7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Nokia's Ovi to bring all your data to your phone Nokia is planning to soon upgrade its Ovi.com service with bots designed to make files stored on your desktop or laptop computers available to you over the Nokia phone in your pocket ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Human body rejection of animal organs overcome? Scientists may have found a way to overcome the problem of the human body rejecting animal parts used in transplants. Using a combination of freezing, chemical baths and ultrasound researchers were able to strip the animal tissue of the cells and biological molecules that trigger a response from the immune system. This left a biological scaffold which could then be populated by cells from a patient's own body, creating a tissue which carries no risk of rejection, which can be repaired, and which can grow along with the body. The work, by University of Leeds researchers, means implanting animal tissue such as blood vessels, tendons and bladders into humans may become common in surgery. Human organs for transplant are constantly in short supply, meaning long waits for many patients. Currently, the use of animal tissue for human transplant is restricted, and of limited effectiveness ... more ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Forget exercise, just take your gene activation pill Forget treadmills, researchers at the Salk Institute for Biological Studies may have found a way around the sweat and pain. They identified two signaling pathways that are activated in response to exercise and converge to dramatically increase endurance.The team of scientists, led by Howard Hughes Medical Investigator Ronald M. Evans, Ph.D., a professor in the Salk Institute's Gene Expression Laboratory report that simultaneously triggering both pathways with oral drugs turned laboratory mice into long-distance runners and conferred many of exercise's other benefits. Previous work with genetically engineered mice in the Evans lab had revealed that permanently activating a genetic switch known as PPAR delta turned mice into indefatigable marathon runners. In addition to their super-endurance, the altered mice were resistant to weight gain, even when fed a high-fat diet that caused obesity in ordinary mice. On top of their lean and mean physique, their response to insulin improved, lowering levels of circulating glucose ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Solar power breakthrough makes energy self-sufficiency a reality In a revolutionary leap that appears likely to transform solar power from a marginal, boutique alternative into a mainstream energy source, MIT researchers have overcome a major barrier to large-scale solar power: storing energy for use when the sun doesn't shine. MIT researchers have hit upon a simple, inexpensive, highly efficient process for storing solar energy that mimics photosynthesis. Homeowners will soon be powering their homes in the day with solar cells, while also producing hydrogen and oxygen to power their car and home at night. Electricity-by-wire from a central source could soon be a thing of the past ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Can't live with 'em, can't live without 'em Living with a spouse may make you crazy, but living without one raises your risk of developing dementia. Living with either a spouse or a partner decreases your risk of developing dementia diseases according to a study by Krister Hakansson, researcher in psychology at Vaxjo University and Karolinska Institutet, Sweden ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Smart contact lenses sense eye, dispense meds
"Smart" contacts that measure pressure within the eye and dispense medication accordingly could be made possible using a new material developed by biomedical engineers at UC Davis. Tingrui Pan, assistant professor of biomedical engineering, and postdoctoral researcher Hailin Cong started with a material called polydimethylsiloxane (PDMS). They developed a method for placing powdered silver on the PDMS in a precise pattern creating conductive wires. The silver also has antimicrobial properties. The researchers were able to shape the PDMS-silver into a contact-lens shape, and show that it could function as a simple pressure sensor ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
IBM memory organizer bot, codenamed PENSIEVE IBM Research's Personal Memory Organizer, codenamed PENSIEVE, can help organize your memory and access information that otherwise might get lost. This technology uses images, sounds, and text recorded on everyday mobile devices to help people recall names, faces, conversations and other important information ... watch

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Project aims for open source bots as smart as humans Earlier this year the OpenCog project was launched, with seed funding from SIAI and code and manpower donations from Novamente LLC. OpenCog is a free and open source software project aimed at providing a generic framework for the development of artificial general intelligence (AGI) software. The first formal code release is planned for Fall 2008, but the project has already gained considerable momentum. Most notably, through the Google Summer of Code project, Google Inc. has supported 11 student interns to work this summer on OpenCog-related projects. Several of these student projects have been extremely successful, yielding code and ideas that will form an important part of OpenCog going forwards ... more ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
A teaching bot able to spot bored or confused students There's one important thing robot tutors haven't been able to do: recognize when students are getting bored or confused, and modify their lessons to suit. Researchers in the UC San Diego Machine Perception (MP) Lab are trying to narrow that learning gap by improving what are known as Intelligent Tutoring Systems (ITS). ITS are computer systems that can simulate a human teacher by providing direct, customized instruction or feedback to students without the intervention of human beings. To make the systems more effective, the MP Lab, which is part of the Institute for Neural Computation, is studying the feedback that human students provide while learning, be it through facial muscle movement, head positioning or other expressions of interest or confusion ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Drug may prevent alcoholics from relapsing An experimental drug that blocks the euphoric feelings associated with drinking may prevent alcoholics from relapsing. The finding, the result of a mouse study at Oregon Health & Science University, could lead to human clinical trials within the next year. "We showed we could block behavior in mice that resembles this increased euphoria even after the animals had been given a lot of alcohol," said Tamara Phillips, Ph.D., professor and vice chair of the behavioral neuroscience department at OHSU and a research scientist at the Portland Veterans Affairs Medical Center. "That's what you want in a treatment, because we don't get to people until after they become addicted to alcohol." (if you watch the movie on the linked page, you may need to turn the volume way up) ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Eating less protein, ramps up immune response Manipulation of dietary variables is one the most described events to retard the aging process and maintain immune function. The present study deals with the effect of variable dietary protein-carbohydrate ratios (without caloric restriction) on the alteration of immune response ... more

