecting themselves from predators in the process.

Milkweed is a common plant that’s toxic to most animals and insects – but the monarch butterfly flies in the face of that plant’s defenses. The bug has evolved the ability to not only thrive on the poisonous plant, but turn it to its own advantage. It stores the toxins in its body, making it poisonous to any predators that might try to eat it.

And now, the UC Berkeley researchers have given fruit flies that ability for the first time. CRISPR has been used to edit the genes of insects, mammals and even humans, but the team says this is the first time a multicellular organism has been edited to endow it with new behaviors and adaptations to the environment. In this case, that means a new diet and a new defense mechanism against predators.