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May 5, 2020

Visualising algae-eating viruses from space

Posted by in categories: biological, climatology, sustainability

Algae isn’t just found in your garden pond or local river. Sometimes it explodes into vast “blooms” far out to sea, that can be the size of a small country. Such algal blooms can match even a rainforest at taking carbon out of the air. And then, in just a week or two, they are gone – sometimes consumed by viruses.

Given the scale of blooms and their vital role in both marine ecology and climate regulation we must know more about these viruses. Research conducted with our Weizmann Institute colleague Yoav Lehahn and others and published in the journal Current Biology, is the first attempt to quantify the affect of viruses on large scale algal blooms.

Algae in this context refers to tiny sea organisms known as phytoplankton which exist right at the bottom of the marine food web, providing the ultimate source of all organic matter in the sea. They do this by consuming carbon dioxide during photosynthesis, “fixing” this carbon into organic matter (themselves) in the same way trees take carbon out of the air.

May 5, 2020

Firm tests UV light treatment that Trump was mocked for mentioning

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

Aytu BioScience announced on April 20, four days before the Trump remarks, that it has signed an exclusive licensing deal with Cedars Sanai Medical Center in Los Angeles. The center has developed and is testing a UV-A “Healight” designed to be inserted via a catheter inside the trachea to kill pathogens, including the coronavirus.

Ultraviolet, or UV, light is commonly used by physicians to treat skin iseases. Cedars-Sanai says UV-A phototherapy potentially could be employed in internal organs.


President Trump has been mocked relentlessly for suggesting that ultraviolet light could be brought “inside the body” to kill the coronavirus, but there is ongoing research to do just that.

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May 5, 2020

NASA video of exploding star

Posted by in category: space

Click on photo to start video.

NASA captured the brilliant flash of an exploding star for the first time.

May 5, 2020

Coronavirus Florida: Bradenton ‘church’ ordered to stop selling bleach as COVID-19 miracle cure

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, neuroscience

Fyodor Rouge, this is the church I was telling you about.


The Bradenton-based organization falsely claims that the treatment is effective for a number of conditions, including Alzheimer’s disease, brain disease, cancer, HIV and AIDS, according to the Food and Drug Administration.

This content is being provided for free as a public service to our readers during the coronavirus outbreak. Sign up for our daily or breaking newsletters to stay informed. If local news is important to you, consider becoming a digital subscriber to the Sarasota Herald-Tribune.

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May 4, 2020

Iran launches its first military satellite

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, military

As the world grapples with the coronavirus pandemic and historically low oil prices, the missile launch may signal a new willingness to take risks by Iran.


It said the satellite — dubbed the Nour — was deployed from the Qassed two-stage launcher from the Markazi desert, a vast expanse in Iran’s central plateau.

The satellite “orbited the Earth at 425km [264 miles]”, said the website. “This action will be a great success and a new development in the field of space for Islamic Iran.”

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May 4, 2020

Study reveals single-step strategy for recycling used nuclear fuel

Posted by in categories: chemistry, engineering, nuclear energy, sustainability

A typical nuclear reactor uses only a small fraction of its fuel rod to produce power before the energy-generating reaction naturally terminates. What is left behind is an assortment of radioactive elements, including unused fuel, that are disposed of as nuclear waste in the United States. Although certain elements recycled from waste can be used for powering newer generations of nuclear reactors, extracting leftover fuel in a way that prevents possible misuse is an ongoing challenge.

Now, Texas A&M University engineering researchers have devised a simple, proliferation-resistant approach for separating out different components of . The one-step chemical reaction, described in the February issue of the journal Industrial & Engineering Chemistry Research, results in the formation of crystals containing all of the leftover nuclear elements distributed uniformly.

The researchers also noted that the simplicity of their recycling approach makes the translation from lab bench to industry feasible.

May 4, 2020

Flyt Aerospace bids its Red Hummingbird hoverbike for US Air Force’s Agility Prime

Posted by in category: military

Flyt Aerospace is offering its Red Hummingbird pilot-optional, fully-electric hoverbike for the US Air Force’s (USAF’s) Agility Prime electric vertical takeoff and landing (eVTOL) procurement effort.

The eight-motor, multi-rotor Red Hummingbird is designed for speeds of 0–97 km/h in 5.1 seconds, payload capacity of up to 113 kg, a cost of USD2.40 worth of electricity per flight, and the ability to operate for 20–30 minutes per charge. The aircraft is also designed to create only 65 db of noise at 50 ft altitude. Flyt is offering the Red Hummingbird for the Agility Prime 1–2 person capacity area of interest (AOI) 2, according to company founder and CEO Ansel Misfeldt.

Misfeldt told Jane’s on 1 May that the Red Hummingbird has a fully-built prototype currently in flight testing, but that the aircraft has yet to fly with a human. Flyt has so far been flying the aircraft with weights in the pilot seat to ensure system checkout before flying with a pilot.

May 4, 2020

How a Retrovirus or RNA Virus Works

Posted by in category: biotech/medical

COVID-19’s genes are encoded in RNA instead of DNA. COVID-19 uses reverse transcriptase to transform its single-stranded RNA into double-stranded DNA. It is DNA that stores the genome of human cells and cells from other higher life forms. Once transformed from RNA to DNA, the new COVID-19 DNA can be integrated into the genome of the infected cells. When the DNA versions of the retroviral genes have been incorporated into the genome, the cell then is tricked into copying those genes as part of its normal replication process and making millions of COVID-19 cells… In other words, the cell does the work of the virus for it.

That’s why it was necessary to upgrade Stem Cell Neurotherapy for COVID-19 by adding T-Cells, B-Cells, and Natural Killer Cells to the arsenal. It was not enough to just regenerate new lung cells to replace the lung cells infected by COVID-19, but the COVID-19 Virus Cells had to be attacked and destroyed, and its RNA single strand had to be unraveled, in order to prevent them from invading and infecting the newly regenerated lung cells.


A retrovirus is a virus whose genes are encoded in RNA, and, using an enzyme called reverse transcriptase, replicates itself by first reverse-coding its genes into the DNA of the cells it infects. Like other viruses, retroviruses need to use the cellular machinery of the organisms they infect to make copies of themselves. However, infection by a retrovirus requires an additional step. The retrovirus genome needs to be reverse-transcribed into DNA before it can be copied in the usual way. The enzyme that does this backward transcription is known as reverse transcriptase.

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May 4, 2020

ACS Publications: Chemistry journals, books, and references published by the American Chemical Society

Posted by in categories: chemistry, engineering

Here is a source of great information ACS Publications has:

‚300,000 Research Articles

‚000 News Stories

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May 4, 2020

Pathogen Mishaps Rise as Regulators Stay Clear

Posted by in categories: biotech/medical, government

We are being told that mistakes can not happen in labs. I for one do not believe such, so let me take you on a trip down memory lane to 2014, around the same year funding of gain of function was stopped.

Lab workers at different sites accidentally jabbed themselves with needles contaminated by anthrax or West Nile virus. An air-cleaning system meant to filter dangerous microbes out of a lab failed, but no one knew because the alarms had been turned off. A batch of West Nile virus, improperly packed in dry ice, burst open at a Federal Express shipping center. Mice infected with bubonic plague or Q fever went missing. And workers exposed to Q fever, brucellosis or tuberculosis did not realize it until they either became ill or blood tests detected the exposure.


The recent number of mistakes documented at federal laboratories involving anthrax, flu and smallpox viruses have contributed to a debate over lax government oversight at high-level containment labs.

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