7/31/2008 PERMALINK
Gene variant + migraine = 3x heart & 4x stroke risk Women who have a certain gene variant in the methyleneterahydrofolate reductase gene and also suffer from migraine with aura have more than three times the risk of cardiovascular disease and four times the risk for stroke ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Watch the Sarcos exoskeleton in action For more movies of the Sarcos exoskeleton doing various tasks ... watch ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Labmeeting, a social network for scientists
Labmeeting is a tool for scientists. It was created to help with those things that make doing science needlessly difficult. These might include things like: Finding someone at Wisconsin who works on aging in yeast. Remembering whether the paper about helix bundles was 8753.pdf or science.pdf. Moving journal club to Tuesday. Finding out the next time someone gives a seminar on spectroscopy. Or, above all, sharing one's interests, expertise, and discoveries with others ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Do full tummy feelings, shave years off your life? New Haven, Conn. -- Researchers at Yale School of Medicine have found the brain's appetite center uses fat for fuel by involving oxygen free radicals—molecules associated with aging and neurodegeneration. The findings, reported in the journal Nature, suggest that antioxidants could play a role in weight control. The study's lead authors were Sabrina Diano and Tamas Horvath, who are an associate professor and professor, respectively, in the Departments of Obstetrics, Gynecology & Reproductive Sciences and Neurobiology. Horvath is also chair of the Section of Comparative Medicine. "In contrast to the accepted view, the brain does use fat as fuel," said Horvath. "Our study shows that the minute-by-minute control of appetite is regulated by free radicals, implying that if you interfere with free radicals, you may affect eating and satiety." The results also imply, added Horvath, "that each time a feeling of fullness or satiety is reached during a meal, you may be chipping away some time from your maximum lifespan as the most free radicals are produced when satiety-promoting brain cells are active." ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
To recover faster, get a bot to do your surgery Robotic surgery, largely pioneered for prostate cancer surgery, is rapidly being adapted for use in many other areas. Urologic surgeons at NewYork-Presbyterian Hospital/Weill Cornell Medical Center have demonstrated considerable success with robotics for removal of the bladder, also known as cystectomy. Their findings are published in a recent edition of the peer-reviewed publication, the British Journal of Urology-International. Led by NewYork-Presbyterian/Weill Cornell's Dr. Douglas Scherr, the study shows that the robotic approach provides similar benefits to prostate resection, including dramatically faster recoveries with equal, or better, surgical precision. Specifically, robotic cystectomy patients have an average hospital stay of five days, compared with eight days for the standard open bladder surgery ... more ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Designing bots that humans enjoy interacting with Recent advances in technology have made possible a new breed of personal bots able to serve people as skilled agents in tasks that are repetitive, difficult, unsafe, or unpleasant for humans. These robots can potentially help with tasks such as doing laundry or dishes, assisting in the care of the elderly, ensuring that children arrive at school safely, or acting as caretakers for individuals within a home or institution. Many of these tasks involve close social interaction between the bot and the people it serves. The human-robot interaction project explores aspects of social interaction between people and bots, in particular how robots should be designed to provide people with appropriate interactions ... more ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Cell's 'quality control' mechanism discovered Researchers in Japan and Canada have discovered a key component of the quality control mechanism that operates inside human cells - sometimes too well. The breakthrough has significant implications for the development of new treatments for a number of hereditary diseases, the researchers say. The cell's endoplasmic reticulum (ER) acts as a sort of packaging plant that folds and prepares proteins for distribution inside or outside the cell. But when proteins are misfolded in the ER, they must be destroyed - and that is where ERdj5 comes into play. "ERdj5 is like a quality control inspector," explained Dr. Thomas, McGill's Chair of Biochemistry and Canada Research Chair in Molecular Genetics ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
The gene that controls your need for sleep Investigators have long been puzzled about what controls the actual need for sleep. Researchers at the University of Pennsylvania School of Medicine might have an answer, at least in fruit flies. In a recent study of fruit flies, they identified a gene that controls sleep. "We spend -- or should spend -- a third of our lives sleeping," says Amita Sehgal, PhD, Professor of Neuroscience and an Investigator with the Howard Hughes Medical Institute (HHMI). "The idea that so much time is spent in sleep is intriguing. Also, sleep deprivation has serious health consequences and impairs cognitive function." Sleep is regulated by two processes: circadian and homeostatic. Circadian regulation affects the timing of sleep, and the homeostatic mechanism affects the need for sleep. The Sleepless gene affects the homeostatic mechanism ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Europe & Japan expect a smartbot breakthrough The European Science Foundation (ESF) and the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science (JSPS) both think that after the significant progress of the last few years. Robots are poised for a breakthrough that will lead to a new generation of intelligent machines capable of taking on multiple tasks in factories, general workplaces and even within our homes. They are seeking to encourage research into adaptable bots that are able to learn from their mistakes to develop the capability of operating in unstructured real-world environments ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Disease-fighting nanobialys look like tiny pastries
Ultra-miniature bialy-shaped particles - called nanobialys because they resemble tiny versions of the flat, onion-topped rolls popular in New York City - could soon be carrying medicinal compounds through patients' bloodstreams to tumors or atherosclerotic plaques. The nanobialys are an important addition to the stock of diagnostic and disease-fighting nanoparticles developed by researchers in the Consortium for Translational Research in Advanced Imaging and Nanomedicine (C-TRAIN) at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis. C-TRAIN's smart nanoparticles can deliver drugs and imaging agents directly to the site of tumors and plaques. The nanobialys weren't cooked up for their appealing shape — that's a natural result of the manufacturing process. The particles answered a need for an alternative to the research group's gadolinium-containing nanoparticles, which were created for their high visibility in magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) scans ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Can a protein change from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde? "The protein superoxide dismutase, normally a useful antioxidant, can turn from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde when it clumps up," said Brandeis chemist Jeff Agar. Research done by Agar and colleagues indicates that protein aggregation is toxic in ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), something that has not been proven for other neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, though researchers worldwide are studying the role of protein clumps in these conditions, as well ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Can a protein change from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde? "The protein superoxide dismutase, normally a useful antioxidant, can turn from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde when it clumps up," said Brandeis chemist Jeff Agar. Research done by Agar and colleagues indicates that protein aggregation is toxic in ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), something that has not been proven for other neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, though researchers worldwide are studying the role of protein clumps in these conditions, as well ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Can a protein change from Dr. Jekyll to Mr. Hyde? "The protein superoxide dismutase, normally a useful antioxidant, can turn from Dr. Jekyll into Mr. Hyde when it clumps up," said Brandeis chemist Jeff Agar. Research done by Agar and colleagues indicates that protein aggregation is toxic in ALS (Lou Gehrig's disease), something that has not been proven for other neurodegenerative diseases such as Alzheimer's and Parkinson's, though researchers worldwide are studying the role of protein clumps in these conditions, as well ... more

7/30/2008 PERMALINK
Aging impairs the 'replay' of memories during sleep

Aging impairs the consolidation of memories during sleep, a process important in converting new memories into long-term ones, according to new animal research. The findings shed light on normal memory mechanisms and how they are disrupted by aging. During sleep, the hippocampus, a brain region important in learning and memory, repeatedly "replays" brain activity from recent awake experiences. This replay process is believed to be important for memory consolidation. In the new study, Carol Barnes, PhD, and colleagues at the University of Arizona found reduced replay activity during sleep in old compared to young rats, and rats with the least replay activity performed the worst in tests of spatial memory. "These findings suggest that some of the memory impairment experienced during aging could involve a reduction in the automatic process of experience replay," said Michael Hasselmo, DPhil, at Boston University, an expert unaffiliated with the study ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
A new trigger found for autoimmune diseases Yale University researchers have discovered a new way that autoimmune diseases like multiple sclerosis (MS) can be triggered. Scientists have long known the molecule TGF-β (transforming growth factor beta) plays a pivotal role in preventing T cells from launching an attack on the body’s own tissues, but might it also influence activity of other immune system cells as well? Richard Flavell, professor and chairman of Immunobiology at the Yale School of Medicine and his colleagues engineered mice in which TGF-β was blocked at different places in the immune system. They found that wherever they blocked TGF-β in dendritic cells (DC’s) the mice developed lesions on myelin sheathing of central nervous system cells, the hallmark of MS ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Quantum dots + xrays = dead tumor cells Medical physicists at the University of Virginia have created a novel way to kill tumor cells using nanoparticles and light. The technique, devised by Wensha Yang, an instructor in radiation oncology at the University of Virginia, and colleagues, employs quantum dots. Quantum dots are semiconductor nanostructures, 25 billionths of a meter in diameter, which can confine electrons in three dimensions and emit light when exposed to ultraviolet radiation. Yang and his colleagues realized that quantum dots also give off light when exposed to megavoltage x-rays, such as those used in cancer radiotherapy. That property, the scientists realized, makes quantum dots an ideal mediator in therapies employing light-activated compounds to treat cancer. A compound called Photofrin is the only photosensitizer currently approved by the FDA. Photofrin is absorbed by cancer cells and, upon exposure to light, becomes active and kills cells. It is currently used to treat certain kinds of shallowly located tumors, but Yang and his colleagues realized that combing Photofrin with quantum dots could create an efficient method to kill even deeply seated cancer cells ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
What happens when you mix physicists & physicians? The formula for it might be e=MD² as physicists meet up with physicians this week in Houston at the American Association of Physicists in Medicine (AAPM) conference to discuss Physics and the Future of Medicine. Put the Bots guys in with the Mods guys, the two most powerful technologies in human history, and look out, no telling what might come out of it ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Futurist says humanity on the edge of longevity leap Genetic science, stem-cell research and extreme caloric restriction are all part of a burgeoning "immortality industry'' that could soon point the way to a fountain of youth with the potential to stretch the human life span to 125 or 150 years, says a sociologist and consultant on future studies ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Bioengineers develop 'microscope on a chip' Researchers have developed a super-compact high-resolution microscope, small enough to fit on a finger tip. This "microscopic microscope" operates without lenses but has the magnifying power of a top-quality optical microscope, can be used in the field to analyze blood samples for malaria or check water supplies for giardia and other pathogens, and can be mass-produced for around $10. "It could be put in a cell phone," says Changhuei Yang, assistant professor of electrical engineering and bioengineering at Caltech, who developed the device. The new instrument combines traditional computer-chip technology with microfluidics--the channeling of fluid flow at incredibly small scales ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Is an electric personal transport a smart choice?
Powered solely by electricity, and chargeable from any socket the smart ed can achieve the equivalent of 300 mpg -- that amounts to a saving of up to 80% in fuel costs over the already highly economical smart fortwo. The ev can travel up to 72 miles between charges, which typically take around 8 hours for a full charge -- ideal for charging at work between your morning and evening commutes. With a top-up charge during the day, the smart ed's daily range weighs in at 100 miles ... more

