New pathogens emerge all the time. It’s becoming easier for small groups to create weaponized diseases. Bill Gates says a small group could build a deadlier form of smallpox in a lab. And people are always hopping on planes, making it possible for a disease to reach a new continent in a few hours.
Ever since 2014, Italy-based Youbionic, which was founded by Federico Ciccarese and specializes in robotics and bionics, has been working on its 3D printed, robot-controlled, bionic prosthetic hand. The company started taking pre-orders for the bionic prosthetic two years ago, and has since been making improvements and updates to the original model, even coming out with a 3D printed double hand device for the augmented human. Now, Youbionic has released its latest bionic product – the Youbionic One.
“We believe that technology at our disposal today can be used for the increase in human capabilities and intervention in the replacement of parts of our body which are not working properly,” Ciccarese wrote in an email.
“Youbionic is committed every day to create technologies that can elevate mankind to a higher level.”
For a few people—those who are terminally ill, in severe pain and determined to die—suicide may be the least terrible option. In such circumstances, and with firm safeguards, doctors should be allowed to assist. But many of the 800,000 people who kill themselves each year act in haste, and more could be saved with better health services, labour-market policies and curbs on booze, guns, pesticide and pills. America, in particular, could spare much pain by learning from the progress elsewhere.
Urbanisation, fewer forced marriages and more curbs on the means of self-destruction.
Tracking brain wave activity in individuals at high risk for Alzheimer’s disease may be a promising new method for early detection, according to a new Canadian study by researchers at Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care in Toronto, Ontario.
This is possible because brain waves tend to slow down in certain regions likely to be affected by the disease next, even before neurons have been lost.
The findings, published online in the journal Human Brain Mapping, show that individuals potentially in the early stages of Alzheimer’s disease (mild cognitive impairment) and those with a rare form of language dementia (primary progressive aphasia) exhibited sluggish brainwaves and subtle signs of damage in the brain regions responsible for memory and planning.
Scientists have discovered a new chemical process—also known as a biosynthetic pathway—in bacteria which could lead to a new generation of antibiotics being produced and manufactured.
Researchers at The University of Manchester’s School of Chemistry say their new pathway includes an enzyme, called a carboxylase, which adds CO2 to a precursor molecule producing a highly unusual antibiotic called malonomycin.
The team says the biosynthetic process used to produce this antibiotic could now possibly lead to the discovery and development of other drugs, helping in the fight against drug-resistant bugs and illnesses in the future.
Not sure if this is real or still vaporware yet. But it IS inevitable. It’s not a matter of “if”, but “when”. And we’re most likely not going to be able to regulate it much, either. If an embryo or fetus is not a human, then parents have the right to do anything they want to it. You might think that this is going to result in eugenics, like erasing melanin genes and starting a race against the fictitious “white genocide”. You’re right. But if you think that’s as bad as it’ll get, think more creatively. What happens when poor parents get paid to implant “willing servility” genes into their unborn children, in order to pay bills. The future is now. Cyborgs will not destroy humanity, but humanity itself might. What kinds of rights can be written into law to prevent this kind of extortion, that won’t also grant fetal personhood and end up derailing abortion rights? It’s going to be a bumpy ride, folks, buckle up!
A Chinese researcher claims he helped make the world’s first genetically edited babies — twin girls born this month, and with DNA he says he altered with a powerful new tool capable of rewriting the very blueprint of life.
If true, it would be a profound leap of science and ethics.
A U.S. scientist said he took part in the work in China, but this kind of gene editing is banned in the United States because the DNA changes can pass to future generations and risks harming other genes.
All brain cells ‘air-kiss’ before they come together to form a final synaptic relationship, new research by University of Kent scientists has revealed.
The breakthrough study reveals that molecular signaling within the brain operates in a very different way to previously thought, with cells now found to use the same pair of molecules for both distant and close contacts.
The research, by a team led by Professor Yuri Ushkaryov of the University’s Medway School of Pharmacy, may lead to a much better understanding of how neurons send messages to distant parts of the brain or other organs in the body, such as muscle cells.
Today, we want to highlight a study that shows the link between atherosclerosis and the age-related shrinking of the thymus, which is arguably the most important organ of the immune system [1].
The adaptive and innate immune systems and atherosclerosis
The thymus is essentially like an army base where new T cells develop and are trained to become the soldiers of the adaptive immune system. However, as we age, the thymus shrinks, its ability to train new T cells declines, and the immune cell-producing tissue turns to fat and slowly wastes away; this process is known as thymic involution.
