Lifeboat Foundation: Safeguarding Humanity
Toggle light / dark theme

Blog – Page 2

Get the latest international news and world events from around the world.

Log in for authorized contributors

Scientists may have found the best place for humans to land on Mars

Hidden ice beneath Mars’ surface may mark the spot where humanity first sets foot on the Red Planet. A newly identified region on Mars may hold the key to future human landings. Researchers found evidence of water ice less than a meter beneath the surface, close enough to be harvested for water, oxygen, and fuel. The location strikes a rare balance between sunlight and cold, helping preserve the ice. It could also offer clues about whether Mars once supported life.

Before humans can make the long trip to another world, scientists must identify a safe and practical place to land. New research led by a University of Mississippi scientist suggests one region on Mars may meet many of the requirements for future human missions.

Erica Luzzi, a planetary geologist and postdoctoral researcher with the Mississippi Mineral Resources Institute, led a study that uncovered signs of water ice located just below the Martian surface. The research, published in the Journal of Geophysical Research: Planets, points to a possible local water supply that astronauts could rely on during extended stays on Mars.

Researchers Discover New Way To Wake Up Cancer-Killing T Cells

Researchers at the University of Southampton have identified a new strategy that could strengthen how the immune system responds to cancer.

Reporting their findings in Nature Communications, the scientists describe the use of specially engineered antibodies designed to more effectively switch on T cells that are capable of destroying cancer cells.

These antibodies act by ‘grabbing’ and ‘clustering’ several immune cell receptors at once, increasing the strength of the signal that instructs T cells to attack tumors.

Deep learning creates virtual multiplexed immunostaining to improve cancer diagnosis

Researchers at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA), in collaboration with pathologists from Hadassah Hebrew University Medical Center and the University of Southern California, have developed a deep learning–based method that can digitally generate multiple immunohistochemical stains from a single, unstained tissue section.

The work is published in the journal BME Frontiers.

The approach enables accurate assessment of vascular invasion—a key indicator of cancer aggressiveness—without the need for conventional chemical staining procedures.

Ancient DNA insights into diverse pathogens and their hosts

Ancient DNA techniques are being applied to study increasingly diverse pathogens of the past. The authors review the latest insights into pathogen–host coevolution, zoonotic events and the spread of pathogens, all while highlighting the importance of a One Health approach to this research.

A new AI tool could dramatically speed up the discovery of life-saving medicines

Researchers in China have unveiled a new AI framework that could accelerate the discovery of new medicines. DrugCLIP can scan millions of potential drug compounds against thousands of protein targets in just a few hours—ten million times faster than current virtual screening methods.

Typically, when scientists develop new medicines, they use complex computer simulations to fit a 3D drug molecule into a protein pocket. This indicates that it is likely to interact with the protein’s binding site and function. However, the process is incredibly time-consuming and expensive.

Applying Clinical Licensure Principles to Artificial Intelligence

Editorial: Proposals to apply clinician-style licensure to AI tools may allow adaptive oversight as AI models grow more complex. Implementation challenges include defining responsible parties and ensuring adequate regulatory expertise.

In this issue of JAMA Internal Medicine, Bressman et al1 propose a clever thought experiment: what if medical tools incorporating artificial intelligence (AI) were licensed as advanced practitioners, rather than solely regulated by the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA)? This strategy seeks to provide an alternative or complement to FDA clearance in regulation of medical software incorporating AI. The authors suggest this may allow the necessary flexibility to keep up with the pace of change in AI, the breadth of applications for a given model, and the need to ensure that such tools demonstrate clinical utility.2

Many instances of more specific, single-purpose AI applications can be adequately regulated within existing frameworks. However, generative AI may be deployed in a wide range of contexts, and models may continue to develop over time. Because these models are probabilistic rather than deterministic, they may make errors that are analogous to human errors, for example, mistakes due to inadequate knowledge or lapses in judgment. Bressman et al1 argue that an appropriately flexible framework for certification already exists in the form of licensing oversight of advanced practitioners. With this approach, the extent of supervision depends on the particular activity, with some tasks requiring more oversight than others.

The proposal leaves a number of critical details to be resolved. Any AI licensing system will need to be able to evaluate and address a model’s specific potentials for harm before deployment; thus, some central regulation likely will continue to be required. In addition, determining who will take on the responsibility and oversight for decisions and treatment pathways generated by AI, as well as assume the liability for errors or adverse events, remains a thorny question. These considerations are again analogous to those of clinician licensing, but although medical boards are well positioned for licensing, the extent to which a similar approach could be developed with the necessary expertise for AI in medicine remains to be seen.

Sequence Variants in Small CAG Repeat Expansions of the HTT Gene and Disease Onset and Progression in Huntington Disease

Background and ObjectivesHuntington disease is an autosomal dominant neurologic disorder caused by an unstable cytosine-adenine-guanine (CAG) expansion (>35 CAG) in the HTT gene. The CAG repeat length is the major determinant of disease onset and…

Successful 40-Hz auditory stimulation in aged monkeys suggests potential for noninvasive Alzheimer’s therapy

A research team from the Kunming Institute of Zoology (KIZ) of the Chinese Academy of Sciences has demonstrated for the first time in non-human primates that auditory stimulation at 40 Hz significantly elevates β-amyloid levels in the cerebrospinal fluid (CSF) of aged rhesus monkeys, with this effect persisting for over five weeks.

The study, published in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences on January 5, provides the first non-human primate experimental evidence supporting the use of 40-Hz stimulation as a noninvasive physical therapy for Alzheimer’s disease (AD), revealing significant differences between primate and rodent models.

/* */