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Putting a virtual doctor in the ambulance A new ambulance communications system will enable doctors to diagnose and begin treating critically ill patients before they reach hospital. Diagnosing and treating a critically ill or injured patient as early as possible can mean the difference between life and death. A new communications system between a moving ambulance and its hospital base allows the simultaneous transmission of bandwidth-hungry video and ultra-sonic images, telephone communications and patient data, all at the same time ... more ... watch

7/29/2008 PERMALINK
Why licking your wound actually will speed healing A compound in human saliva that can be mass produced is found to speed healing. Histatin, a protein in saliva, kills bacteria and speeds healing. The researchers cultured epithelial cells that line the inner cheek in dishes. Then they made an artificial wound in the cell layer in each dish. In one dish, cells were bathed in an isotonic fluid. In the other dish, cells were bathed in human saliva. The saliva treated wound closed faster. The next step was to identify which component was responsible. Saliva was split into its individual components and testedin their wound model until histatin was proven responsible. This study not only answers the biological question of why animals lick their wounds. It also explains why wounds in the mouth heal much faster than comparable wounds of the skin and bone ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
Getting up-close and personal pictures of nanobots The fab of nanobots and other nano-devices benefits from good nano-scale imaging. Now Jülich scientists have succeeded in precisely measuring atomic spacings down to a few picometres using new methods in ultrahigh-resolution electron microscopy. This makes it possible to find out decisive parameters determining the physical properties of materials directly on an atomic level in a microscope ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
How do those personal DNA tests actually work? Medgadget.com has an interview with CEO Dietrich Stephan of the personal DNA testing company Navigenics.

Dietrich: Its a pleasure, thank you for agreeing to be involved in our beta testings. Navigenics was started by myself (a human geneticist) and David Agus (a clinical oncologist) in 2006. We both recognize that all human disease has a genetic component and that the most effective cure is prevention.
Dietrich: The goal of Navigenics is ultimately to provide an individual (and their physician) with a holistic assessment of their genetic predispositions to disease.
Dietrich: Yes, we are proud to announce the recent addition of 3 new conditions (colon cancer, graves disease, and psoriasis) to bring current total to 21 medical conditions.

For the full interview ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
New quantum ring, nanowire array & nanotube fabs Investigation of the fabrication mechanism of self-assembled GaAs quantum rings grown by droplet epitaxy ... more
Tuning the crystallinity of thermoelectric Bi2Te3 nanowire arrays grown by pulsed electrodeposition ... more
Growth of p-type Si nanotubes by catalytic plasma treatments ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
DNA "Scissors" Go Open Source Imagine you're trying to find a cure for a disease, such as cystic fibrosis, which results from a single defective gene. Using "traditional" gene therapy, you'd infect the patient with a virus containing a good copy of the gene, hoping the DNA inserts into the person's genome in a spot that doesn't trigger cancer. "There's got to be a better way," you tell yourself--and there is. About a decade ago, researchers began developing a new strategy that relies on proteins called zinc finger nucleases that bind to a very specific place on a chromosome. The nucleases work like scissors, cutting the DNA at this precise location--say, the site of your defective gene--so that the gene can be repaired ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
Controlling our immune system's response The symptoms of influenza, such as breathlessness, weight loss and fever, are made much worse by the immune system responding in an exaggerated way to the virus. The virus is often cleared from the body by the time symptoms appear and yet symptoms can last for many days, because the immune system overreaction, something that occurs in a number of other diseases as well. Now, a new study, led by researchers from Imperial College London, reveals how the activity of immune cells in the lung is normally kept under control by a receptor known as CD200R, working with another molecule called CD200. CD200R is found in high levels in the lungs and the new research shows that it is able to limit the immune system's response and to turn off inflammation once it has started ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
Genes Evolve to Minimize Protein Production Errors Protein molecules must fold to become biologically active, and mistakes can cause misfolding, which can be toxic. Yet the protein-producing factories in our cells are estimated to make mistakes in 20 percent of the molecules they produce. Adaptations to this surprising sloppiness may be crucial in understanding the evolution of genes across species, from bacteria to humans. Misfolded proteins can build up in long-lived cells, like neurons, causing neurodegenerative diseases. "These genes may produce proteins that look innocuous but nevertheless cause a severe disease condition," said Claus Wilke at The University of Texas at Austin ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
Tumor-inhibiting protein stimulates immune system “Angiocidin is a protein that has a lot of anti-cancer activity and inhibits angiogenesis, a physiological process involving the growth of new blood vessels from pre-existing vessels, which is a fundamental step in the transition of tumors from a dormant state to a malignant state,” said George Tuszynski, a professor of neuroscience in Temple’s School of Medicine and a professor of biology in Temple’s College of Science and Technology, who discovered the protein. “All of these cancers are inhibited by Angiocidin by virtue of the fact that this protein inhibits vascularization or the formation of new vessels,” he said. New research also demonstrates the ability of Angiocidin to stimulate the body’s immune system by differentiating monocytic cells into macrophages, which function to ingest bacteria and protein debris as part of the immune system ... more

7/28/2008 PERMALINK
Smart bots could save lives and our civilization Brad Templeton, Chairman of the Electronic Frontiers Foundation has written an essay about smart bots. Says Templeton, "Geeks can save the planet and millions of lives using near-term A.I. to make taxis and trucks deliver, park, recharge and drive themselves." Robot cars can make electric cars real and eliminate the USA's dependence on foreign oil and the wars that causes. Not to mention making goods much cheaper and ending congestion and parking problems in our cities ... more

See also: Meet Stanley, world's first successful car-driving bot

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
Drugs that may slow aging enter clinical trials

Sirtris has two drugs in clinical trials. One is being tested against Type 2 diabetes, one of the many diseases of aging that the company's scientists hope the drugs will avert. With success against just one such disease, the impact on health "could be possibly transformational," said Dr. Patrick Vallance, head of drug discovery at GlaxoSmithKline. The new drugs are called sirtuin activators, meaning that they activate an enzyme called sirtuin. The basic theory is that all or most species have an ancient strategy for riding out famines: switch resources from reproduction to tissue maintenance. A healthy diet but with 30 percent fewer calories than usual triggers this reaction in mice and is the one intervention that reliably increases their life span. The mice seem to live longer because they are somehow protected from the usual diseases that kill them ... more

See also Resveratrol found to mimic the age retarding effects of caloric restriction

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
Meet Stanley, world's first bot-driven mobile pod
This is the story of Stanley, the robotic car that won the Darpa Grand Challenge. For an in-depth view of the complete system design see Stanford's excellent white paper. The car itself was built at the Electronic Research Lab (ERL) of Volkswagen of America (Palo Alto, CA) and I had the great pleasure to lead the team of engineers who brought it to life. It all started when one of my colleagues, Martin Lienkamp, paid us a visit at the ERL. On the plane ride from Germany he had read an article about the 2004 Grand Challenge and was convinced that "we (Volkswagen) can do better than that" referring to the fact that none of the autonomous vehicles that had entered that race were able to complete the course. ... more

