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Science

SCIENCE: This Animal Doesn’t Breathe

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When the parasitic blob known as Henneguya salminicola sinks its spores into the flesh of a tasty fish, it does not hold its breath. That’s because H. salminicola is the only known animal on Earth that does not breathe. If you spent your entire life infecting the dense muscle tissues of fish and underwater worms, like H. salminicola does, you probably wouldn’t have much opportunity to turn oxygen into energy, either. However, all other multicellular animals on Earth whose DNA scientists have had a chance to sequence have some respiratory genes. According to a new study published today (Feb. 24) … Read more

Scientists Discover “Engine of Consciousness” – In Monkeys

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macaque - pixabay

A team of researchers has found an “engine of consciousness” in the brain — a region where, in monkeys at least, even a little jump start will make them wake up from anesthesia. Consciousness is a mystery. We don’t know for certain why creatures are sometimes awake and sometimes asleep, or which mechanisms in the brain are most important for a conscious state. In this new paper, though, researchers turned up some important clues. Using electrodes across the brains of awake and sleeping macaques, as well as macaques under different forms of anesthesia, the team found two key pathways in … Read more

SCIENCE: Yaravirus Is Unlike Anything We Have Ever Seen

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Yaravirus

Our planet is teeming with mysterious microbes. Now, in the waters of an artificial lake, scientists may have discovered one of the most mysterious of all: a brand-new virus with genes that have never been seen before. A couple of years ago, the group collected water samples from the creeks of Lake Pampulha, an artificial lagoon in the city of Belo Horizonte in Brazil, in search of giant viruses — or those with massive genomes — that infect single-celled organisms called amoebas. But when the team went back to the lab and added these samples to amoeba cells to try … Read more

WELCOME TO THE FUTURE: A New App Scans Your Face to Verify You Are a “Girl”

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fsacial scan woman - deposit photos

A new app designed exclusively for women is raising eyebrows for requiring users to send in pictures for their bio-metric gender verification software to get access. The app, called “giggle,” explains that the gender verification process “ensures that those within the platform are verified as girls.” Users are required to send in a “3D selfie” that examines their bone structure, a process that “ensures that those within the platform are verified as girls.” “It’s Bio-Science, not pseudo-science like phrenology,” the app claims. At the end of this explanation in the app’s FAQ, a message about trans women casually states “Unfortunately … Read more

SCIENCE: Could Quantum Cognition Explain Human Behavior?

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artificial intelligence - pixabay

The same fundamental platform that allows Schrödinger’s cat to be both alive and dead, and also means two particles can “speak to each other” even across a galaxy’s distance, could help to explain perhaps the most mysterious phenomena: human behavior. Quantum physics and human psychology may seem completely unrelated, but some scientists think the two fields overlap in interesting ways. Both disciplines attempt to predict how unruly systems might behave in the future. The difference is that one field aims to understand the fundamental nature of physical particles, while the other attempts to explain human nature — along with its … Read more

SCIENCE: There Are (At Least) Four Distinct Patterns of Aging

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Some people’s hearts stay strong well into their 60s, but their kidneys begin to fail. Others may have the kidneys of a 30-year-old but fall victim to constant infection. Now, scientists may be one step closer to understanding why the aging process varies so drastically between people. Even within a single person, aging unfolds at different rates in different tissues, sometimes striking the liver before the heart or kidney, for example. People fall into distinct categories depending on which of their biological systems ages fastest, and someday, doctors could use this information to recommend specific lifestyle changes and design personalized … Read more

Gene Tweak Extends Life 500% (If You’re This Worm)

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roundworm - deposit photos

By tweaking a few key genes in the DNA of a roundworm, scientists have extended the animal’s life span by about 500%. That’s a huge jump in life: An average roundworm lives for about three to four weeks. But when unencumbered of two specific genes — DAF-2 and RSKS-1 — the creatures can survive for several months. Scientists had linked these genes to longevity years ago, noting an increase in the life span of worms and other creatures when these genes are switched off. However, the exact role of the genes in the aging process remained a mystery. Now, researchers … Read more

SCIENCE: First Living Machine Constructed With AI and Frog Cells

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What happens when you take cells from frog embryos and grow them into new organisms that were “evolved” by algorithms? You get something that researchers are calling the world’s first “living machine.” Though the original stem cells came from frogs — the African clawed frog, Xenopus laevis — these so-called xenobots don’t resemble any known amphibians. The tiny blobs measure only 0.04 inches (1 millimeter) wide and are made of living tissue that biologists assembled into bodies designed by computer models, according to a new study. These mobile organisms can move independently and collectively, can self-heal wounds and survive for … Read more

Are There Invisible Aliens Among Us?

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Life is pretty easy to recognize. It moves, it grows, it eats, it excretes, it reproduces. Simple. In biology, researchers often use the acronym “MRSGREN” to describe it. It stands for movement, respiration, sensitivity, growth, reproduction, excretion and nutrition. But Helen Sharman, Britain’s first astronaut and a chemist at Imperial College London, recently said that alien lifeforms that are impossible to spot may be living among us. How could that be possible? While life may be easy to recognize, it’s actually notoriously difficult to define and has had scientists and philosophers in debate for centuries — if not millennia. For … Read more

FOR READERS: It’s Not Right, But I Don’t Care

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FOR READERS Today’s reader topic comes from QSFer Olivia Wylie: Ever read a sci fi book that you know are not scientifically accurate, but you love anyway? Share your faves and tell us why. Writers: This is a reader chat – you are welcome to join it, but please do not reference your own works directly. Thanks! Join the chat: FB: http://bit.ly/1MvPABV MeWe: http://bit.ly/2mjg8lf