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Submission + - Scientists may have found the tiny DNA switch that made us human (sciencedaily.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: Scientists at UC San Diego have discovered a small but powerful section of DNA, called HAR123, that could help explain what makes the human brain so unique. Instead of being a gene, HAR123 acts like a “volume control” for brain development, guiding how brain cells form and in what proportions. The human version of HAR123 behaves differently from the chimpanzee version, possibly giving us greater flexibility in how we think and learn. This finding could also help researchers understand the roots of certain brain-related conditions, including autism.

Submission + - New Brain Device Is First To Read Out Inner Speech (scientificamerican.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: After a brain stem stroke left him almost entirely paralyzed in the 1990s, French journalist Jean-Dominique Bauby wrote a book about his experiences—letter by letter, blinking his left eye in response to a helper who repeatedly recited the alphabet. Today people with similar conditions often have far more communication options. Some devices, for example, track eye movements or other small muscle twitches to let users select words from a screen. And on the cutting edge of this field, neuroscientists have more recently developed brain implants that can turn neural signals directly into whole words. These brain-computer interfaces (BCIs) largely require users to physically attempt to speak, however—and that can be a slow and tiring process. But now a new development in neural prosthetics changes that, allowing users to communicate by simply thinking what they want to say.

The new system relies on much of the same technology as the more common “attempted speech” devices. Both use sensors implanted in a part of the brain called the motor cortex, which sends motion commands to the vocal tract. The brain activation detected by these sensors is then fed into a machine-learning model to interpret which brain signals correspond to which sounds for an individual user. It then uses those data to predict which word the user is attempting to say. But the motor cortex doesn’t only light up when we attempt to speak; it’s also involved, to a lesser extent, in imagined speech. The researchers took advantage of this to develop their “inner speech” decoding device and published the results on Thursday in Cell. The team studied three people with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) and one with a brain stem stroke, all of whom had previously had the sensors implanted. Using this new “inner speech” system, the participants needed only to think a sentence they wanted to say and it would appear on a screen in real time. While previous inner speech decoders were limited to only a handful of words, the new device allowed participants to draw from a dictionary of 125,000 words.

Submission + - Aging Can Spread Through Your Body Via a Single Protein, Study Finds (sciencealert.com)

Submitted by alternative_right
alternative_right writes: Take note of the name: ReHMGB1. A new study pinpoints this protein as being able to spread the wear and tear that comes with time as it quietly travels through the bloodstream. This adds significantly to our understanding of aging.

The researchers were able to identify ReHMGB1 as a critical messenger passing on the senescence signal by analyzing different types of human cells grown in the lab and conducting a variety of tests on mice.

When ReHMGB1 transmission was blocked in mice with muscle injuries, muscle regeneration happened more quickly, while the animals showed improved physical performance, fewer signs of cellular aging, and reduced systemic inflammation.

Submission + - Starlink tries to block Virginia's plan to bring fiber Internet to residents (arstechnica.com)

Submitted by AmiMoJo
AmiMoJo writes: Starlink operator SpaceX is fighting Virginia's plan to deploy fiber Internet service to residents, claiming that federal grant money should be given to Starlink instead. SpaceX is already in line to win over $3 million in grant money in the state but is seeking $60 million.

Starlink is poised to benefit from the Trump administration rewriting rules for the $42 billion Broadband Equity, Access, and Deployment (BEAD) grant program. While the Biden administration decided that states should prioritize fiber in order to build more future-proof networks, the Trump administration ordered states to revise their plans with a "tech-neutral approach" and lower the average cost of serving each location.

Submission + - Apple Watch is Cleared by the CBP of Infringing on the ECG Patent (cbp.gov)

Submitted by Kirschey
Kirschey writes: The U.S. Customs and Border Protection determined that the redesigned Apple Watch models do not violate AliveCor’s electrocardiogram patents, allowing them to be imported. This decision comes before a consolidated hearing at the Federal Circuit Court regarding the same patents.

We find that Apple Inc. (“Apple”) has met its burden to show that certain redesigned wearable devices (“articles at issue”) do not infringe one or more of claims 12, 13, and 19-23 of U.S. Patent No. 10,638,941 (“the ’941 Patent”) and claims 1, 3, 5, 8-10, 12, 15, and 16 of U.S. Patent No. 10,595,731 (“the ’731 Patent). Thus, CBP’s position is that the articles at issue are not subject to the limited exclusion order that the U.S. International Trade Commission (“Commission” or “ITC”) issued in Investigation No. 337-TA-1266 (“the underlying investigation” or “the 1266 investigation”), pursuant to Section 337 of the Tariff Act of 1930, as amended, 19 U.S.C. 1337 (“Section 337”).

Submission + - Glass is the Future of Storage (microsoft.com) 1

Submitted by Kirschey
Kirschey writes: Microsoft is working on storing data in glass for their data centers part of their Project Silica.

Project Silica aims to break this cycle. Developed under the aegis of Microsoft Research, it can store massive amounts of data in glass plates roughly the size of a drink coaster and preserve the data for thousands of years. Richard Black, Research Director, Project Silica, adds, “This technology allows us to write data knowing it will remain unchanged and secure, which is a significant step forward in sustainable data storage.