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
An interface that works directly from neuro-signals The Audeo is being developed by Ambient Corporation to create a human-computer interface for communication without the need of physical motor control or speech production. Using signal processing, unpronounced speech representing the thought of the mind can be translated from intercepted neurological signals. By interfacing near the source of vocal production, the Audeo has the potential to restore communication to people who are unable to speak. The proposed solution is a featherweight wireless device resting over the vocal cords capable of transmitting neurological information from the brain. Using data analysis, this information can be processed into synthesized speech or a menu selection capable of conveying the basic necessities of human life ... more ... watch

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
Activating brain stem cells to restore function Adult stem cells originate in a different part of the brain than is commonly believed, and with proper stimulation they can produce new brain cells to replace those lost to disease or injury, a study by UC Irvine scientists has shown. Evidence strongly shows that the true stem cells in the mammalian brain are the ependymal cells that line the ventricles in the brain and spinal cord, rather than cells in the subventricular zone as biologists previously believed. Brain ventricles are hollow chambers filled with fluid that supports brain tissue, and a layer of ependymal cells lines these ventricles. Knowing the cell source is crucial when developing stem cell-based therapies. Additionally, knowing that these normally dormant cells can be coaxed into dividing lays the groundwork for future therapies. Image shows brain renewing cell division ... more

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
Humans still better than bots at soccer In the long saga of bots beating out humans in every game from chess to air hockey, at least we still seem to have an edge in soccer ... watch

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
What is so special about green tea? Experts say this tea, which is rich in catechin polyphenols (i.e. compounds that have antioxidant activity), helps lower bad cholesterol levels, kills cancer cells and fights heart disease. New research by a team at the University of Athens Medical School in Greece adds more weight to the latter, highlighting that drinking green tea (Camellia sinesis) improves the function of endothelial cells lining the circulatory system. When endothelial cells dysfunction, atherosclerosis advances, thus increasing cardiovascular risk ... more

7/27/2008 PERMALINK
Mass production method for nano-structures Scientists at the University of Pennsylvania have created a one-step, repeatable method for the production of functional nanoscale patterns or motifs with adjustable features, size and shape using a single master "plate." The features of the resultant nanoparticle patterns are up to 10 times sharper than the original membrane. The resulting symmetry of the film can be transferred onto a substrate, both flat or curved, where it can be used to generate similar anisotropic magnetic, photonic, phononic and plasmonic properties. Researches see the inexpensive fabrication of smart clothing as one of many potential uses for their technique ... more

7/26/2008 PERMALINK
Europe working on self-aware sensor/tactile bot

The EU's SENSOPAC project will combine machine learning techniques and modeling of biological systems to develop a machine capable of abstracting cognitive notions from sensorimotor relationships during interactions with its environment, and of generalizing this knowledge to novel situations. Through active sensing and exploratory actions the machine will discover the sensorimotor relationships and consequently learn the intrinsic structure of its interactions with the world and unravel predictive and causal relationships. Together with action policy formulation and decision making, this will underlie the machine’s abilities to create abstractions, to suggest and test hypotheses, and develop self-awareness ... more

7/26/2008 PERMALINK
Intel: human & machine intelligence about to merge
After 40 years of being the driving force behind the personal computer revolution. What do the scientists and engineers at Intel Corp. see when they look 40 years into the future? According to Intel's Chief Technology Officer, Justin Rattner, they see human intelligence and machine intelligence merging. Perhaps as early as 2012 they expect to see the lines between human and machine intelligence begin to blur ... more

7/26/2008 PERMALINK
Intel's new strategy for personal tech chips Intel currently has more than 15 System on Chip (SoC) projects under development, including the company's first consumer electronics chip codenamed "Canmore" scheduled for introduction later this year and the second-generation "Sodaville" next year. In addition, Intel's second-generation embedded product line is scheduled to arrive in 2009, with Intel's next-generation platform for Mobile Internet Devices code-named "Moorestown" and featuring "Lincroft," scheduled for release in 2009/2010. Many of these new products will be based on the Intel® Atom™ processor core. All of these chips will provide the increased performance and energy efficiency necessary to allow for the creation of much more advance personal devices ... more

7/25/2008 PERMALINK
Research indicates that aging is a curable disease Age may not be rust after all. Specific genetic instructions drive aging in worms, report researchers at the Stanford University School of Medicine. Their discovery contradicts the prevailing theory that aging is a buildup of tissue damage akin to rust, and implies science might eventually halt or even reverse the ravages of age. “We were really surprised,” said Stuart Kim, PhD, professor of developmental biology and of genetics, who is the senior author of the research. Kim’s lab examined the regulation of aging in C. elegans, a millimeter-long nematode worm whose simple body and small number of genes make it a useful tool for biologists. The worms age rapidly: their maximum life span is about two weeks. Comparing young worms to old worms, Kim’s team discovered age-related shifts in levels of three transcription factors, the molecular switches that turn genes on and off. These shifts trigger genetic pathways that transform young worms into geezers ... more

7/25/2008 PERMALINK
Now there's a Lego bot that solves Rubik’s cube Bots are now beating humans at chess, air hockey and many other games. Now along comes Tilted Twister, which solves Rubik’s cube fully automatically. Just place the scrambled cube on Tilted Twister’s turntable. An ultrasonic sensor detects its presence and starts to read the colors of the cube faces using a light sensor. The robot turns and tilts the cube in order to read all the faces of the cube. It then calculates a solution and executes the moves by turning, tilting and twisting the cube ... more ... watch

7/25/2008 PERMALINK
Synthetic enzymes that can repair DNA sequences

A multi-institutional team led by Massachusetts General Hospital (MGH) investigators has developed a powerful new tool for genomic research/medicine – a robust method for generating synthetic enzymes that can target particular DNA sequences for inactivation or repair ... more

7/25/2008 PERMALINK
Make your own "lab-on-a-chip" device with a new kit A microfluidic device or "lab-on-a-chip" could bring a new generation of instant home tests for illnesses, food contaminants and toxic gases. But today these portable, efficient tools are often stuck in the lab themselves. Specifically, in the labs of researchers who know how to make them from scratch. Now University of Michigan engineers are seeking to change that with a 16-piece lab-on-a-chip kit that brings microfluidic devices to the scientific masses. The kit cuts the costs involved and the time it takes to make a microfluidic device from days to minutes, says Mark Burns, a professor in the departments of Biomedical Engineering and Chemical Engineering who developed the device with graduate student Minsoung Rhee. "In a lot of fields, there can be significant scientific advances made using microfluidic devices and I think that has been hindered because it does take some degree of skill and equipment to make these devices," Burns said. "This new system is almost like Lego blocks. You don't need any fabrication skills to put them together." ... more

