World’s Smallest Drone Autopilot System Goes Open Source

The Lisa/S chip, perched on the front of an aerial drone. Photo: 1bitsquared

The Lisa/S chip is 4 square-centimeters — about the same size as a Euro coin. But this 1.9-gram sliver of silicon includes everything you need to autopilot an aerial drone.

It’s the world’s smallest drone autopilot system — over 30 grams lighter than its predecessor — according to the chip’s designers at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands. And best of all, both the hardware and the software is open source, meaning anyone can copy and use it — for free.

“The main reason we chose open source is that we want to make it available for society,” says the project’s leader, Bart Remes. “My vision is that within a few years, every fireman [will have] a drone in his pocket.”

The Lisa/S is the MAV Laboratory’s latest project. The chip’s software is based on Paparazzi, an open source drone autopilot system.

The chip was designed with the help of a U.S.-based electronics company called 1Bitsquared, which will sell Lisa/S chips starting in January 2014. But since both the hardware and software is open source, Remes says any company will be able to sell chips based on the technology.

Source: http://www.wired.com/wiredenterprise/2013/08/drone-autopilot/

Miniature 'human brain' grown in lab

Miniature "human brains" have been grown in a lab in a feat scientists hope will transform the understanding of neurological disorders.

The pea-sized structures reached the same level of development as in a nine-week-old foetus, but are incapable of thought.

The study, published in the journal Nature, has already been used to gain insight into rare diseases.

Scientists at Institute of Molecular Biotechnology of the Austrian Academy of Sciences have now reproduced some of the earliest stages of the organ's development in the laboratory.

One of the researchers, Dr Juergen Knoblich, said: "What our organoids are good for is to model development of the brain and to study anything that causes a defect in development.

"Ultimately we would like to move towards more common disorders like schizophrenia or autism. They typically manifest themselves only in adults, but it has been shown that the underlying defects occur during the development of the brain."

Prof Paul Matthews, from Imperial College London, told the BBC: "I think it's just mindboggling. The idea that we can take a cell from a skin and turn it into, even though it's only the size of a pea, is starting to look like a brain and starting to show some of the behaviours of a tiny brain, I think is just extraordinary.

"It's a long way from conscience or awareness or responding to the outside world. There's always the spectre of what the future might hold, but this is primitive territory” according to Dr Zameel Cader.

Source: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/health-23863544

Nissan Promises to Deliver Autonomous Car by 2020

Nissan just got serious about autonomous cars. The automaker is promising to deliver the first “commercially-viable” self-driving system by 2020, and it won’t just be limited to a single model — Nissan says several vehicles will come equipped with its Autonomous Drive technology.

Nissan has begun working with dozens of research and educational institutions to make autonomous vehicles a reality, including MIT, Stanford, UC Berkeley, Carnegie Mellon, Oxford, the National Institute of Advanced Industrial Science and Technology, Virginia Tech, and nearly every major university in Japan.

“In 2007 I pledged that – by 2010 – Nissan would mass market a zero-emission vehicle,” Nissan CEO Carlos Ghosn said in the announcement. “Today, the Nissan LEAF is the best-selling electric vehicle in history. Now I am committing to be ready to introduce a new ground-breaking technology, Autonomous Drive, by 2020, and we are on track to realize it.”

“Nissan’s autonomous driving will be achieved at realistic prices for consumers,” the automaker stated in its release. “The goal is availability across the model range within two vehicle generations.” That’s ambitious. But it’s best not to bet against Ghosn and Co.

Source: http://www.wired.com/autopia/2013/08/nissan-autonomous-drive/

3D graphene could replace expensive platinum in solar cells

One of the most promising types of solar cells has a few drawbacks. A scientist at Michigan Technological University may have overcome one of them.

Dye-sensitized solar cells are thin, flexible, easy to make and very good at turning sunshine into electricity. However, a key ingredient is one of the most expensive metals on the planet: platinum. While only small amounts are needed, at $1,500 an ounce, the cost of the silvery metal is still significant.

Yun Hang Hu, the Charles and Carroll McArthur Professor of Materials Science and Engineering, has developed a new, inexpensive material that could replace the platinum in solar cells without degrading their efficiency: 3D graphene.

The researchers determined that the 3D honeycomb graphene had excellent conductivity and high catalytic activity, raising the possibility that it could be used for energy storage and conversion.

