Science and Technology

Discussion in 'The Mainboard' started by angus, Feb 5, 2016.

  1. Merica

    Merica Devine pls stop pointing out my demise. :(
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    angus or someone else in here, you seem like you might know something about this. We have a product that is anti-static with a resistivity level between 10^9 and 10^11 ohms and this guy needs to know if his product fits within that classification.

    upload_2017-1-5_11-51-25.png

    I honestly don't have a clue here.
     
  2. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    What are you actually asking? Which type of bag (a,b,c, or d) to supply for a fill material that has a level between 10^9 and 10^11 omhs?

    Does this page help?

    http://www.gotopac.com/art-esd-resistivity

    C and D appear the only ones that are actually classified as anti static.

    http://www.crohmiq.com/fibc-type-a-b-c-d-classification-safety.html

    Take it with a grain of salt though because this is just 10 minutes of research.
     
  3. Prospector

    Prospector I am not a new member
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    CRISPR will be a huge story in 2017. Here are 7 things to look for.
    The gene-editing tool’s potential to upend science is dizzying.
    Updated by Eliza Barclay and Brad Plumer Jan 3, 2017, 8:50am EST tweet
    [​IMG]
    With CRISPR, scientists can edit genes quickly and cheaply.
    Shutterstock


    We’re about to enter a golden age of genetic engineering, where huge advances in gene-editing technology are making it possible for scientists to tweak the DNA of different organisms with incredible, unprecedented precision.

    Until just a few years ago, altering individual genes in everything from plant cells to mouse cells to human cells was a crude, laborious, and often futile process.

    Now scientists have developed a technology called CRISPR/Cas9 (or CRISPR for short), which harnesses the immune system of bacteria to snip individual genes, either knocking them out or even inserting new ones in their place. (Here’s our full explainer on CRISPR, which is different from conventional genetic modification techniques.)

    What’s impressive about CRISPR is how it’s transforming the work of so many scientists in so many different fields. Much of the important work is still in the proof-of-concept stage — for example, proving that you can use CRISPR to control transcription (making an RNA copy of a gene sequence), edit the epigenome, or image the genome in living cells. But as the details get worked out, scientists say they can imagine CRISPR becoming an incredibly powerful tool.


    “We are getting to a point where we can investigate different combinations of genes, controlling when, where, and how much they are expressed, and investigate the roles of individual bases of DNA,” says Nicola Patron, a molecular and synthetic biologist at the Earlham Institute in the UK. “Understanding what DNA sequences do is what enables us to solve problems in every field of biology from curing human diseases, to growing enough healthy food, to discovering and making new medicines, to understanding why some species are going extinct.”

    Note that Patron didn’t mention editing genes in human embryos — that is, designing babies with coveted traits like high intelligence or muscular stature. Indeed, most scientists obsessed with CRISPR say this potential use of the technology is much more scientifically challenging and less important than other applications. With 3 billion base pairs, the human genome is so massive that complex modifications will be a major hurdle even with CRISPR. Plus embryo editing is ethically very fraught — it will likely be many years before any scientist in the US gets the green light to try it (though China and other countries will move faster on this front).

    Designer babies, in other words, are, for now, mainly a sideshow. But we asked Patron and a variety of other scientists what they think are realistically the most exciting ways that scientists might one day change the world using CRISPR. Here are some ideas they put forward.


    1) Figure out what different genes actually do
    It sounds strange, but even though scientists have sequenced the entire genomes of organisms like mice, corn, and even humans, we still have a lot to learn about what those genes actually do — and which genes are responsible for certain traits or diseases and so on. Piecing this together is an enormously difficult task.

    CRISPR could, potentially, change that. By knocking out certain genes and then looking at what effects that has, the technology has the potential to help scientists vastly improve their understanding of different genomes. “That’s one of the most exciting uses,” says Jennifer Doudna, one of the early CRISPR pioneers at the University of California Berkeley. “It gives us the potential to uncover what genome sequences are actually telling us about the behavior of different organisms.”

    [​IMG]
    The magical revival of the resurrection plant.
    Wikimedia Commons
    One fun example: Neal Stewart, a professor of plant sciences at the University of Kentucky, has long been interested in the resurrection plant, which can go into a state of near-death during extreme drought, and then revive when the rain returns. With CRISPR, researchers might be able to puzzle together how this fern actually works — and then possibly see if genetic editing could help other crops harness this skill.

    2) Engineer plants to improve food security
    Over the next 30 years, we’re going to have to find ways feed another two billion people. That means we’re going to have to grow a lot more food — and fast. One way we might be able to do this is to engineer crops to be more resilient to things like weeds, pests, and drought, and to grow faster.

    Dan Voytas, a plant geneticist at the University of Minnesota, runs a lab that’s developing methods to use CRISPR for targeted genome modification of plants. Right now, he says he’s working on herbicide-tolerant varieties of cassava for smallholder farmers in Africa. (These plants would be different from conventional GMOs, which are typically created by transplanting genes from other organisms into crops. With CRISPR, you are editing the crop genome directly.)

    Voytas is also interested in understanding how CRISPR might help improve the photosynthetic efficiency of rice. Plants like rice, potatoes, and cassava — staple foods in much of the developing world — have slower photosynthesis rates in hot environments. If scientists like Voytas can figure out how to get rice to do photosynthesis faster, crop yield could increase dramatically.

    [​IMG]<img src="https://cdn1.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/7738015/160317_RCas9_image_no_outlines.jpg" alt=" ">
    A cell carrying an RNA-targeted CRISPR/Cas9 system.
    UC San Diego Health
    3) Identify potential Alzheimer’s treatments
    Martin Kampmann is a cell biologist at the Institute for Neurodegenerative Diseases at the University of California San Francisco. Along with his colleagues, he has helped develop a CRISPR-based platform to identify the genes controlling processes that drive neurodegenerative diseases like Alzheimer's and Parkinson's.

    Kampmann says the goal is to identify new strategies for developing treatments. “It’s a hugely important problem,” he says. “We currently have no therapies that slow the progression of those devastating diseases.”

    4) Develop new cancer treatments
    Scientists have already been exploring how CRISPR might be used to treat certain types of cancer for a few years. A research team at the University of Pennsylvania recently got approval for a small clinical trial in 2017: They will take out some immune cells from 18 patients and use CRISPR to modify the cells to make them more effective at targeting and destroying cancer cells. They will then transplant these edited cells back into the patients and see if it helps with treatment.

    But this is only the beginning. For instance, Luke Gilbert of the University of California San Francisco, tells us that he’s excited about using CRISPR to make safer and more effective suppressors for tumors caused by “mistakes” in the DNA. First, though, he and his colleagues need “to evaluate how every gene encoded by the genome dictates cancer cell sensitivity to new anti-cancer drugs” to figure out which ones will work best.

    5) Reduce our reliance on petrochemicals
    Currently, the world relies on the hydrocarbon molecules found in fossil fuels to create materials like plastics. But with CRISPR, we could conceivably change that.