7/25/2008 PERMALINK
Key process for cellular damage causing aging found Damage can be measured by newly captured events in a cell's powerhouse. Researchers have taken a first snapshot of how a class of highly reactive molecules inflicts cellular damage that causes many of the effects of aging. Researchers have discovered a tool that can monitor related damage and determine the degree to which antioxidant drugs effectively combat disease. Reactive oxygen species (ROS), which include free radicals, are highly reactive molecules that force change upon many molecules they encounter. The body uses ROS to signal for wound healing and to destroy invaders. Excess amounts, however, damage sensitive cell components, including proteins and DNA, in a process called oxidative stress. ROS are kept in check by the body's natural antioxidants, but when uncontrolled can lead to aging and disease ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
Nanonet circuits making flexible electronics a reality
Researchers have overcome a major obstacle in producing transistors from networks of carbon nanotubes, a technology that could make it possible to print circuits on plastic sheets for applications including flexible displays and an electronic skin to cover an entire aircraft to monitor crack formation. The so-called "nanonet" technology - circuits made of numerous carbon nanotubes randomly overlapping in a fishnet-like structure - has been plagued by a critical flaw. The network is contaminated with metallic nanotubes that cause short circuits. The discovery solves this problem by cutting the nanonet into strips, preventing short circuits by breaking the path of metallic nanotubes. "This is a fundamental advance in how nanotube circuits are made," said Ashraf Alam, a professor of electrical and computer engineering at Purdue University ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
Molecular biology latest science to gets wikified The steady march of the crowd sourcing movement has reached molecular biology in force. Earlier this week, bioinformatics experts announced the creation of a Wikipedia-style database that allows anyone to create and amend a repository of complex biochemical pathways. The database, called WikiPathways, joins WikiGene, Protein Data Bank Wiki, and WikiProteins, not to mention a host of other wikis used by individual labs and smaller communities of researchers ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
An online collaborative medical encyclopedia MedPedia is a new project, currently in development, that will offer an online collaborative medical encyclopedia for use by the general public. In order to keep the content accurate and up-to-date, content editors and creators have to have an MD or a PhD. Several highly-esteemed medical colleges will be contributing content to MedPedia ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
It's not pretty, but human belly fat is rich in stem cells Fat removed from the lower abdomen and inner thigh through liposuction was found to be an excellent source of stem cells, with higher stem cell concentrations than other areas of the body, reports a Brazilian-based study. "Adult stem cells, derived from our own tissues, hold strong promise for improved clinical therapies," said J. Peter Rubin, MD ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
Converting human visual system into a computer Since the idea of using DNA to create faster, smaller, and more powerful computers originated in 1994, scientists have been scrambling to develop successful ways to use genetic code for computation. Now, new research from a professor at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute suggests that if we want to carry out artificial computations, all we have to do is literally look around. Assistant Professor of Cognitive Science Mark Changizi has begun to develop a technique to turn our eyes and visual system into a programmable computer ... more

7/24/2008 PERMALINK
The pros and cons of life extension Future Blogger takes a look at the debate about life extension. Some of you have heard me talk about prospects for extreme life extension – “To live in a healthy body continuously until I choose to die; to not be killed by disease or aging.” I believe that science and technology will make extreme life extension possible for most of us alive today. The prime requisite is to maintain good health, keep a positive attitude towards the future, and root for science and technology breakthroughs in the coming decades ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
How to build a functional android Here is an interesting show that discusses all the technical problems that must be overcome in order to build a robot that is able to walk and move around in a similar way as a human.

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Turn your mobile phone into a social life control bot Loopt.com, a new Reality Enhancement Service (res) bot, shows users where friends are located and what they are doing via detailed, interactive maps on their mobile phones. The bot helps friends connect on the fly and navigate their social lives by orienting them to people, places and events. Users can also share location updates, geo-tagged photos and comments with friends in their mobile address book or on online social networks, communities and blogs ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Protein promotes DNA repair & prevents cancer An abundant chromosomal protein that binds to damaged DNA prevents cancer development by enhancing DNA repair, researchers at The University of Texas M. D. Anderson Cancer Center report. "The protein, HMGB1, was previously hypothesized to block DNA repair," said senior author Karen Vasquez, Ph.D., associate professor in M. D. Anderson's Department of Carcinogenesis at the Science Park - Research Division in Smithville, Texas. "Our findings suggest that depleting this protein may leave patients more vulnerable to developing cancer." ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Repairing age-related declines in immune response A team of Canadian and Finnish scientists has identified a protein able to stimulate the production of T-cells, the white blood cells involved in the recognition and the elimination of infectious agents. The discovery by researchers of the Institute for Research in Immunology and Cancer (IRIC) at the Université de Montréal in Canada and the University of Oulu in Finland – published in the latest edition of the journal Immunity – could help to combat age-related declines in immune response ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Decoding DNA seems easy compared to proteins As molecules go, DNA is pretty straight forward. With its simple composition and linear structure, it easily lends itself to mathematical models. Not so with proteins. In fact, proteins are an order of magnitude more complex than DNA. It is proteins, not DNA, that carry out the cell's heavy lifting. However, with their intricately folded three-dimensional shapes determining a seemingly endless range of possible functions and their manifold interactions with other proteins and with DNA, the leg-work required to mathematically capture the protein universe seems absurd.
And it is. That is why a team of Harvard Medical School researchers have decided to attack this issue from an entirely new angle. Rather than build a mountain range of proteomic data one grain of dirt at a time, they have developed a computer program that can take on the responsibility of assembling such a gargantuan model. Enter Little b, a computational language that can penetrate the "mind" of a cell.
"Through incorporating principles of engineering, we've developed a language that can describe biology in the same way a biologist would," says Jeremy Gunawardena, director of the Virtual Cell Program in Harvard Medical School's department of systems biology. "The potential here is enormous. This opens the door to actually performing discovery science, to look at things like drug interactions, right on the computer."... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Cerebellum-modeled bot runs human-like hand A European research project has brought the dream of human-like robots closer to reality by creating a human-like arm and hand controlled by an electronic ‘brain’ modeled on the human cerebellum ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Key to how brain controls immune system found In a major step in understanding how the nervous system and the immune system interact, scientists at The Feinstein Institute for Medical Research have identified a new anatomical path through which the brain and the spleen communicate. The spleen, once thought to be an unnecessary bit of tissue, is now regarded as an organ where important information from the nervous system reaches the immune system. Understanding this process could ultimately lead to treatments that target the spleen to send the right message when fighting human disease ... more

7/23/2008 PERMALINK
Bot remotes to zip around measuring up the artic Scientists are diligently working to understand how and why the world’s ice shelves are melting. While most of the data they need (temperatures, wind speed, humidity, radiation) can be obtained by satellite, it isn’t as accurate as good old-fashioned, on-site measurement and static ground-based weather stations don’t allow scientists to collect info from as many locations as they’d like. To help arctic scientists collect more detailed data researchers at the Georgia Institute of Technology working with Pennsylvania State University have created small snowmobile bots called SnoMotes able to traverse dangerous ice environments with ease. The SnoMote bots are able to work as a team, autonomously collaborating among themselves to cover all the necessary ground to gather assigned scientific measurements ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Can you find your true love with DNA matching? This had to come, GenePartner.com says that they have a formula to match men and women by analyzing specific genes in their DNA. At GenePartner, says the company, we are dedicated to help you find your ideal life partner. Our formula is based on research on hundreds of couples and analyzes the pattern of genetic combinations found in successful relationships. Using this formula we will determine the probability for a satisfying and long-lasting romantic relationship between two people. Can't help but wonder, if a hillbilly were to send in his and a cousins' DNA, would GenePartner think they were the genetic match made in heaven? ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Rewalk quasi-robotic ambulation exoskeleton
The Rewalk exoskeleton is a quasi-robotic ambulation system developed by ARGO Medical Technologies that provides a viable, upright day-to-day alternative to wheelchair use. By enabling wheelchair users to stand, walk, and climb stairs, the wearable upright mobility system helps restore dignity, health, inclusion, and self-esteem ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
First direct neural interface to actual hit the market
OCZ Technology’s Neural Impulse Actuator (nia) may be the first direct neural interface to actual hit the market, and it is getting some good reviews. Although reviews point out that training the device can take a very long time. Says the company, rather than being a substitute for a mouse, the nia is a pioneering new peripheral to be used in conjunction with your mouse for a more immersive gaming experience. The nia is compatible with any PC game using keyboard input… past, present, or future. Predefined profiles included with the software allow the gamer to develop their own nia—memory to launch the desired behavior of their character and shoot with the “blink of an eye”, without lifting a finger ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
New way to image mutant cells within intact tissues MIT biological engineers have developed a new imaging system that allows them to see cells that have undergone a specific mutation. The work, which could help scientists understand how precancerous mutations arise, marks the first time researchers have been able to pinpoint the number and location of mutant cells--cells with a particular mutation--in intact tissue. In this case, the researchers worked with mouse pancreatic cells. In the image shown, blue dots represent pancreatic cell nuclei, and the cells within the yellow cluster express the mutation ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Stem cells found that may repair spinal-cord injuries A researcher at MIT's Picower Institute for Learning and Memory has pinpointed stem cells within the spinal cord that, if persuaded to differentiate into more healing cells and fewer scarring cells following an injury, may lead to a new, non-surgical treatment for debilitating spinal-cord injuries ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
The long, ever escalating war - humans vs. viruses Humans and viruses have been locked in an evolutionary back-and-forth since humanity first evolved -- one changes to outsmart the other, prompting the second to change and outsmart the first. With retroviruses, which work by inserting themselves into their host's DNA, the evidence remains in our genes. Last year, researchers at Rockefeller University and the Aaron Diamond AIDS Research Center brought an ancient retrovirus back to life and showed it could reproduce and infect human cells. Now, the same scientists have looked at the human side of the story and found evidence that our ancestors fought back against that virus with a defense mechanism our bodies still use today ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Amazing viral abilities to outwit your immune system When individuals infected with HIV become infected with a second strain of the virus, the two viral strains can exchange genetic information, creating a third, recombinant strain of the virus ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Can making yeasts live longer let you live longer? Our understanding of aging in animals owes a great debt to a large body of careful work in a single-celled organism, the brewer’s yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae. Yeast is one of the two organisms with the strongest credible claim to have started modern biogerontology ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Tunable graphene single electron nano-ransistor The device consists of a graphene island connected to source and drain electrodes via two narrow graphene constrictions. It is electrostatically tunable by three lateral graphene gates and an additional back gate ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Some cells can regress back into stem-like cells Researchers from the McGill University Health Centre have shown that insulin-producing β-cells (beta cells) can return to a more primitive developmental state called stem-like cells inside your body. This process is known as "dedifferentiation" and highlights the plasticity of this cell type. This same result has also been validated for the three additional types of cells that – along with β-cells – make up the islets of Langerhans. Together, these islet cells produce insulin and other hormones in the pancreas ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Could tomorrow's mobile pods run on air? It is possible that you could soon be driving a small personal vehicle for trips around town that runs on compressed air. The small but powerful little motor at the end of the video is especially fascinating ... watch

