Lifeboat Foundation

Electronic waste, or e-waste, is a rapidly growing global problem, and it’s expected to worsen with the production of new kinds of flexible electronics for robotics, wearable devices, health monitors, and other new applications, including single-use devices.

A new kind of flexible substrate material developed at MIT, the University of Utah, and Meta has the potential to enable not only the recycling of materials and components at the end of a device’s useful life, but also the scalable manufacture of more complex multilayered circuits than existing substrates provide.

The development of this new material is described in the journal RSC Applied Polymers (“Photopatternable, Degradable, and Performant Polyimide Network Substrates for E-Waste Mitigation”), in a paper by MIT Professor Thomas J. Wallin, University of Utah Professor Chen Wang, and seven others.

Researchers led by the University of California, Irvine have discovered how the TREM2 R47H genetic mutation causes certain brain areas to develop abnormal protein clumps, called beta-amyloid plaques, associated with late-onset Alzheimer’s disease. Leveraging single-cell Merfish spatial transcriptomics technology, the team was able to profile the effects of the mutation across multiple cortical and subcortical brain regions, offering first-of-their-kind insights at the single-cell level.

The study, published in Molecular Psychiatry, compared the brains of normal mice and special mouse models that undergo changes like those in humans with Alzheimer’s.

Findings revealed that the TREM2 mutation led to divergent patterns of beta-amyloid plaque accumulation in various parts of the brain involved in higher-level functions such as memory, reasoning and speech. It also affected certain cell types and their gene expression near the plaques.

Experiments that test physics and philosophy “as a single whole” may be our only route to surefire knowledge about the universe.

With the first CRISPR–Cas9 gene therapy now approved, scientists are turning to newer editing technologies to produce safer, faster and better treatments for genetic diseases.

When the European Space Agency launched the Gaia spacecraft to map stars, it encountered problems from a solar storm and space dust. Its electronics and measurements were impacted by these issues, which raised data inaccuracies. To overcome these issues, teams are collaborating remotely.

Figure 2 can pick up objects as heavy as 55 pounds and put parts in place accurately, down to the millimeter. It was created by Figure AI, a startup backed by OpenAI, Jeff Bezos, Nvidia, and Microsoft.

Non-personalized content and ads are influenced by things like the content you’re currently viewing and your location (ad serving is based on general location). Personalized content and ads can also include things like video recommendations, a customized YouTube homepage, and tailored ads based on past activity, like the videos you watch and the things you search for on YouTube. We also use cookies and data to tailor the experience to be age-appropriate, if relevant.

Select “More options” to see additional information, including details about managing your privacy settings. You can also visit g.co/privacytools at any time.

“This study has changed the picture of the environments around stars less massive than our Sun, which emit very little UV light outside of flares,” said Jason Hinkle.

How can red dwarf stars, which are both smaller and cooler than our Sun, influence the habitability potential for exoplanets orbiting them? This is what a recent study published in the Monthly Notices of the Royal Astronomical Society hopes to address as a team of international researchers led by the University of Hawai’i investigated how stellar flares emanating from red dwarf stars could help ascertain the habitability potential for exoplanetary systems. This study holds the potential to help astronomers better understand the formation and evolution of exoplanetary systems throughout the cosmos and the conditions necessary for life to exist on these worlds.

For the study, the researchers analyzed near-ultraviolet (near-UV) and far-ultraviolet (far-UV) data obtained from the now-retired NASA GALEX space telescope of 182 stellar flares emitting from 158 stars within 100 parsecs (326 light-years) from Earth. The goal of the study was to ascertain how UV emissions influence whether a planet can host life.

Continue reading “Impact of Intense UV Radiation on Planet Habitability Around Red Dwarf Stars” »

A discovery that uncovered the surprising way atoms arrange themselves and find their preferred neighbors in multi-principal element alloys (MPEA) could enable engineers to “tune” these unique and useful materials for enhanced performance in specific applications ranging from advanced power plants to aerospace technologies, according to the researchers who made the finding.