The cell with the 3D graphene counter electrode converted 7.8 percent of the sun’s energy into electricity, nearly as much as the conventional solar cell using costly platinum (8 percent).

Source:
http://www.mtu.edu/news/stories/2013/august/story94626.html
http://www.kurzweilai.net/3d-graphene-could-replace-expensive-platinum-in-solar-cells

Nanoparticles reprogram immune cells to fight cancer

Researchers at the University of Georgia are developing a new treatment technique that uses nanoparticles to reprogram immune cells so they are able to recognize and attack cancer.

“What we are working on is specifically geared toward breast cancer,” said Shanta Dhar, the study’s co-author and an assistant professor of chemistry in the UGA Franklin College of Arts and Sciences.

Effective immune stimulation

“Our paper reports for the first time that we can stimulate the immune system against breast cancer cells using mitochondria-targeted nanoparticles and light using a novel pathway.”

A new cancer vaccine

She cautions that the results are preliminary, and the approach works only with certain forms of breast cancer. But if researchers can refine the process, this technology may one day serve as the foundation for a new cancer vaccine used to both prevent and treat disease.

“We particularly hope this technique could help patients with advanced metastatic disease that has spread to other parts of the body,” said Dhar, who also is a member of the UGA Nanoscale Science and Engineering Center, Cancer Center and Center for Drug Discovery.

Source: http://www.kurzweilai.net/nanoparticles-reprogram-immune-cells-to-fight-cancer

New rechargeable flow battery enables cheaper, large-scale energy storage

MIT researchers have engineered a new rechargeable flow battery that doesn’t rely on expensive membranes to generate and store electricity. The device, they say, may one day enable cheaper, large-scale energy storage.

“This technology has as much promise as anything else being explored for storage, if not more,” says Cullen Buie, an assistant professor of mechanical engineering at MIT. “Contrary to previous opinions that membraneless systems are purely academic, this system could potentially have a large practical impact.”

Buie, along with Martin Bazant, a professor of chemical engineering, and William Braff, a graduate student in mechanical engineering, have published their results this week in Nature Communications.

“Here, we have a system where performance is just as good as previous systems, and now we don’t have to worry about issues of the membrane,” Bazant says. “This is something that can be a quantum leap in energy-storage technology.”

Possible boost for solar and wind energy 

Low-cost energy storage has the potential to foster widespread use of renewable energy, such as solar and wind power. To date, such energy sources have been unreliable: Winds can be capricious, and cloudless days are never guaranteed. With cheap energy-storage technologies, renewable energy might be stored and then distributed via the electric grid at times of peak power demand.

According to preliminary projections, Braff and his colleagues estimate that the membraneless flow battery may produce energy costing as little as $100 per kilowatt-hour — a goal that the U.S. Department of Energy has estimated would be economically attractive to utility companies.

Source: http://web.mit.edu/newsoffice/2013/rechargeable-flow-battery-enables-cheaper-large-scale-energy-storage-0816.html

Researchers have identified key signaling molecules that are part of the advance teams that tumors form to ready the lung for cancer spread

Cancer metastasis requires tumor cells to acquire properties that allow them to escape from the primary tumor site, travel to a distant place in the body, and form secondary tumors.

Now, researchers in Japan and the United States have discovered that the signaling protein calcineurin upregulates another molecule, Ang-2 that promotes angiogenesis.
In their study, published in Cell Reports, the researchers found that hyperactivation of calcineurin in genetically altered mice led to increased lung metastases. Inhibition of calcineurin or Ang-2, however, blocked metastases in lung cells of the mice.

The researchers will now investigate whether calcineurin is important for metastases in other organs or whether this pathway is specific for lung metastases.

The article can be found at: Minami et al. (2013) The Calcineurin-NFAT-Angiopoietin-2 Signaling Axis In Lung Endothelium Is Critical For The Establishment Of Lung Metastases.

Bron: http://www.asianscientist.com/in-the-lab/tumors-advance-teams-ready-lungs-spread-cancer-2013/

Grow your own meat

Building a $325,000 Burger

MAASTRICHT, the Netherlands — As a gastronomic delicacy, the five-ounce hamburger that Mark Post has painstakingly created here surely will not turn any heads. But Dr. Post is hoping that it
 will change some minds.
The hamburger, assembled from tiny bits of beef muscle tissue grown in a laboratory and to be cooked and eaten at an event in London, perhaps in a few weeks, is meant to show the world — including potential sources of research funds — that so-called in vitro meat, or cultured meat, is a reality.