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Quantum nanorings nets able to program electron spins An array of quantum rings with local (ring by ring) modulation of the spin orbit interaction (SOI) can lead to novel effects in spin state transformation of electrons ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Kevlar clothing that even shields body from germs Protective clothing worn by firemen and other emergency workers may soon get a germ-fighting upgrade. Researchers in South Dakota report progress toward the first Kevlar fabrics that can kill a wide range of infectious agents, including bacteria, viruses, and the spores that cause anthrax. The scientists developed a special process to coat Kevlar samples with acyclic N-Halamine, a potent germ-fighting substance. They then exposed coated and uncoated fabric samples to E. coli, Staphylococcus aureus, Candida tropicalis (a fungus), MS2 virus, and Bacillus subtilis spores (to mimic anthrax). Large amounts of microorganisms stuck to untreated fabric samples, but the coated fabrics showed little to no adherence of the infectious agents, the researchers say. The coating is long-lasting, can be reactivated, and does not cause any loss of fabric comfort or strength, they add ... more

7/22/2008 PERMALINK
Palm-sized sensors for disease microbes & toxins Scientists in Singapore are reporting development of a complete, palm-sized sensor that can detect disease-causing microbes, toxins, and other biological threats instantly without the need for an external power source or a computer. The long-awaited device, ideal for remote medical clinics, battlefields, and other sites, represents the next-generation of faster, simpler biosensors ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Cranberry juice creates bacteria barrier for your cells For generations, people have consumed cranberry juice, convinced of its power to ward off urinary tract infections, though the exact mechanism of its action has not been well understood. A new study by researchers at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (WPI) reveals that the juice changes the thermodynamic properties of bacteria in the urinary tract, creating an energy barrier that prevents the microorganisms from getting close enough to latch onto cells and initiate an infection ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
How cells die directs immune system response Every moment we live, cells in our bodies are dying. One type of cell death activates an immune response while another type doesn't. Now researchers at Washington University School of Medicine in St. Louis and St. Jude's Children's Research Hospital in Memphis have figured out how some dying cells signal the immune system. They say the finding eventually could have important implications in the treatment of autoimmune diseases and cancer ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Putting an end to allergies and asthma Researchers at NYU School of Medicine have zeroed in on a class of custom-made immune cells that block allergic reactions. These regulatory T cells are manufactured according to instructions from a gene called Foxp3 whenever we eat or inhale a potential allergen for the first time, ensuring that the next time we encounter that substance, we will not mount an allergic response ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Is golf the next sport to be taken over by bots? Real computer-controlled bots have beaten humans at chess, air hockey and many other sports. Now the guys over at crabfu.com, who make all those clever and often amazingly life-like little RC-controlled bot-like gizmos, are addressing the next big bot challenge. They are out to beat Tiger Woods at golf. Here's the video:

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Mouse Spinal Cord Gene Map Goes Online The Allen Brain Atlas-Mouse Spinal Cord is an interactive database of gene expression mapped across all anatomic segments of the cord for juveniles and adults. The annotated results for over 2000 genes are available as of July, and additional data will be available in November 2008 ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Oldest personal technology of all gets an upgrade
This weapon injects a freezing cold ball of compressed gas, approximately the size of a basketball, at 800psi nearly instantly. The effects of this injection will drop many of the world's largest land predators. The effects of the compressed gas not only cause over-inflation during ascent when used underwater, but also freezes all tissues and organs surrounding the point of injection on land or at sea. When used underwater, the injected gas carries the predator to the surface BEFORE blood is released into the water. Thus giving the diver added protection by diverting other potential predators to the surface ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Life extension - next big venture capitalist target? Life extension is a growing market and could be the next significant industry targeted by Venture Capitalists and private investment as alternative energy and clean tech eventually wane. The opportunity is made obvious by continuous soaring costs in the world’s largest industry, healthcare, unfunded Medicare type liabilities in every industrialized country, and the demographic aging of populations and below replacement fertility rates together with massive demand and willingness to spend on longevity remedies ... more

7/21/2008 PERMALINK
Controlling the movement of cells inside your body A study by researchers at the Institute for Research in Biomedicine (IRB Barcelona), in collaboration with the Instituto de Biología Molecular of CSIC, reveal a mechanism that controls the movement of cells in a tissue by regulating cell adhesion. This same mechanism may be defective in diseases such as cancer and metastasis, when tumor cells lose their adhesion to neighboring cells and migrate through the organism ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Is gene music the perfect way to monitor your health? Could converting genetic activity into music be the perfect way to let you monitor your health. That's what Gil Alterovitz thinks. Gil is a research fellow at Harvard Medical School who is developing a smart bot that translates protein and gene expression into music with healthy bio-expression coming out with harmony and gene expression associated with illness generating a sour note. I can't wait to get my hands on one of these bots ... listen ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Better pattern recognition for your smart bot To implement a truly capable smart bot personal digital assistant, much better pattern recognition software will be necessary. A startup company called Numenta is working on developing such software and their approach is to imitate your brain. Numenta is creating a new computing paradigm that replicates the structure and function of the human neocortex. This Hierarchical Temporal Memory (HTM) technology has the potential to allow computers to solve problems that are currently easily solved for humans but difficult or impossible to solve for machines. Examples include a vision system that can recognize faces or a system that can recognize dangerous traffic situations ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Are electric bikes the future of personal transport? There are expected to be 83-90 million electric bikes and scooters worldwide by the end of 2008, with most on the roads of China. Check out the variety of ingeniously designed, foldaway electric bikes shown in this article ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Japanese team developing palm-held 3D display This seems like the perfect technology for implementing the smart digital companions that will eventually replace our cell phones and netbook computers. A prototype of the gCubik, a 10-centimetre (3.9-inch) cube which can show 3D images with no special glasses was unveiled in Tokyo. Researchers in Japan are developing a gadget that could enable people to hold a three-dimensional image of someone in the palm of their hand ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Nanoribbons with Tunable Electronic Properties Abstract: We present theoretical evidence, based on total-energy first-principles calculations, of the existence of spin-polarized states well localized at and extended along the edges of bare zigzag boron nitride nanoribbons. Our calculations predict that all the magnetic configurations studied in this work are thermally accessible at room temperature and present an energy gap ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Can nanotech cure Ted Kennedy's brain tumor? An interdisciplinary team of researchers at Washington University in St. Louis, led by Karen L. Wooley, Ph.D., James S. McDonnell Distinguished University Professor in Arts & Sciences, is a step closer to delivering cancer-killing drugs to brain tumors similar to the tumor that Senator Ted Kennedy is suffering from ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Artificial nano-photosynthesis to power devices