    One team at the University of California Riverside has been exploring how to use CRISPR to manipulate and control a type of yeast that transforms sugars into hydrocarbons. Eventually, the hope is to engineer yeast that can create the necessary building blocks for certain polymers, adhesives, and fragrances — rather than relying on inefficient petroleum-based processes. (Further out, this process could even be used to produce biofuels for vehicles, although much work remains to be done.)

    And that’s only one project. Other researchers hope CRISPR-engineered yeast can help us reduce our reliance on petrochemicals in a wide variety of areas. “Anything that can be polymerized to make plastic — succinic, fumaric, and malic acids — would be top of my list,” of chemicals to develop, says Sarah Richardson of Ignition Genomics, a private biotech firm in San Francisco. “They could be swapped in to make nylon and polyurethanes that are currently made entirely from benzene made from petrochemicals.”

    [​IMG]<img src="https://cdn3.vox-cdn.com/uploads/chorus_asset/file/7740371/shutterstock_543688933.jpg" alt=" ">
    Scientists can turn tobacco and its relatives into living pharmaceutical factories.
    Shutterstock
    6) Use plants to make drugs and vaccines
    Pharmaceutical makers use all kinds of different systems to produce drugs and vaccines, including bacteria, yeast, and mammal cells. Lately, they’ve been especially keen on turning plants or plant cells into factories for metabolites and proteins. Plants work well because they’re strong, cheap, and have a low risk of contamination with toxins or pathogens. This goes by the name of “molecular pharming.”

    CRISPR can be helpful here for the targeted insertion of specific genes in plants — and to understand how plants genes are regulated, how they respond to foreign molecules, and how they repair their DNA, says Nicola Patron, a molecular and synthetic biologist at the Earlham Institute UK. Lately, she’s been developing plants that could make human therapies and vaccines that are currently very hard to manufacture.

    7) Destroy viruses like HIV, herpes, and hepatitis
    While researchers have come a long way in developing treatments for HIV, herpes, hepatitis, and human papilloma virus, or HPV, they still cause disease and still can’t quite be definitively cured. Bryan Richard Cullen at Duke Medical Center says CRISPR can be used to target and destroy these persistent DNA viruses in ways researchers haven’t be able to before.

    The way he uses CRISPR is to develop a vector, based on different Cas9 proteins encoded by different bacteria, which attack DNA viruses in cultured cells. “We hope to move these studies into animal models in the very near future to see if we can cure animals bearing, for example, an HPV-16 induced tumor, or with a high level [Hepatitis B] infection of their liver,” his website says.

    Further reading:

    A simple guide to CRISPR, one of the biggest science stories of 2017

    — Michael Specter has a massive feature in the New Yorker on DNA editing.
     
  4. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Metallic hydrogen, once theory, becomes reality
    January 26, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Image of diamond anvils compressing molecular hydrogen. At higher pressure the sample converts to atomic hydrogen, as shown on the right. Credit: R. Dias and I.F. Silvera

    Nearly a century after it was theorized, Harvard scientists have succeeded in creating the rarest - and potentially one of the most valuable - materials on the planet.


    The material - atomic metallic hydrogen - was created by Thomas D. Cabot Professor of the Natural Sciences Isaac Silvera and post-doctoral fellow Ranga Dias. In addition to helping scientists answer fundamental questions about the nature of matter, the material is theorized to have a wide range of applications, including as a room-temperature superconductor. The creation of the rare material is described in a January 26 paper published in Science.

    "This is the holy grail of high-pressure physics," Silvera said. "It's the first-ever sample of metallic hydrogen on Earth, so when you're looking at it, you're looking at something that's never existed before."

    To create it, Silvera and Dias squeezed a tiny hydrogen sample at 495 gigapascal, or more than 71.7 million pounds-per-square inch - greater than the pressure at the center of the Earth. At those extreme pressures, Silvera explained, solid molecular hydrogen -which consists of molecules on the lattice sites of the solid - breaks down, and the tightly bound molecules dissociate to transforms into atomic hydrogen, which is a metal.

    While the work offers an important new window into understanding the general properties of hydrogen, it also offers tantalizing hints at potentially revolutionary new materials.

    "One prediction that's very important is metallic hydrogen is predicted to be meta-stable," Silvera said. "That means if you take the pressure off, it will stay metallic, similar to the way diamonds form from graphite under intense heat and pressure, but remains a diamond when that pressure and heat is removed."

    Understanding whether the material is stable is important, Silvera said, because predictions suggest metallic hydrogen could act as a superconductor at room temperatures.

    "That would be revolutionary," he said. "As much as 15 percent of energy is lost to dissipation during transmission, so if you could make wires from this material and use them in the electrical grid, it could change that story."

    Among the holy grails of physics, a room temperature superconductor, Dias said, could radically change our transportation system, making magnetic levitation of high-speed trains possible, as well as making electric cars more efficient and improving the performance of many electronic devices.

    The material could also provide major improvements in energy production and storage - because superconductors have zero resistance energy could be stored by maintaining currents in superconducting coils, and then be used when needed.


    [​IMG]
    Photos of compressed hydrogen transitioning with increasing pressure from transparent molecular to black molecular to atomic metallic hydrogen. The sketches below show a molecular solid being compressed and then dissociated to atomic hydrogen. Credit: R. Dias and I.F. Silvera

    Though it has the potential to transform life on Earth, metallic hydrogen could also play a key role in helping humans explore the far reaches of space, as the most powerful rocket propellant yet discovered.

    "It takes a tremendous amount of energy to make metallic hydrogen," Silvera explained. "And if you convert it back to molecular hydrogen, all that energy is released, so it would make it the most powerful rocket propellant known to man, and could revolutionize rocketry."

    The most powerful fuels in use today are characterized by a "specific impulse" - a measure, in seconds, of how fast a propellant is fired from the back of a rocket - of 450 seconds. The specific impulse for metallic hydrogen, by comparison, is theorized to be 1,700 seconds.


    "That would easily allow you to explore the outer planets," Silvera said. "We would be able to put rockets into orbit with only one stage, versus two, and could send up larger payloads, so it could be very important."

    To create the new material, Silvera and Dias turned to one of the hardest materials on Earth - diamond.

    But rather than natural diamond, Silvera and Dias used two small pieces of carefully polished synthetic diamond which were then treated to make them even tougher and then mounted opposite each other in a device known as a diamond anvil cell.

    "Diamonds are polished with diamond powder, and that can gouge out carbon from the surface," Silvera said. "When we looked at the diamond using atomic force microscopy, we found defects, which could cause it to weaken and break."

    The solution, he said, was to use a reactive ion etching process to shave a tiny layer - just five microns thick, or about one-tenth of a human hair - from the diamond's surface. The diamonds were then coated with a thin layer of alumina to prevent the hydrogen from diffusing into their crystal structure and embrittling them.

    After more than four decades of work on metallic hydrogen, and nearly a century after it was first theorized, seeing the material for the first time, Silvera said, was thrilling.

