Lifeboat Foundation

With the phone, predictions now feel relatively easy. But we’re setting off on our next five years, and we’re looking beyond the phone. What happens next? And what does it mean for how we live in the future? For our anniversary, we asked 10 of the smartest, most interesting, most influential people we know to describe our lives in 2021 — and the many ways technology, culture, science, and transportation will change. We’ll be running these interviews all through November, and they paint an ambitious, dynamic vision of the future.

We’ll discuss how in the near future, many Americans may never drive again. We’ll talk to groundbreaking scientists about CRISPR, a revolutionary method of editing genes that’s already led to incredible breakthroughs. We’ll see how for many employees, technology may make geography irrelevant, and how social media will usher in a new age of social activism. More women will finally find their rightful place in boardrooms, and by 2021, artificial and human intelligence will exist in something called “symbiotic autonomy.”

It’s tempting to look backwards on an anniversary. But The Verge is about looking ahead, and we would much rather spend our fifth birthday imagining the incredible (and occasionally terrifying) promise of the future. We’ve collected some excellent guides to help us along the way — we hope you join us.

Devices that autonomously regulate blood sugar levels are in the final stages before widespread availability.

In Brief:

Our life experiences may be passed on to our children and our children’s children — and now scientists report that they have discovered that this inheritance can be turned on or off.

Epigenetics is the study of inherited changes in gene expression…changes that are inherited, but they are not inherent to our DNA. For instance, life experiences, which aren’t directly coded in human DNA, can actually be passed on to children. Studies have shown that survivors of traumatic events may have effects in subsequent generations.

Continue reading “Memories Can Be Inherited, and Scientists May Have Just Figured out How” »

More progress with gene therapy safety.

A Washington State University researcher has developed a way to reduce the development of cancer cells that are an infrequent but dangerous byproduct of gene therapy.

Grant Trobridge, an associate professor of pharmaceutical sciences, has altered the way a virus carries a beneficial gene to its target cell. The modified viral vectors reduce the risk of cancer and can be used for many blood diseases.

Continue reading “Researcher develops safer gene therapy” »

2013 saw the release of one of the most important papers in aging research and one that saw renewed interest and support for the concept of SENS.

Aging is characterized by a progressive loss of physiological integrity, leading to impaired function and increased vulnerability to death. This deterioration is the primary risk factor for major human pathologies, including cancer, diabetes, cardiovascular disorders, and neurodegenerative diseases. Aging research has experienced an unprecedented advance over recent years, particularly with the discovery that the rate of aging is controlled, at least to some extent, by genetic pathways and biochemical processes conserved in evolution. This Review enumerates nine tentative hallmarks that represent common denominators of aging in different organisms, with special emphasis on mammalian aging. These hallmarks are: genomic instability, telomere attrition, epigenetic alterations, loss of proteostasis, deregulated nutrient sensing, mitochondrial dysfunction, cellular senescence, stem cell exhaustion, and altered intercellular communication. A major challenge is to dissect the interconnectedness between the candidate hallmarks and their relative contributions to aging, with the final goal of identifying pharmaceutical targets to improve human health during aging, with minimal side effects.

The excellent SENS animations hosted by Edward James Olmos of battlestar galactica fame.

Discover how SENS Research Foundation is driving public and professional recognition of potential true cures for age-related diseases and disabilities.

A woman living on a dialysis machine is grown a new kidney using her own cells. A father struggling with age-related vision loss has his eyesight restored. A soldier suffers extensive burns and has his skin regenerated.

This is a glimpse of the holy grail of regenerative medicine. The ultimate goal of the field is to develop therapies that restore normal function to diseased tissues and organs. Advances in 3D bioprinting, the process of fabricating functional human tissue outside the body in a layer-by-layer fashion, have pushed the envelope on what is considered possible in the field.

Continue reading “Printable Organs Will Put an End to Transplant Lists” »

Dr. Watson will see you now…

IBM Watson is rapidly earning its place in medical diagnosis. It has recently proven its ability to accurately diagnose patients and far faster than conventional doctors could ever do. The world of diagnosis of medicine is going to change very rapidly in the next few years.

#crowdfundthecure #aging

Continue reading “Dr House goes digital as IBM’s Watson diagnoses rare diseases” »

The pace at which conventional chips improve is slowing, and these startups say optical computers are the answer.