Carbon nanotubes are the crucial chemical ingredient that could make artificial photosynthesis possible, say a team of Chinese researchers. The team has found that nanotubes mimic an important step in photosynthesis that chemists have been unable to copy until now. Artificial photosynthesis has the potential to efficiently produce hydrogen that could be used as a clean fuel for devices large and small ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Can a massively multiplayer game forecast the future? This fall, The Institute for the Future invites you to play Superstruct, the world's first massively multiplayer forecasting game. It is not just about envisioning the future, it is about inventing the future. Everyone is welcome to join the game. Watch for the opening volley of threats and survival stories, September 2008 ... more ... watch

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Another neat life-like RC bot from crabfu.com
The way these guys are able to translate simple RC controlled servos into such life-like motion never fails to amaze me.

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
First device to read sequence of a single DNA strand Helicos BioSciences' HeliScope is the first commercial device that can directly read the sequence of a single DNA strand, a capability that gives it the potential for unprecedented speed. The company says the device will allow a human genome, which took years and many millions of dollars to decode the first time, to be decoded in one day for a cost of around $1,000 ... movie showing how device works ... more ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Nature's tree branching works great for skins
Nature's tree canopy appears to provide keen insights into the best way to design "smart" materials. Duke University engineers believe that an image of two tree canopies touching top-to-top can guide their efforts to most efficiently control "skins" that can self-repair when damaged, or self-cool when overheated for aircraft and eventually perhaps humods applications ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Molecular alarm system kicks in immune response A new study led by UC Berkeley biologists has identified a molecular alarm system in which intracellular pathogens send out signals that kick the immune response into gear. The findings shed light on how host cells recognize and destroy the pathogenic bugs living within their walls, and may even provide new targets for the research and development of new vaccines and drugs ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Some bacterial can function without DNA Some bacterial cells can swim, morph into new forms and even become dangerously virulent -- all without initial involvement of DNA. Yale University researchers describe Friday in the journal Science how bacteria accomplish this amazing feat -- and in doing so provide a glimpse of what the earliest forms of life on Earth may have looked like. To initiate many important functions, bacteria sometimes depend entirely upon ancient forms of RNA, once viewed simply as the chemical intermediary between DNA's instruction manual and the creation of proteins, said Ronald Breaker, the Henry Ford II Professor of Molecular, Cellular and Developmental Biology at Yale and senior author of the study. ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Making babies: the next 30 years Louise Brown, the first test-tube baby, was born 30 years ago this month after being conceived outside the body using in vitro fertilization (IVF). In their current issue, Nature asks what developments in reproductive medicine could have an equivalent impact in the next three decades ... more (to read predictions without being forced to subscribe)

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Designing empathetic robots tuned to our emotions Feelix Growing is developing software empowering robots that can learn when a person is sad, happy or angry. The learning part is achieved through the use of artificial neural networks, which are well suited to the varied and changing inputs that ‘perceptive’ robots would be exposed to. Using cameras and sensors, the very simple robots being built by the researchers – using mostly off-the-shelf parts – can detect different parameters, such as a person's facial expressions, voice, and proximity to determine emotional state ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Goodbye computer mouse, hello gestural computing

A Gartner analyst predicts the demise of the computer mouse in the next three to five years. Taking over will be so called gestural computer mechanisms like touch screens and facial recognition devices ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Quantum jump towards a quantum computer An international team of researchers has shown that it can control the quantum state of a single electron in a silicon transistor -- even putting the electron in two places at once. Their discovery paves the way toward practical quantum computer with millions of quantum circuits that can be integrated with more-conventional electronics ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
New images unravel another human cell mystery Within human cells, tiny membrane-bound compartments called vesicles shepherd biomolecules from place to place. How these vesicles form, move and finally fuse to deliver cargo at a particular destination largely remains a mystery, now being investigated by Yale researchers Karin Reinisch and Susan Ferro-Novick ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Strongest Material Ever Tested Graphene, praised for its electrical properties, has been proven the strongest known material ... more

7/20/2008 PERMALINK
Nothing to lose but their chains Robots are getting cleverer and more dexterous. Their time has almost come. The Economist takes a look at advances in robotics ... more

7/19/2008 PERMALINK
Humans and machines will merge in future Dr. Nick Bostrom, director of Oxford's Future of Humanity Institute, pointed out at the Global Catastrophic Risk Conference, that unless humans learn how to use our machines to up-mod ourselves, our species is likely to be replaced by intelligent machines. "Any entity which is radically smarter than human beings would also be very powerful," said Dr. Bostrom. "If we get something wrong, you could imagine the consequences would involve the extinction of the human species." ... more

7/19/2008 PERMALINK
Human blood vessels grown from cells in mice For the first time, researchers have successfully grown functional human blood vessels in mice using cells from adult human donors — an important step in developing clinical strategies to grow tissue. "What's really significant about our study is that we are using human cells that can be obtained from blood or bone marrow rather than removing and using fully developed blood vessels," said Joyce Bischoff, Ph.D., senior author of the study and associate professor at Harvard Medical School and Children's Hospital Boston ... more

7/18/2008 PERMALINK
Injecting human brain stem cells offers a cure A research team from Rochester University in New York lead by Steven Goldman has successfully injected human brain stem cells into mice suffering from lack of myelin and cured them ... more

7/18/2008 PERMALINK
Can genetic methods replace hormonal birth control? A group of Canadian and European researchers have unlocked the mystery of a gene with the potential to both regulate and block ovulation. "Our findings demonstrate that the Lrh1 gene is essential in regulating ovulation," said Bruce D. Murphy, director the Animal Research Centre at the Faculty of Veterinary Medicine and an adjunct professor of and obstetrics and gynaecology at the Faculty of Medicine of the Université de Montréal. "Until this point, the role of Lrh1 in female fertility was unclear, but we have found the gene regulates multiple mechanisms of ovulation and may affect fertilization."... more

7/18/2008 PERMALINK
Curing diseases by blocking signaling proteins Curing diseases by blocking or re-programming signaling proteins is a promising area of scientific inquiry. The body's inflammatory response often can get out of hand and do much more harm than good. In the latest success with signaling proteins, a team of researchers at the University of California, San Diego School of Medicine has uncovered a new signaling mechanism used to activate protein kinases that are critical for the body's inflammatory response. "These results may identify a potential therapy for interfering with inflammation," said Michael Karin, Ph.D., professor of pharmacology and pathology in UC San Diego's Laboratory of Gene Regulation and Signal Transduction ... more

7/18/2008 PERMALINK
Treating diseases by finding the genetic cause Scientists at a Duke University Medical School in Singapore are working on a new way to developing targeted therapies for all diseases. Compare normal tissue to diseased tissue and determine which genes are expressing in one situation but not in the other. Then once you know what genes are controlling, use this knowledge to engineer a precisely targeted treatment ... more

7/18/2008 PERMALINK
The race to build a bot that can understand language

Semantic search is the term used by computer scientists to describe bots that can actually understand the context of a web page, not just look for keywords. Obviously, such a bot could greatly improve everyone's search results and many teams are working on this problem at universities all over the world. Companies working on a language understanding bot include: Poweset (recently assimilated by Microsoft), Cognition Technologies, Hakia, and Expert Systems.