    "It was really exciting," he said. "Ranga was running the experiment, and we thought we might get there, but when he called me and said, 'The sample is shining,' I went running down there, and it was metallic hydrogen.

    "I immediately said we have to make the measurements to confirm it, so we rearranged the lab...and that's what we did," he said. "It's a tremendous achievement, and even if it only exists in this diamond anvil cell at high pressure, it's a very fundamental and transformative discovery."
     
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  5. Heavy Mental

    Heavy Mental non serviam
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    should move this thread to the donor board, imo

    don't want it to get shut down by the feds
     
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  6. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    A commuter's dream: Entrepreneurs race to develop flying car
    January 30, 2017 by Joan Lowy
    [​IMG]
    This artist rendering provided by Airbus shows a vehicle in their flying car project, Vahana. Even before George Jetson entranced kids with his flying car, people dreamed of soaring above traffic congestion. Inventors and entrepreneurs have …more

    Even before George Jetson entranced kids with his cartoon flying car, people dreamed of soaring above traffic congestion. Inventors and entrepreneurs have long tried and failed to make the dream a reality, but that may be changing.


    Nearly a dozen companies around the globe, including some with deep pockets such as European aircraft maker Airbus, are competing to be the first to develop a new kind of aircraft that will enable commuters to glide above crowded roadways. A few of the aircraft under development are cars with wings that unfold for flight, but most aren't cars at all. Typically they take off and land vertically like helicopters. Rather than a single, large main rotor, they have multiple small rotors. Each rotor is operated by a battery-powered electric motor instead of a conventional aircraft piston engine.

    It's no sure bet that flying-car dreams will turn into reality. There are many obstacles, including convincing regulators that the aircraft are safe, figuring out how to handle thousands of new low-flying aircraft over cities without collisions and developing batteries that will keep them aloft long enough to be useful.

    But entrepreneurs are moving forward. They see a vast potential market for "air taxis" and personally owned small aircraft to transport people from the fringes of metropolitan areas to city centers as urban areas grow more congested and people spend more time stuck in traffic. They envision tens of thousands of one or two-person flying taxis delivering passengers to the rooftops of office buildings in city centers and other landing pads during rush hours.

    "In as little as 10 years, products could be on the market that revolutionize urban travel for millions of people," said Zach Lovering, the leader of Airbus' project to develop an autonomous flying taxi called the Vahana. The name means the mount or vehicle of a Hindu deity.

    [​IMG]
    This image provided by Joby Aviation shows the conceptual design of the Joby S2 Electric VTOL PAV aircraft. Even before George Jetson entranced kids with his flying car, people dreamed of soaring above traffic congestion. Inventors and …more
    Uber released a 98-page report in October making the business case for air taxis, which the company sees as the future of on-demand transportation. Uber doesn't have any plans to develop a flying car itself, but the online transportation network is advising several companies that have aircraft in the works.

    "The role we want to play is as a catalyst for the entire industry," said Nikhil Goel, an Uber project manager for advanced programs.

    Some of the aircraft are drones that will be preprogrammed for each flight and monitored or operated from the ground or a command center. Others are designed for human pilots.

    It's unclear yet how much the aircraft will cost, although prices are likely to vary significantly. Some of the aircraft are designed to be individually owned, while others are envisioned more for commercial use. Designers hope that if demand is high, prices can be kept affordable through economies of mass production.

    Several recent developments could make these aircraft possible. Advances in computing power mean the rotors on multi-copter drones can be adjusted many times per second, making the aircraft easy to control. Drones have also benefited from advances in battery and electric motor technology. Some companies, like Chinese dronemaker EHang, are scaling-up drones so that they can carry people.

    [​IMG]
    This artist rendering provided by Airbus shows a vehicle in their flying car project, Vahana. Even before George Jetson entranced kids with his flying car, people dreamed of soaring above traffic congestion. Inventors and entrepreneurs have …more
    Another aircraft under development, Santa Cruz, California-based Joby Aviation's S2, looks more like a conventional plane except that there are 12 tiltrotors spread along the wings and tail. And some, like the Vahana, a cockpit mounted on a sled and flanked by propellers in front and back, don't really look like any aircraft in the skies today.

    "In terms of what you can make fly in a reliable manner, the solution speed gateway that (computer) chips have gone through recently have literally opened the door to a whole new world of flying machine possibilities," said Charles Eastlake, an Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University professor emeritus of aerospace engineering.

    But he also cautioned: "My best engineering guess is that people actually using autonomous air taxis in the next 10 or 15 years is possible, but definitely not certain. The challenges are big."

    Key for many of the designs will be the development of longer-lasting lightweight batteries. Currently available batteries could probably keep an air taxi aloft about 15 to 30 minutes before it would have to land, experts said. Depending on how fast the aircraft flies, that probably isn't quite enough to transport passengers between nearby cities or across metropolitan areas, experts said.

    Another hurdle will be winning Federal Aviation Administration certification for any radical new kind of aircraft when approval of even small changes in aviation technology can take years.

    [​IMG]
    This image provided by Joby Aviation shows the conceptual design of the Joby S2 Electric VTOL PAV aircraft. Even before George Jetson entranced kids with his flying car, people dreamed of soaring above traffic congestion. Inventors and …more
    The FAA said in a statement that it is taking a "flexible, open-minded, and risk-based approach" to flying cars. FAA officials have discussed with several manufacturers the certification of aircraft that will be flown with a pilot in the beginning, and later converted to an autonomous passenger aircraft.

    While further research is needed to ensure that autonomous aircraft are safe, "we believe automation technology already being prototyped in low-risk unmanned aircraft missions, when fully mature, could have a positive effect" on aviation safety," the agency said.

    Reducing noise is another challenge since air taxis will be taking off and landing in densely populated areas. So is creating enough landing pads to handle lots of aircraft at the same time. A new air traffic control system would also likely be needed.

    "It's pretty clear that the existing air traffic control system won't scale to the kind of density at low altitudes that people are talking about," said John Hansman, a Massachusetts Institute of Technology professor who chairs the FAA's research and engineering advisory committee.

    NASA is developing an air traffic control system for small drones that perhaps could be expanded to include flying cars.

    "There's no question we can build the vehicle," Hansman said. "The big challenge is whether we can build a vehicle that would be allowed to operate in the places where people want to use it."

    Flying cars under development vary significantly

    Spurred by technology advances and demand for transportation alternatives in increasingly congested cities, entrepreneurs around the globe are vying to become the first to develop a commercially viable "flying car." The designs vary greatly, and most aren't actually cars capable of driving on roads. Here are some examples:

    Vahana

    European aircraft manufacturer Airbus is working at its Silicon Valley research center on a driverless flying taxi that at first will have a pilot, but will later be autonomous. The vertical takeoff-landing, all-electric aircraft is a cockpit mounted on a sled and flanked by propellers in front and back. Airbus plans to test a prototype before the end of 2017, and to have the first Vahanas ready for production by 2020.

