Lifeboat Foundation

In the past few decades, a lethal disease has decimated populations of frogs and other amphibians worldwide, even driving some species to extinction. Yet other amphibians resisted the epidemic. Based on previous research, scientists at the INDICASAT AIP, Smithsonian and collaborating institutions knew that skin bacteria could be protecting the animals by producing fungi-fighting compounds. However, this time they decided to explore these as potential novel antifungal sources for the benefit of humans and amphibians.

“Amphibians inhabit humid places favoring the growth of fungi, coexisting with these and other microorganisms in their environment, some of which can be pathogenic,” said Smithsonian scientist Roberto Ibáñez, one of the authors of the study published in Scientific Reports. “As a result of evolution, amphibians are expected to possess chemical compounds that can inhibit the growth of pathogenic bacteria and fungi.”

The team first travelled to the Chiriquí highlands in Panama, where the chytrid fungus, responsible for the disease chytridiomycosis, has severely affected amphibian populations. They collected samples from seven frog species to find out what kind of skin bacteria they harbored.

Continue reading “Bacteria in frog skin may help fight fungal infections in humans” »

According to the Bulletin, we’ve done nothing in the past year to make the situation any less precarious — humanity still faces not one, but two “existential threats” in the form of nuclear weapons and climate change.

While the clock remains set at 11:58, the potential of either threat to destroy humanity has increased over the past 12 months, according to the Bulletin’s 2019 statement. We must do something to alter our path.

“Though unchanged from 2018, this setting should be taken not as a sign of stability but as a stark warning to leaders and citizens around the world,” the scientists wrote. “The current international security situation — what we call the ‘new abnormal’ — has extended over two years now… Th e longer world leaders and citizens carelessly inhabit this new and abnormal reality, the more likely the world is to experience catastrophe of historic proportions.”

Researchers are finding that kelp, eelgrass, and other vegetation can effectively absorb CO₂ and reduce acidity in the ocean. Growing these plants in local waters, scientists say, could help mitigate the damaging impacts of acidification on marine life.

A DAY of science challenges and investigations run by the Institute of Physics was hosted by Rugby High School.

Teams from 12 schools from across the West Midlands came to take part in Super Physics Day.

The teams of four used their knowledge of science to conduct three timed investigations including ‘Air Drop’, an RAF challenge to drop relief packages from a plane to the desired location.

Continue reading “School hosts students from across West Mids for physics day” »

Spider silk, which is tougher than steel, could be used as artificial muscles for robots, research finds.

Spider silk, already known as one of the strongest materials for its weight, can be used to create artificial muscles or robotic actuators, scientists say.

According to researchers from the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) in the US, the resilient fibres respond very strongly to changes in humidity.

Continue reading “Artificial muscles for robots could be made by spider silk, finds study” »

It’s yet another historic moment for the Crew Dragon mission as the docking procedure is quite different this time when compared to previous Dragon missions: “Dragon was basically hovering under the ISS,” said Hans Koenigsmann, vice president of mission assurance at SpaceX during a pre-launch briefing on Thursday. “You can see how it moves back and forth and then the [Canadarm] takes it to a berthing bay.”

In contrast, the Crew Dragon’s docking system is active, he said: “it will plant itself in front of the station and use a docking port on its own, no docking arm required.”

Five days from now, Crew Dragon will undock and makes its long way back to Earth. This time around, it will splash down in the Atlantic Ocean — previous (cargo) Dragon missions have touched down in the Pacific.

By tapping nutrients from bedrock, red alder trees play a key role in healthy forest ecosystems, according to a new study.

The study published today in the journal Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

Researchers from Oregon State University and the U.S. Geological Survey determined red alder, through its symbiotic relationship with nitrogen-fixing bacteria, taps nutrients that are locked in bedrock, such as calcium and phosphorus. This process accelerates rock dissolution, releasing more mineral nutrients that allow plants and trees to grow.

Continue reading “Nitrogen-fixing trees ‘eat’ rocks, play pivotal role in forest health” »

But would you actually want to carry it around?

Keeping track of all Facebook’s scandals could easily be seen as a part-time job right now. All joking aside, the development of its worldwide network ramifications participated in decreasing communication distances between individuals with three and a half degrees of separation in average between its members in 2016.

As a reminder, this network and its numerous variations, which certainly don’t need to be quoted anymore, have enabled us
— to reach our friends, family members, business collaborators or partners
— to create and join groups of discussion
— to organize events
— to promote icons and push contents of very different shapes

The actual downside here is that all of it became possible from the very moment that we accepted to join the online club for free. The benefits of being able to access brand new and pretty efficient communication means, have left us with no choice but to keep returning again and again to a highly segmented network (made from both acquaintances and closed ones). Such network, of which more and more of our “friends” form part, manage to convince us to never really read the terms and conditions of use in their full details (who says boring?) even though they clearly involve nonetheless the real-time sale of a stream of our personal profiles and somewhat predictable behaviors as soon as we consciously tick the right (wrong?) boxes in order to just get in at some point.

Taking benefits in using a free service could be very different from being the actual provider of a stream of values (somewhat made available from analytics data and advertising market places) by acting in good faith as we would simply do in real life, by not accepting advertisement as the only existing way how to endorse some of our cultural preferences with regards to this or that innovative trends (when there is little innovation and not only unsustainable waste of our limited resources — time or namely our attention to mention some of them).

Today, the privacy advocates can also be thrilled by the broad variety of initiatives enabling us to restrain ourselves from dissipating our shared moments between our interlocutors AND third parties interfering with our conversations. How to progressively upgrade the software without requiring everybody (who feels like it could be a good idea, of course) to get on board? I guess we’re facing quite a pickle here, perhaps not as hard to take on as gluing back together large blocks of melting ice, but still not that trivial when considered at scale.

Here are two technological means how to get connected with your peers outside of what might have become the most “normative ways” and another one relying upon one of the oldest network there is –emails-, and their respective slogans:
— Element — Own your conversations — https://element.io
its underlying protocols are nowadays relied upon by the french state for some of its administration services
— Manyverse — A social network off the grid — https://www.manyver.se
— Delta Chat — Chat over email with encryption, like Telegram or messaging apps owned by Facebook but without the tracking or central control — https://delta.chat/en/

I would invite you to try them out, to share your insight about them and to support them and their contributors. Social challenges won’t only be taken care of by switching communication tools but conversations remain conversations and the better the host, the more comfortable and safe some could feel in preserving a discussion as open, honest and respectful as possible.