The financial success of Google has researchers focused on search applications, but the greatest advantage of building a bot able to understand the context of language will come elsewhere.

Solving the semantic search problem will also put an enormously powerful personal assistant bot in everyone's pocket that we chat with constantly to organizes our lives. It will function as a RES (reality enhancement system) bringing us the data we need to successfully negotiate reality. It will handle our communication, letting in friends and filtering out spam. Our personal assistant bots will ultimately become the technology we rely on the most.

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
An amazingly life-like swimming snake-bot
Watching the life-like swimming agility of the ACM-R5 snake-bot is mesmerizing. Hopefully, we aren't very far from a nano-bot version able to swim through the bloodstream cleaning out the plaque ... more

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
A catalog of BioBricks ~ plug-in DNA fragments The Registry of Standard Biological Parts is a publicly available resource and the focal point of the annual International Genetically Engineered Machine (iGEM) competition. iGEM undergraduate students engineer novel biological systems starting from BioBricks, the parts documented in the Registry of Standard Biological Parts. The BioBrick is an emerging standard for DNA fragments that facilitates the assembly of biological parts into more complex devices and systems by using a standardized fabrication process. The entire collection of parts associated with the Registry is distributed to all teams enrolled in the iGEM competition. The iGEM participants are expected to return the designs they made to the Registry at the end of the competition ... more

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
Will your next car come with a chauffeurbot? Imagine the scene: You're driving your car to an office building in New York City, five minutes from a job interview. No worries. You have already dialed into the car's memory the parking garage where it's going to stay, and prepaid the bill. You shut the door. And off it goes. Driverless. And the chances of the car getting into an accident while it travels five or six treacherous city blocks are less than if the hopeful job applicant had tried to park it himself under time pressure ... more

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
The ambitious plan to find the genes controlling aging

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
Growing neural interface implants Conductive polymer coatings that weave their way into implanted tissue might one day improve the performance of medical implants, such as cochlear implants and brain stimulators. In early studies, neural interfaces coated with an electrically conductive polymer outperformed conventional metal counterparts. Scientists at the University of Michigan hope that the material's novel properties will help lessen the tissue damage caused by medical implants and boost long-term implant function ... more

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
Why genes work in one cell but not in another Although every cell of our bodies contains the same genetic instructions, specific genes typically act only in specific cells at particular times. Other genes are "silenced" in a variety of ways. One mode of gene silencing depends upon the way DNA, the genetic material, is packed in the nucleus of cells. When packed very tightly around complexes of proteins called histones, the DNA double helix is rendered physically inaccessible to molecules that mediate gene expression. Now, a research team that includes Michael Q. Zhang, Ph.D., a professor at Cold Spring Harbor Laboratory (CSHL), has published a comprehensive analysis of modification patterns in histones ... more

7/17/2008 PERMALINK
DARPA's $3 billion man, we have the technology With ambitious goals of 10 times the muscle endurance and the ability to crawl up a wall or leap 7 feet straight up and run at 100 meter olympic sprinter speed for hours. DARPA's $3 billion program to create wearable gear for a Metabolically Dominant Soldier is an effort to create a cyborg fighting man/machine that could dominate future battlefields ... more

7/16/2008 PERMALINK
Mechanism linking stress to illness & aging found Every cell contains a tiny clock called a telomere, which shortens each time the cell divides. Short telomeres are linked to a range of human diseases and aging. Previous studies have shown that an enzyme within the cell, called telomerase, keeps immune cells young by preserving their telomere length and ability to continue dividing. UCLA scientists found that the stress hormone cortisol suppresses immune cells' ability to activate their telomerase. This may explain why the cells of persons under chronic stress have shorter telomeres. Immune cells (stained blue in photo) end in protective caps called telomeres (stained yellow) that are shorter in the elderly -- and in persons suffering chronic stress.

7/16/2008 PERMALINK
How to sharpen a nanobot's spear Fabrication of high aspect ratio metal nanotips by nanosecond pulse laser melting ... more

7/16/2008 PERMALINK
Can nano-magnets prevent the spread of cancer? As we reported in [Making cells trackable throughout our body] researchers have found a way to use magnetic nano-particles to tag certain cells. Now scientists at Georgia Tech have announced that they can not only tag cancer cells with magnetic nano-particles. They can then use magnets to carry the cancer cells out of the body ... more

7/16/2008 PERMALINK
Coding net data so that smart bots can find it Text-based searches do what they say on the box: they find keywords within documents. But what kind of web search could quickly give you a list of foods triggering adverse reactions in elderly women taking medication for high blood pressure? "The current web is a web of text and pictures," says Frank van Harmelen, a researcher in the Department of Artificial Intelligence at the Free University of Amsterdam. "Data is everywhere, but most of it is locked in inaccessible databases behind websites, locked within documents, or held within silos so it can’t be linked to related data elsewhere." ... more

7/15/2008 PERMALINK
To find cure for bird flu, look in the dragon's mouth Scientists and researchers at the U.S. Department of Energy's (DOE) Argonne National Laboratory, in conjunction with scientists from China and Singapore, have taken a big step closer to a cure for the most common strain of bird flu (H5N1). All viruses contain only a small number of proteins that govern all of the viruses' functions. In bird flu the protein RNA polymerase contains the instructions that allows the virus to copy itself along with all of its genetic material. The Argonne study performed X-ray crystallography on the protein crystals and discovered a surprising resemblance in the protein's structure to the head of a dragon and found that to reproduce another subunit must bind to the dragon's mouth. Blocking this to inhibit RNA replication in H5N1 seems very feasible ... more

7/15/2008 PERMALINK
Effort to develop cell therapy imaging technologies European Institute for Biomedical Imaging Research (EIBIR) has launched ENCITE, a research effort aimed at developing imaging technologies and methods in the cellular therapy field. The medical world lacks a single imaging modality that would be effective in stem cell therapy. But experts say that several types of imaging have the capacity to play major roles in this line of research, particularly magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) and optical imaging. Both these imaging types are being researched by the ENCITE team ... more

7/15/2008 PERMALINK
Living legos that can form tissue-like structures Researchers at Harvard-MIT Health Sciences and Technology have taken an important first step toward building complex tissues from the bottom up by creating what they call living legos. These building blocks, biofriendly gels of various shapes studded with cells, can self-assemble into complex structures resembling those found in tissues ... more

7/15/2008 PERMALINK
Is military seeking the perfect bot to spy on you? Scientists at Tufts University have received a $3.3 million contract from the U.S. Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency (DARPA) to develop chemical robots that will be so soft and squishy that they will be able to squeeze into spaces as tiny as 1 centimeter, then morph back into something 10 times larger, and ultimately biodegrade. As previously reported, DARPA has also given a grant to iRobot for similar research. Cheap little morphing bugbots like those in the movie Minority Report (see trailer below) are the perfect technology for allowing security apparatchiks to spy on and achieving total domination and control over any restive population, including their own ... more ... watch

7/15/2008 PERMALINK
Why does DNA replication stall?

In a Tufts University study published in the July 14 issue of "Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America," a team of biologists have found a relationship between peculiar DNA sequences named palindromes and replication delays. Sergei Mirkin, White Family Professor of Biology at Tufts' School of Arts and Sciences and his team studied palindrome behavior in bacterial, yeast and mammalian cells. "Replication is carried out by a complex and sophisticated machinery, which has many levels of checks and balances to prevent 'typos' from happening. Long DNA palindromes, however, can occasionally jam this powerful replication machinery," Mirkin explained. The researchers were also able to pinpoint the exact structure causing DNA malfunction. "In all cases it was the formation of the hairpin-like DNA structure in a palindrome that caused the replication to stall," he said ... more