    [​IMG]
    This image provided by Urban Aeronautics/Tactical Robotics shows an Israeli-made flying car. Urban Aeronautics conducted flight tests of its passenger-carrying drone call the Cormorant in Megiddo, Israel, late in 2016. The company says the …more
    ___

    Cormorant

    Israeli tech firm Urban Aeronautics originally designed its people-carrying drone as an "air mule" for military use. It takes off vertically and has a standard helicopter engine, but no large main rotor. Its lift comes from two fans buried inside the fuselage. Two smaller ducted "fans" mounted in the rear provide forward movement. It can fly between buildings and below power lines, attain speeds up to 115 mph, stay aloft for an hour and carry up to 1,100 pounds

    ___

    Lilium Jet

    German technology company Lilium Aviation is working on a two-seater aircraft that will take off vertically using 36 electric fan engines arrayed along its wings. The aircraft will hover and climb until the fans are turned backward slowly. After that, it flies forward like a plane using electric jet engines. The company has been flight-testing small scale models. The aircraft will have an estimated cruising speed of up to 190 mph and a range of 190 miles.

    [​IMG]
    This image provided by Urban Aeronautics/Tactical Robotics shows an Israeli-made flying car. Urban Aeronautics conducted flight tests of its passenger-carrying drone call the Cormorant in Megiddo, Israel, late in 2016. The company says the …more
    ___

    AeroMobil 3.0

    The Slovakian company AeroMobil has developed a car with wings that unfold for flight. It uses regular gasoline and fits into standard parking spaces. It can also take off from airports or "any grass strip or paved surface just a few hundred meters long," according to the company's website. Driver and pilot licenses will be required.

    ___

    EHang 184

    Chinese drone maker EHang has been flight-testing a person-carrying drone in Nevada. The vehicle is a cockpit with four arms equipped with rotors. Takeoff and landing targets are pre-programmed. A command station in China will be able to monitor and control the aircraft anywhere in the world, company officials say.

    ___

    S2

    Joby Aviation of Santa Cruz, California is developing a two-seat, all-electric plane with 12 tilt rotors arrayed along its wings and tail. The aircraft takes off and lands vertically and can achieve speeds up to 200 mph, according to the company's website.

    [​IMG]
    This image provided by Urban Aeronautics/Tactical Robotics shows an Israeli-made flying car. Urban Aeronautics conducted flight tests of its passenger-carrying drone call the Cormorant in Megiddo, Israel, late in 2016. The company says the aircraft can fly between buildings and below power lines, attain speeds up to 115 mph, stay aloft for an hour and carry up to 1,100 pounds. (Urban Aeronautics/Tactical Robotics via AP)
    ___

    Transition/TF-X

    Terrafugia, based in Woburn, Massachusetts, began working a decade ago on a car folding wings that can fly or be driven on roads that's called the Transition. The company says it plans to begin production of the Transition in 2019. Terrafugia is also working on a "flying car" called the TF-X—a car with folding arms and rotors for vertical takeoff and landing.

    ___

    Volocopter

    This two-seater, electric multicopter from German company e-volo has 18-rotors and looks like a cross between a helicopter and a drone. It is controlled from the ground, eliminating the need for a pilot license.

    ___

    Zee

    This Mountain View, California, aircraft developer bankrolled by Google co-founder Larry Page says on its webpage that it is working on a "revolutionary new form of transportation" at the "intersection of aerodynamics, advanced manufacturing and electric propulsion." Company officials declined to provide details about Zee's projects.
     
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  7. Keef

    Keef Liked by Pierre Gasly
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  8. Can I Spliff it

    Can I Spliff it Is Butterbean okay?
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    Ya hagfish slime is trill af
     
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  9. oldberg

    oldberg Thinkin bout thos beans
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    Fuck you
     
  10. Hoss Bonaventure

    Hoss Bonaventure I can’t pee with clothes touching my butt
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    No u!
     
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  11. oldberg

    oldberg Thinkin bout thos beans
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    Gfy :bananallama:
     
  12. Hoss Bonaventure

    Hoss Bonaventure I can’t pee with clothes touching my butt
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  13. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Finally a theory for how life started that makes realistic sense.

    Enzyme-free krebs cycle may have been key step in origin of life on Earth
    March 13, 2017
    [​IMG]
    A set of biochemical processes crucial to cellular life on Earth could have originated in chemical reactions taking place on the early Earth four billion years ago, believes a group of scientists from the Francis Crick Institute and the University of Cambridge. The researchers have demonstrated in the lab an enzyme-free metabolic pathway that mirrors the important Krebs cycle present in living organisms today. It is sparked by particles called sulphate radicals under conditions similar to those on the harsh, volcanic Earth of four billion years ago. There has been much interest in how the first life forms developed in these conditions and how the biochemical processes necessary to sustain life could form from nothing. Credit: Aleksej Zelezniak/Francis Crick Institute

    A set of biochemical processes crucial to cellular life on Earth could have originated in chemical reactions taking place on the early Earth four billion years ago, believes a group of scientists from the Francis Crick Institute and the University of Cambridge.


    The researchers have demonstrated a network of chemical reactions in the lab which mimic the important Krebs cycle present in living organisms today. In a study published in the journal Nature Ecology and Evolution, they say it could explain an important step in how life developed on Earth.

    Life developed four billion years ago on a harsh, volcanic Earth that lacked any oxygen, but that did possess large oceans rich in metal ions. There has been much interest in how the first life forms developed in these conditions and how the biochemical processes necessary to sustain life could form from nothing.

    Metabolism is universal to life. It's the set of processes through which we gain energy from food and produce the biomolecules we need in our body's cells. The biochemical pathways that underpin these processes are highly similar across all organisms and species.

    One central metabolic pathway learned by every A-level biology student is the Krebs cycle. But how did this essential set of chemical reactions, each step catalyzed by an enzyme, first arise? Each step in the cycle is not enough by itself. Life needs a sequence of these reactions, and it would have needed it before biological enzymes were around: Amino acids, the molecular components of enzymes, are made from products of the Krebs cycle.

    The research group from the Francis Crick Institute and the University of Cambridge say their demonstration offers an answer. They have shown an enzyme-free metabolic pathway that mirrors the Krebs cycle. It is sparked by particles called sulphate radicals under conditions similar to those on Earth four billion years ago.

    Senior author Dr Markus Ralser of the Francis Crick Institute and University of Cambridge explains: "This non-enzymatic precursor of the Krebs cycle that we have demonstrated forms spontaneously, is biologically sensible and efficient. It could have helped ignite life four billion years ago."

    The scientists used simple carbon compounds which are involved at various points in the Krebs cycle (such compounds have recently been found in a meteorite by NASA scientists) and mixed them with iron and sulphur-containing chemicals that would be found in sediments in the early oceans.

    [​IMG]
    A set of biochemical processes crucial to cellular life on Earth could have originated in chemical reactions taking place on the early Earth four billion years ago, believes a group of scientists from the Francis Crick Institute and the …more
    They carried out a systematic screening strategy of around 4,850 different experiments using mass spectrometry techniques, and looked out for reactions similar to those seen in the Krebs cycle.

