Lifeboat Foundation

It’s been a busy month for the Parker Solar Probe which, if you haven’t been keeping track, is currently moving faster than any man-made object ever and also closer to the sun than anything humans have ever built. The spacecraft launched a couple of months back, but it’s finally ready to do some science, and it just made it first close pass by our Sun, which is obviously cause for celebration.

The probe, which will make dozens of passes of the star, achieved its closest distance of this particular loop (called “perihelion”) on Monday night. Now, its handlers back on Earth are eagerly awaiting word from the craft so that it can share whatever information it has gathered.

Coronary artery disease, or coronary heart disease, can lead to heart attack or death. Learn what causes this condition and how you can prevent it.

LSD changes the communication patterns between regions of the brain, a new study by researchers of the University of Zurich and Yale University shows. The study also provides insights into how mental health disorders develop and how these could be treated.

The researchers used brain imaging technology to examine the effects of LSD on the brains of healthy study participants. The data suggests that LSD triggers a reduction in the communication between the brain regions that are responsible for planning and decision making. At the same time, LSD increases the connectivity in brain networks associated with sensory functions and movement.

Turbulence in this sea of charged particles can interfere with satellites 🛰 as well as communication 📡 and navigation 📶 signals. When it launches tomorrow, our #NASAICON mission will watch and image airglow, helping scientists better understand the extreme variability of the region where Earth meets space.

A new study by Calico found that our genes determine our lifespan much less than previously accepted and lifespan heritability is less than seven percent.

Although long life tends to run in families, genetics has far less influence on life span than previously thought, according to a new analysis of an aggregated set of family trees of more than 400 million people. The results suggest that the heritability of life span is well below past estimates, which failed to account for our tendency to select partners with similar traits to our own. The research, from Calico Life Sciences and Ancestry, was published in Genetics.

“We can potentially learn many things about the biology of aging from human genetics, but if the heritability of life span is low, it tempers our expectations about what types of things we can learn and how easy it will be,” says lead author Graham Ruby. “It helps contextualize the questions that scientists studying aging can effectively ask.”

Continue reading “Family tree of 400 million people shows genetics has limited influence on longevity” »

The Solar Decathlon deadline is today! (And actually, you have until 5 p.m. Eastern. smile ) Teams, we want to see you at the National Showcase Build Challenge culminating at the 2020 @SmithsonianFolk Festival on the National Mall in Washington, DC. https://www.solardecathlon.gov/about-apply.html

Through a new approach dubbed AMBAR, the biotechnology company Grifols has attempted to reduce the amount of harmful, Alzheimer’s disease-causing amyloid beta in the brain by collecting it with a blood protein called albumin and draining it out of the bloodstream. This approach differs from the previous antibody and catabody approaches and offers new hope for sufferers of this neurodegenerative disease.

What is Alzheimer’s disease?

Alzheimer’s disease, named after its discoverer, is a slow and progressive disease that causes the degradation of the brains of its sufferers. This leads to memory loss, a decrease in problem-solving abilities, changes in personality, and other symptoms. It is associated with the accumulation of tau and amyloid beta in the brain.

‘’Until now, scientists assumed this all happened in a smooth, coordinated way. ‘’… silly scientists 🤔🙈🤦‍♂️.

Hitting a material with laser light sends vibrations rippling through its latticework of atoms, and at the same time can nudge the lattice into a new configuration with potentially useful properties – turning an insulator into a metal, for instance.

Until now, scientists assumed this all happened in a smooth, coordinated way. But two new studies show it doesn’t: When you look beyond the average response of atoms and vibrations to see what they do individually, the response, they found, is disorderly.

Continue reading “In materials hit with light, individual atoms and vibrations take disorderly paths” »

The Wellcome Trust, which gave out £1.1 billion (US$1.4 billion) in grants in 2016–17, is also the first funder to detail how it intends to implement Plan S. Its approach suggests that journals may not need to switch wholesale to open-access (OA) models by 2020 to be compliant with Plan S — if the initiative’s other backers decide on a similar line.

The Wellcome Trust has also announced how it will implement the plan, which could provide a blueprint for others.