“Let’s make a proof of concept, and change the discussion from ‘this is never going to work’ to, ‘well, we actually showed that it works, but now we need to get funding and work on it,’ “ Dr. Post said in an interview last fall in his office at Maastricht University.

Given the difficulties, Modern Meadow is first focusing on creating cultured leather. Its process does not use stem cells but rather skin fibroblasts, specialized cells that produce collagen. “There are a lot of parallels to cultured meat, except that it is a lot less controversial because you’re not going to eat it,” Dr. Forgacs said. “But if we can convince the universe that we can build leather, it will be much easier to convince the universe that we can build meat.”

In his work on cultured meat, Dr. Post uses a type of stem cell called a myosatellite cell, which the body itself uses to repair injured muscle tissue. The cells, which are found in a certain part of muscle tissue, are removed from the cow neck and put in containers with the growth medium. Through much trial and error, the researchers have learned how best to get the cells to grow and divide, doubling repeatedly over about three weeks.

“But we need billions,” said Anon van Essen, the technician in Dr. Post’s lab.

Other researchers are studying different kinds of stem cells that, unlike myosatellite cells, can reproduce indefinitely, ensuring a “livestock-autonomous” supply of cells to make cultured meat. Dutch researchers at Utrecht University are trying to isolate embryonic stem cells from pigs and cows. And Nicholas Genovese of the University of Missouri is trying to develop a type of stem cell that is “induced” from a regular adult cell. So a skin cell from a pig, perhaps, could be turned into a stem cell that could reproduce indefinitely and differentiate into muscle tissue to create cultured pork.

Source: http://www.nytimes.com/2013/05/14/science/engineering-the-325000-in-vitro-burger.html?pagewanted=all&_r=1&

Datum: 20-Feb-2012

Lab-grown meat is first step to artificial hamburger


Lab-grown meat is first step to artificial hamburger

Dutch scientists have used stem cells to create strips of muscle tissue with the aim of producing the first lab-grown hamburger later this year. At a major science meeting in Canada, Prof Mark Post said synthetic meat could reduce the environmental footprint of meat by up to 60%.

"We would gain a tremendous amount in terms of resources," he said.

Professor Post's group at Maastricht University in the Netherlands has grown small pieces of muscle about 2cm long, 1cm wide and about a mm thick.

Lab-grown meat could eventually become more efficient than producing meat the old fashioned way, according to Prof Post. Currently, 100g of vegetable protein has to be fed to pigs or cows to produce 15g of animal protein, an efficiency of 15%. He believes that synthetic meat could be produced with an equivalent energy efficiency of 50%.

Dr Steele, who is also a molecular biologist, said he was also concerned that unhealthily high levels of antibiotics and antifungal chemicals would be needed to stop the synthetic meat from rotting.

Bron: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/science-environment-16972761

Datum: 13-Jan-2012

Grow your own meat

Grow your own meat

Instead of getting meat from animals raised in pastures, he wants to grow steaks in lab conditions, directly from muscle stem cells. If successful, the technology will transform the way we produce food. "We want to turn meat production from a farming process to a factory process," he explained.
Prof Post is not the first to dream this dream. In the mid 20th Century, Dutchman Willem van Eelen - back then a budding medical student - dreamt of creating meat without killing animals, by using stem cells.

Bron BBC: http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/technology-15402552

Proton Therapy radiation treatment for cancerous tumors

The National Association for Proton Therapy (NAPT) is a non-profit organization supported by proton center members and is the Voice of the Proton Community. The NAPT promotes education and public awareness for the clinical benefits of proton beam radiation therapy. Founded in 1990, NAPT is an advocate for the advancement of proton therapy. It serves as a resource center for patients, physicians and health care providers, universities, academic medical centers, hospitals, cancer centers, the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services (CMS) and other health care agencies, the U.S. Congress and staff, and the news media.

We are strong advocates for patient access to proton therapy as a superior form of radiation treatment for cancerous tumors that can result in less morbidity and minimum to no side effects.

Sources:
http://www.proton-therapy.org/
http://www.nu.nl/binnenland/3539951/vier-umcs-mogen-protonentherapie-aanbieden.html