    In the vast majority of cases, the mixtures were unreactive. However, in the presence of the compound peroxydisulfate, the researchers detected 24 chemical reactions. These resembled the pattern of reactions seen in the Krebs cycle in living organisms.

    "We took components representative of the sediments present on Earth billions of years ago." says Dr Ralser, "As salts that would have been present in the sediments did not trigger many reactions, we mostly concentrated on metal ions and sulphate species. These are also known to be important in the modern cell's Krebs cycle.

    "We conducted a huge screen involving thousands of measurements then systematically worked through them. At the end we found a condition that may have enabled the Krebs cycle to emerge. It relies on sulphate radicals and previously nobody had thought about them."

    An alternative hypothesis for the origin of life suggests that RNA - a molecule similar to DNA that can maintain genetic information but is more transient and more reactive - can explain the first steps towards life. This is known as the RNA-world hypothesis.

    Dr Ralser says: "There is a huge scientific debate about whether the first steps towards life were driven by metabolism or genetics."

    He argues that the presence of RNA molecules cannot easily explain the origin of metabolism, as RNA is made from products of metabolism. And that his group's results support the theory that environmental chemistry enabled metabolism to begin.

    "People have tried to work on a non-enzymatic Krebs cycle for years, but most have thought about it theoretically or philosophically. Few have done systematic physical experiments like those we report here. A non-enzymatic catalyst for the Krebs cycle exists and we have found it," concludes Dr Ralser
     
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  14. Shawn Hunter

    Shawn Hunter Vote Corey Matthews for Congress
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  15. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Several cool new technologies in this article. Mainly the hyper water repellent by just altering surface structure. Especially watch the video.

    Imaging at the speed of light
    March 14, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Researchers at the University of Rochester's Institute of Optics developed a technique to visualize, for the first time, the complete evolution of micro- and nanoscale structural formation on a material's surface both during and after the …more

    Tiny micro- and nanoscale structures within a material's surface are invisible to the naked eye, but play a big role in determining a material's physical, chemical, and biomedical properties.


    Over the past few years, Chunlei Guo and his research team at the University of Rochester have found ways to manipulate those structures by irradiating laser pulses to a material's surface. They've altered materials to make them repel water, attract water, and absorb great amounts of light—all without any type of coating.

    Now, Guo, Anatoliy Vorobyev, and Ranran Fang, researchers at the University's Institute of Optics, have advanced the research another step forward. They've developed a technique to visualize, for the first time, the complete evolution of micro- and nanoscale structural formation on a material's surface, both during and after the application of a laser pulse.

    "After we determined that we could drastically alter the property of a material through creating tiny structures in its surface, the next natural step was to understand how these tiny structures were formed," Guo says. "This is very important because after you understand how they're formed you can better control them."

    Having that control will open the way for improvements in all kinds of technologies, including anti-corrosive building materials, energy absorbers, fuel cells, space telescopes, airplane de-icing, medical instrumentation, and sanitation in third world countries.





    Over the past few years, Chunlei Guo and his research team at the University of Rochester have used lasers to manipulate the properties of target materials and make them, for instance, superhydrophilic or superhydrophobic. Now the team has developed …more
    In a paper published in the Nature journal Light: Science & Applications, the group introduced a scattered-light imaging technique that allows them to record an ultrafast movie of the ways in which laser radiation alters a material's surface. The technique opens a window on the entire process, from the moment a laser hits the material to melting, transient surface fluctuations, and resolidification resulting in permanent micro- and nanostructures.

    It currently takes about an hour to pattern a one-inch by one-inch metal sample. Identifying how micro- and nanostructures form has the potential to allow scientists to streamline the creation of these structures—including increasing the speed and efficiency of patterning surfaces.

    Creating and altering these small structures makes properties intrinsically part of the material and reduces the need for temporary chemical coatings.

    To produce these effects, researchers use a femtosecond laser. This laser produces an ultra-fast pulse with a duration of tens of femtoseconds. (A femtosecond is equal to one quadrillionth of a second.)

    [​IMG]
    Electron microscope images of micro- and nanostructures found within a material’s surface after application of femtosecond laser pulses . Credit: Guo Lab
    Changing the laser's conditions causes changes in the morphological features of the surface structures— such as their geometry, size, and density—leading the material to exhibit various specific physical properties.

    It is difficult to obtain detailed images and movies of events in micro- and nanoscales because they occur during a matter of femtoseconds, picoseconds (one trillionth of a second), and nanoseconds (one billionth of a second).

    To put this into perspective: Vorobyev explains that it takes about one second for light to travel from Earth to the moon. However, light travels only about one foot in a nanosecond and approximately 0.3 micrometers in a femtosecond, which is a distance comparable to the diameter of a virus or bacteria.

    A typical video camera records a series of images at a rate of five to 30 frames per second. When playing the series of images in real time, human eyes perceive continuous motion rather than a series of separate frames.

    [​IMG]
    The imaging setup that allows researchers to visual material effects. Credit: Guo Lab
    So how was Guo's team able to record frames at an interval of femtoseconds, picoseconds, and nanoseconds? They used a technique involving scattered light. During a femtosecond laser pulse, the beam is split in two: one pump beam is aimed at the material target in order to cause micro- and nanostructural change, and the second probe beam acts as a flashbulb to illuminate the process and record it into a CCD camera—a highly-sensitive imaging device with high-resolution capabilities.

    "We worked very hard to develop this new technique," Guo says. "With the scattered light pulsing at femtosecond time intervals, we can capture the very small changes at an extremely fast speed. From these images we can clearly see how the structures start to form."

    Guo explains that this scattered light visualization technique has applications for capturing any process that takes place on a minute scale. "The technique we developed is not necessarily limited to just studying the surface effects produced in my lab. The foundation we laid in this work is very important for studying ultrafast and tiny changes on a material surface." This includes studying melting, crystallography, fluid dynamics, and even cell activities.
     
  16. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Wi-fi on rays of light—100 times faster, and never overloaded
    March 17, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Credit: Public Domain

    Slow wi-fi is a source of irritation that nearly everyone experiences. Wireless devices in the home consume ever more data, and it's only growing, and congesting the wi-fi network. Researchers at Eindhoven University of Technology have come up with a surprising solution: a wireless network based on harmless infrared rays. The capacity is not only huge (more than 40Gbit/s per ray) but also there is no need to share since every device gets its own ray of light. This was the subject for which TU/e researcher Joanne Oh received her PhD degree with the 'cum laude' distinction last week.

    The system conceived in Eindhoven is simple and, in principle, cheap to set up. The wireless data comes from a few central 'light antennas', for instance mounted on the ceiling, which are able to very precisely direct the rays of light supplied by an optical fiber. Since there are no moving parts, it is maintenance-free and needs no power: the antennas contain a pair of gratings that radiate light rays of different wavelengths at different angles ('passive diffraction gratings'). Changing the light wavelengths also changes the direction of the ray of light. Since a safe infrared wavelength is used that does not reach the vulnerable retina in your eye, this technique is harmless.