Submission + - SPAM: Newly Discovered Molecule Fights Off Over 300 Kinds of Drug-Resistant Bacteria

Submitted by schwit1
schwit1 writes: “The molecule is called fabimycin, and further down the line it could be used to fight off some of the most stubborn infections that humans can get. The new potential treatment targets gram-negative bacteria, a group of hard-to-kill pathogens that are commonly behind infections of the urinary tract, lungs, and even the bloodstream.”
Link to Original Source

Comment When the three year deal is up in November... (Score 1) 54

by Kirschey (#62791046) Attached to: Disney's Streaming Services Now Have More Subscriptions Than Netflix
I like so many other prebought Disney+ around this time three years ago. The service began in November, if I remember correctly. The biggest question is what will the new cost be and how many people will cancel Disney+ or even flip between Netflix and Disney+ every other quarter?

Also in the numbers...this is total subscribers to all of Disney's services: ESPN, Hulu, and Disney+.

Submission + - A Single Gene in One Species Can Cause Other Species to Go Extinct (scientificamerican.com)

Submitted by Anonymous Coward
An anonymous reader writes: Some species play an outsize role in the environment they inhabit. Beavers build dams that create ponds where fish thrive. Otters in kelp forests eat enough sea urchins so that the kelp can grow without being gobbled up first. These so-called keystone species hold their ecosystem together. But what if ecosystems not only hinge on a single species but can be made or broken by a single gene? In a study published on Thursday in Science, researchers have demonstrated the existence of what theycall a “keystone gene.” The discovery may have implications for how scientists think about the ways ecosystems, and the species in them, persist over time.

In the lab, the researchers built several miniature ecosystems that consisted of just four species each. At the bottom of the food chain was Arabidopsis thaliana, a small annual plant that is a favorite study organism among biologists (its genome was sequenced more than 20 years ago). In each ecosystem, the plant served as food for two species of aphids, which in turn fed a parasitoid wasp. Each bread-box-sized ecosystem contained multiple Arabidopsis plants. In some systems, the plants were genetically identical—a monoculture. In others, genetic variations were introduced by turning on and off three genes—MAM1, AOP2 and GSOH—in various combinations.The researchers focused on these genes because they maintain the production of compounds called aliphatic glucosinolates, which protect the plant by deterring hungry aphids. Some of the experimental ecosystems had more variation in the number of genetic combinations than others; the researchers watched to see how well plants, aphids and wasps would coexist in each scenario.

As the team expected, the ecosystems with more genetically diverse plants turned out to be more stable. For each plant with a different genetic makeup that the researchers added to the mix, the insects’ extinction rate fell by nearly 20 percent, compared with monocultures. But what stunned the researchers was that this result seemed to hinge on a single gene. Regardless of diversity, if systems contained plants with a certain variant, or allele, of the AOP2 gene, the extinction rate of the insects decreased by 29 percent, compared with systems without it. Essentially, if you change that AOP2 allele, you lose the insects. Increasing genetic diversity helped the insects because it increased the likelihood of the aphids encountering plants with this one critical gene variant. [...] Also surprising was the mechanism by which the AOP2 allele impacted the aphids. Although the variant changed the way a plant produced its aphid-deterring compound, it also allowed the plant to grow faster. This in turn allowed the aphids, as well as the wasps that relied on them for food, to become larger faster.

Submission + - Dark matter may be made of Black Holes formed in the Big Bang (livescience.com)

Submitted by GFS666
GFS666 writes: We may soon be able to test one of Stephen Hawking's most controversial theories, new research suggests. In the 1970s, Hawking proposed that dark matter, the invisible substance that makes up most matter in the cosmos, may be made of black holes formed in the earliest moments of the Big Bang.

Now, three astronomers have developed a theory that explains not only the existence of dark matter, but also the appearance of the largest black holes in the universe. "What I find personally super exciting about this idea is how it elegantly unifies the two really challenging problems that I work on — that of probing the nature of dark matter and the formation and growth of black holes — and resolves them in one fell swoop," study co-author Priyamvada Natarajan, an astrophysicist at Yale University, said in a statement. What's more, several new instruments — including the James Webb Space Telescope that just launched — could produce data needed to finally assess Hawking's famous notion.

Submission + - Blood test could help detect cancer in people with nonspecific symptoms

Submitted by eastlight_jim
eastlight_jim writes: Scientists from the University of Oxford have today published a study in Clinical Cancer Research which shows that they can use a technique called NMR (nuclear magnetic resonance) metabolomics to identify patients with cancer. Specifically, they identify patients with cancer from within a population of generally unwell patients with non-specific symptoms like fatigue and weigh-loss — a traditionally hard to diagnose cohort. The technique works because the NMR identifies small molecules called metabolites in the blood of patients and this information can then be used by machine learning to recognise patterns of metabolites specific to cancer, as well as identifying patients whose cancer has already spread.

The Guardian goes on to say:

If validated, the test could enable cancer patients to be identified earlier, when they are more likely to respond to treatment, and help flag up who could benefit from early access to drugs designed to tackle metastatic cancer.

Comment iCore + Good MB (Score 1) 516

by Kirschey (#33463660) Attached to: Video Appliance For a Large Library On a Network?

I built a full system about a year ago that is versatile and wife friendly. It is upgradable and I never have codec issues.

1. I chose an iCore 3 because of the quiet nature and the HD-friendly power.

2. Motherboard - I chose ASUS P7H55D-M EVO LGA 1156 Intel H55 HDMI USB 3.0 Micro ATX because of the HDMI + DVI and the optical sound in addition to its no fan quiet design.

3. Case - This is always the tricky part. I chose the Antec Minuet350. It works even though it is not the best looking case. I prefer my old ASUS barebones for looks, but they stopped making the book pcs when the eee became popular.

4. Software - you can choose windows media center or something like sagetv. I prefer GBPVR. It is simple, intuitive and still actively developed. There is a great and helpful community to assist.

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