    No interference

    If you walk around as a user and your smartphone or tablet moves out of the light antenna's line of sight, then another light antenna takes over. The network tracks the precise location of every wireless device using its radio signal transmitted in the return direction. It is a simple matter to add devices: they are assigned different wavelengths by the same light antenna and so do not have to share capacity. Moreover, there is no longer any interference from a neighboring wi-fi network.

    Data capacity of light rays

    Current wi-fi uses radio signals with a frequency of 2.5 or 5 gigahertz. The system conceived at TU Eindhoven uses infrared light with wavelengths of 1500 nanometers and higher; this light has frequencies that are thousands of times higher, some 200 terahertz, which makes the data capacity of the light rays much larger. Joanne Oh even managed a speed of 42.8 Gbit/s over a distance of 2.5 meters. For comparison, the average connection speed in the Netherlands is two thousand times less (17.6 Mbit/s). Even if you have the very best wi-fi system available, you won't get more than 300 Mbit/s in total, which is some hundred times less than the speed per ray of light achieved by the Eindhoven study. The Eindhoven system has so far used the light rays only to download; uploads are still done using radio signals since in most applications much less capacity is needed for uploading.

    Five years

    The work of doctoral student Oh is part of the wider BROWSE project headed up by professor of broadband communication technology Ton Koonen, and with funding from the European Research Council. Joanne Oh focused predominantly on the technology of data transmission via directable infrared light rays. Other PhDs are still working on the technology that tracks the location of all the wireless devices as well as on the essential central fiber-optic network connecting the light antennas. Koonen expects it will still be five years or more before the new technology will be in our stores. He thinks that the first devices to be connected to this new kind of wireless network will be high data consumers like video monitors, laptops or tablets.

    Many devices at the same time

    Koonen's group is not the only one working on 'indoor optical wireless networks'. A few other universities and research institutes around the world are also studying whether data can be transmitted via a room's LED lighting. However, the drawback here is that the bandwidth is not high and that the connected devices still have to share. A few other groups are investigating network concepts in which infrared light rays are directed using movable mirrors. The disadvantage here is that this requires active control of the mirrors and therefore energy, and each mirror is only capable of handling one ray of light at a time. The grating used by Koonen and Oh can cope with many rays of light and, therefore, devices at the same time.

    The work of Oh and Koonen comes under the auspices of the TU/e Institute for Photonic Integration, one of the world's leading research institutes for 'photonics', the use of light (photons) rather than electricity (electrons) to transmit data.



    Read more at: https://phys.org/news/2017-03-wi-fi-rays-light100-faster-overloaded.html#jCp
     
  17. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Scientists unveil a giant leap for anti-aging
    March 23, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Researchers have discovered a protein complex in humans that helps protect cells from DNA damage. The finding could be helpful for astronauts in space, who are at greater risk of DNA damage from cosmic radiation. Credit: David Sinclair, Harvard Medical School

    UNSW researchers have made a discovery that could lead to a revolutionary drug that actually reverses ageing, improves DNA repair and could even help NASA get its astronauts to Mars.


    In a paper published in Science today, the team identifies a critical step in the molecular process that allows cells to repair damaged DNA.

    Their experiments in mice suggest a treatment is possible for DNA damage from ageing and radiation. It is so promising it has attracted the attention of NASA, which believes the treatment can help its Mars mission.

    While our cells have an innate capability to repair DNA damage—which happens every time we go out into the sun, for example - their ability to do this declines as we age.

    The scientists identified that the metabolite NAD+, which is naturally present in every cell of our body, has a key role as a regulator in protein-to-protein interactions that control DNA repair.

    Treating mice with a NAD+ precursor, or "booster," called NMN improved their cells' ability to repair DNA damage caused by radiation exposure or old age.

    "The cells of the old mice were indistinguishable from the young mice, after just one week of treatment," said lead author Professor David Sinclair of UNSW School of Medical Sciences and Harvard Medical School Boston.

    Human trials of NMN therapy will begin within six months.

    "This is the closest we are to a safe and effective anti-ageing drug that's perhaps only three to five years away from being on the market if the trials go well," says Sinclair, who maintains a lab at UNSW in Sydney.

    What it means for astronauts, childhood cancer survivors, and the rest of us:

    The work has excited NASA, which is considering the challenge of keeping its astronauts healthy during a four-year mission to Mars.

    Even on short missions, astronauts experience accelerated ageing from cosmic radiation, suffering from muscle weakness, memory loss and other symptoms when they return. On a trip to Mars, the situation would be far worse: five per cent of the astronauts' cells would die and their chances of cancer would approach 100 per cent.

    Professor Sinclair and his UNSW colleague Dr Lindsay Wu were winners in NASA's iTech competition in December last year.

    "We came in with a solution for a biological problem and it won the competition out of 300 entries," Dr Wu says.

    [​IMG]
    Professor David Sinclair and his UNSW team. Credit: Britta Campion
    Cosmic radiation is not only an issue for astronauts. We're all exposed to it aboard aircraft, with a London-Singapore-Melbourne flight roughly equivalent in radiation to a chest x-ray.

    In theory, the same treatment could mitigate any effects of DNA damage for frequent flyers.The other group that could benefit from this work is survivors of childhood cancers.

    Dr Wu says 96 per cent of childhood cancer survivors suffer a chronic illness by age 45, including cardiovascular disease, Type 2 diabetes, Alzheimer's disease, and cancers unrelated to the original cancer.

    "All of this adds up to the fact they have accelerated ageing, which is devastating," he says.

    "It would be great to do something about that, and we believe we can with this molecule."

    An anti-ageing pill could be on the horizon:

    For the past four years, Professor Sinclair and Dr Wu have been working on making NMN into a drug substance with their companies MetroBiotech NSW and MetroBiotech International.

    The human trials will begin this year at Brigham and Women's Hospital, in Boston.

    The findings on NAD+ and NMN add momentum to the exciting work the UNSW Laboratory for Ageing Research has done over the past four years.

    They've been looking at the interplay of a number of proteins and molecules and their roles in the ageing process.

    They had already established that NAD+ could be useful for treating various diseases of ageing, female infertility and also treating side effects of chemotherapy.

    In 2003, Professor Sinclair made a link between the anti-ageing enzyme SIRT1 and resveratrol, a naturally occurring molecule found in tiny quantities in red wine.

    "While resveratrol activates SIRT1 alone, NAD+ boosters activate all seven sirtuins, SIRT1-7, and should have an even greater impact on health and longevity," he says.
     
  18. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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  19. Prospector

    Prospector I am not a new member
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    Scientist have created a synthetic womb. Should really help w viability of premies
     
  20. Henry Blake

    Henry Blake No Springsteen is leaving this house!
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    http://www.independent.co.uk/news/h...ns-hospital-philadelphia-nature-a7701546.html

    Scientists create 'artificial womb' that could save premature babies' lives
    Researchers rule out possibility new device will spell end of conventional pregnancy

    Extremely premature babies could be kept alive in future using an “artificial womb” that scientists plan to test in humans after a successful study involving unborn lambs.

    A plastic bag filled with artificial amniotic fluid – the nutrient-rich liquid that sustains a foetus in the womb – allowed foetal lambs to develop at an age equivalent to 23 weeks in humans.

    Human infants born at 23 weeks have just a 15 per cent chance of survival, according to pregnancy research charity Tommy’s. This rises to 55 per cent at 24 weeks, while babies born at 25 weeks have an 80 per cent chance of survival.

    Premature babies are often placed in incubators to help keep them warm, but the new invention closely replicates conditions in a real womb, scientists at the Center for Fetal Research at the Children's Hospital of Philadelphia have said.

    “This system is potentially far superior to what hospitals can currently do for a 23-week-old baby born at the cusp of viability,” said Dr Alan Flake, the Centre’s director.

    “These infants have an urgent need for a bridge between the mother's womb and the outside world. If we can develop an extra-uterine system to support growth and organ maturation for only a few weeks, we can dramatically improve outcomes for extremely premature babies.”

    Inside the device, the infant's own heart circulates blood through the umbilical cord into an external gas-exchange machine taking the place of the mother's placenta, while synthetic amniotic fluid enriched with nutrients flows in and out of the temperature-controlled, near-sterile “biobag”.

    No mechanical pump is used, because even gentle artificial pressure could fatally overload an underdeveloped heart.




    Expert Professor Colin Duncan, from the University of Edinburgh, said: “This research isn't about replacing the womb in the first half of pregnancy. It is about the development of new ways of treating extremely premature babies.

    “The researchers supported the growth and development of extremely premature foetuses within a bag of fluid where the foetus pumps its own blood through an artificial placenta.

    “This is a really attractive concept and this study is a very important step forward. There are still huge challenges to refine the technique, to make good results more consistent and eventually to compare outcomes with current neonatal intensive care strategies.”

    Scientists at the University of Cambridge have grown a miniature “womb lining” in a lab which they hope can provide new insights into the early stages of pregnancy, when the placenta is established.

    “Events in early pregnancy lay the foundations for a successful birth, and our new technique should provide a window into this events,” said Professor Graham Burton, director of the university’s Centre for Trophoblast Research.
     
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  21. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    This is what will truly change the world. Electric cars that charge in the amount of time it takes to fill a tank.


    In the fast lane—conductive electrodes are key to fast-charging batteries
    July 10, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Drexel University researchers have developed two new electrode designs, using MXene material, that will allow batteries to charge much faster. The key is a microporous design that allows ions to quickly make their way to redox active sites. Credit: Drexel University

    Can you imagine fully charging your cell phone in just a few seconds? Researchers in Drexel University's College of Engineering can, and they took a big step toward making it a reality with their recent work unveiling of a new battery electrode design in the journal Nature Energy.


    The team, led by Yury Gogotsi, PhD, Distinguished University and Bach professor in Drexel's College of Engineering, in the Department of Materials Science and Engineering, created the new electrode designs from a highly conductive, two-dimensional material called MXene. Their design could make energy storage devices like batteries, viewed as the plodding tanker truck of energy storage technology, just as fast as the speedy supercapacitors that are used to provide energy in a pinch—often as a battery back-up or to provide quick bursts of energy for things like camera flashes.

    "This paper refutes the widely accepted dogma that chemical charge storage, used in batteries and pseudocapacitors, is always much slower than physical storage used in electrical double-layer capacitors, also known as supercapacitors," Gogotsi said. "We demonstrate charging of thin MXene electrodes in tens of milliseconds. This is enabled by very high electronic conductivity of MXene. This paves the way to development of ultrafast energy storage devices than can be charged and discharged within seconds, but store much more energy than conventional supercapacitors."

    The key to faster charging energy storage devices is in the electrode design. Electrodes are essential components of batteries, through which energy is stored during charging and from which it is disbursed to power our devices. So the ideal design for these components would be one that allows them to be quickly charged and store more energy.

    To store more energy, the materials should have places to put it. Electrode materials in batteries offer ports for charge to be stored. In electrochemistry, these ports, called "redox active sites" are the places that hold an electrical charge when each ion is delivered. So if the electrode material has more ports, it can store more energy—which equates to a battery with more "juice."

    Collaborators Patrice Simon, PhD, and Zifeng Lin, from Université Paul Sabatier in France, produced a hydrogel electrode design with more redox active sites, which allows it to store as much charge for its volume as a battery. This measure of capacity, termed "volumetric performance," is an important metric for judging the utility of any energystorage device.

    To make those plentiful hydrogel electrode ports even more attractive to ion traffic, the Drexel-led team, including researchers Maria Lukatskaya, PhD, Sankalp Kota, a graduate student in Drexel's MAX/MXene Research Group led by Michel Barsoum, PhD, distinguished professor in the College of Engineering; and Mengquiang Zhao, PhD, designed electrode architectures with open macroporosity—many small openings—to make each redox active sites in the MXene material readily accessible to ions.

    "In traditional batteries and supercapacitors, ions have a tortuous path toward charge storage ports, which not only slows down everything, but it also creates a situation where very few ions actually reach their destination at fast charging rates," said Lukatskaya, the first author on the paper, who conducted the research as part of the A.J. Drexel Nanomaterials Institute. "The ideal electrode architecture would be something like ions moving to the ports via multi-lane, high-speed 'highways,' instead of taking single-lane roads. Our macroporous electrode design achieves this goal, which allows for rapid charging—on the order of a few seconds or less."

    The overarching benefit of using MXene as the material for the electrode design is its conductivity. Materials that allow for rapid flow of an electrical current, like aluminum and copper, are often used in electric cables. MXenes are conductive, just like metals, so not only do ions have a wide-open path to a number of storage ports, but they can also move very quickly to meet electrons there. Mikhael Levi, PhD, and Netanel Shpigel, research collaborators from Bar-Ilan University in Israel, helped the Drexel group maximize the number of the ports accessible to ions in MXene electrodes.

    Use in battery electrodes is just the latest in a series of developments with the MXene material that was discovered by researchers in Drexel's Department of Materials Science and Engineering in 2011. Since then, researchers have been testing them in a variety of applications from energy storage to electromagnetic radiation shielding, and water filtering. This latest development is significant in particular because it addresses one of the primary problems hindering the expansion of the electric vehicle market and that has been lurking on the horizon for mobile devices.

    "If we start using low-dimensional and electronically conducting materials as battery electrodes, we can make batteries working much, much faster than today," Gogotsi said. "Eventually, appreciation of this fact will lead us to car, laptop and cell-phone batteries capable of charging at much higher rates—seconds or minutes rather than hours."
     
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  22. Leeroy Jenkins!

    Leeroy Jenkins! Radicalized
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    Does anyone here worry that the singularity will happen during our lifetime and probably be a bad thing? I kind of do .... #noShu
     
  23. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Probably depends on what you mean by singularity. Computers thinking for themselves is probably not that far off, like a decade.

    As far as a computer being a sentient being, that's probably still a ways off.

    Computers trying to wipe us out because we are a threat to their existence, probably a few hundred years out on that.

    Who knows, but soon we won't be the smartest things on the planet that's for sure.

    Read somewhere awhile back they are working on brain computer interfaces because a main limiting factor in computation is the interface (like typing). Maybe the future is all man-computers.
     
  24. Leeroy Jenkins!

    Leeroy Jenkins! Radicalized
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    Yeah idk, I just think once AI is birthed its going to be an exponential takeoff from there, however maybe it would be limited by hardware
     
  25. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    AI is already here. They are running self driving cars, a lot of googles shit, and other stuff we don't know about. Basically a self learning computer is considered AI and that is all over the place right now.
     
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  26. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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  27. Leeroy Jenkins!

    Leeroy Jenkins! Radicalized
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    Well now I'm just going to go and figure out how to create an EMP and then go and build my underground bunker.
     
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  28. Kevintensity

    Kevintensity Poster/Posting Game Coordinator
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    Glad we got this guy on our side
     
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  29. Name P. Redacted

    Name P. Redacted I have no money and I'm also gay
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    Yeah we are really far away from a singularity. But maybe the singularity isn't a bad thing considering how much we fuck stuff up
     
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  30. Baseballman86

    Baseballman86 Well-Known Member
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  31. Merica

    Merica Devine pls stop pointing out my demise. :(
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    I'm still not sure if we can actually teach computers to be a sentient being.

    Every emotion we have has been developed to protect us from a threat.

    I don't think you can program survival instincts. Love keeps us in herds. Ambition makes increases our prospects for survival and mating better stock. Imagination helps us invent ways to improve our situation.

    I just don't see how any of that is possible with robots. I guess some Frankenstein could develop the program but he'd have no control over the robot whatsoever.
     
  32. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    That's actually the problem, we aren't teaching them, they are teaching themselves and we basically don't know how they are coming up with the answers. The article I posted a few posts back goes into some detail.

    The worry is that once they get to a certain level of learning that it may be able to evolve its own programming and take off exponentially from there. And when they get to that certain level no one will be able to decipher the programming that drives their decisions, therefore no way to adjust it if starts going down a path we don't like.

    Ambition is the actual starting programming if you want to think of it that way. To learn more, better, faster is what it is initially designed to do.
     
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  33. Leeroy Jenkins!

    Leeroy Jenkins! Radicalized
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    This 100%
     
  34. Mr Bulldops

    Mr Bulldops If you’re juiceless, you’re useless
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    [​IMG]
     
  35. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    If you mean am I an expert in any way on this, no I am not.

    All I know is from the sciency articles that I read on the subject.
     
  36. Mr Bulldops

    Mr Bulldops If you’re juiceless, you’re useless
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    No, I wasn't referring to your knowledge of the subject. Just referencing Anthony Hopkins expert troubleshooting of the host's decisions when they started going off the rails in Westworld
     
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  37. Can I Spliff it

    Can I Spliff it Is Butterbean okay?
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  38. Can I Spliff it

    Can I Spliff it Is Butterbean okay?
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    encrypting digital information as DNA is pretty baller bruh
     
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  39. pearl

    pearl Fan of: White wimmens feet
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  40. angus

    angus Well-Known Member
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    Scientific cure to ptsd and addiction? Whoa.


    Researchers show how particular fear memories can be erased
    August 17, 2017
    [​IMG]
    Jun-Hyeong Cho (left) and Woong Bin Kim. Credit: I. Pittalwala, UC Riverside.

    Researchers at the University of California, Riverside have devised a method to selectively erase particular fear memories by weakening the connections between the nerve cells (neurons) involved in forming these memories.

    A sight, sound, or smell we have sensed may not later trigger fear, but if the stimulus is associated with a traumatic event, such as a car accident, then fear memory is formed, and fearful responses are triggered by the stimulus.

    To survive in a dynamic environment, animals develop fear responses to dangerous situations. But not all fear memories, such as those in PTSD, are beneficial to our survival. For example, while an extremely fearful response to the sight of a helicopter is not a useful one for a war veteran, a quick reaction to the sound of a gunshot is still desirable. For survivors of car accidents, it would not be beneficial for them to relive the trauma each time they sit in a car.

    In their lab experiments, Jun-Hyeong Cho, M.D., Ph.D., an assistant professor of molecular, cell, and systems biology, and Woong Bin Kim, his postdoctoral researcher, found that fear memory can be manipulated in such a way that some beneficial memories are retained while others, detrimental to our daily life, are suppressed.

    The research, done using a mouse model and published today in Neuron, offers insights into how PTSD and specific phobias may be better treated.

    "In the brain, neurons communicate with each other through synaptic connections, in which signals from one neuron are transmitted to another neuron by means of neurotransmitters," said Cho, who led the research. "We demonstrated that the formation of fear memory associated with a specific auditory cue involves selective strengthening in synaptic connections which convey the auditory signals to the amygdala, a brain area essential for fear learning and memory. We also demonstrated that selective weakening of the connections erased fear memory for the auditory cue."



    In the lab, Cho and Kim exposed mice to two sounds: a high-pitch tone and a low-pitch tone. Neither tone produced a fear response in the mice. Next, they paired only the high-pitched tone with a mild footshock administered to the mice. Following this, Cho and Kim again exposed the mice to the two tones. To the high-pitch tone (with no accompanying footshock), the mice responded by ceasing all movement, called freezing behavior. The mice showed no such response to the low-pitch sound (with no accompanying footshock). The researchers found that such behavioral training strengthened synaptic connections that relay the high-pitch tone signals to the amygdala.

    The researchers then used a method called optogenetics to weaken the synaptic connection with light, which erased the fear memory for the high-pitch tone.

    "In the brain, neurons receiving the high- and low-pitch tone signals are intermingled," said Cho, a member of the Center for Glial-Neuronal Interactions in the UC Riverside School of Medicine. "We were able, however, to experimentally stimulate just those neurons that responded to the high-pitch sound. Using low-frequency stimulations with light, we were able to erase the fear memory by artificially weakening the connections conveying the signals of the sensory cue—a high-pitch tone in our experiments - that are associated with the aversive event, namely, the footshock."

    Cho explained that for adaptive fear responses to be developed, the brain must discriminate between different sensory cues and associate only relevant stimuli with aversive events.

    "This study expands our understanding of how adaptive fear memory for a relevant stimulus is encoded in the brain," he said. "It is also applicable to developing a novel intervention to selectively suppress pathological fear while preserving adaptive fear in PTSD."

    The researchers note that their method can be adapted for other research, such as "reward learning" where stimulus is paired with reward. They plan next to study the mechanisms involved in reward learning which has implications in treating addictive behaviors.
     
  41. Can I Spliff it

    Can I Spliff it Is Butterbean okay?
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    It's something of a meme talking about how awful and bad "forensic science" is, particularly when talking about fire investigation, but this is another instance of how fucked it the field is.
     
  42. Duvel

    Duvel Single Malts, Strong Pale Ales
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    -Asshole- likes this.