I have a question I would like to ask and that is, is this device patentable by the gentleman in the article. http://www.haaretz.com/hasen/spages/890970.html. The reason I am asking is that in my understanding to gain a patent there has to be an improvement of some sort. In his device there is no im
More truth-based weapons against the antivaxxers | Bad Astronomy
A few antivax links for your amusement:
1) When challenged about their bizarre and provably false beliefs, a lot of antivaxxers claim that they have personal experience with their kid. That’s anecdotal and uses a small sample size, and so is prone to all sorts of logical failings. But what if the sample size is much larger and uses scientific reasoning? Then you get something like this good spanking of antivax nonsense by an actual pediatrician.
Tip o’ the syringe to David Whalley.
2) The Australian Vaccination Network is one of the most pernicious and awful of the antivax groups, as regular readers know. They may be on their way out — science, apparently, can inoculate us against such infections — but it’s still worth keeping up with the sort of offal they spew, since other groups do it as well. This article by The Australian Skeptics is an excellent exposé of AVN mendacity.
3) Healthday has an alarming article about the San Diego 2008 measles outbreak which exposed over 800 people because one family decided not to vaccinate their kid. Yes, one family started an minor epidemic that cost over $170,000 to contain and nearly killed one infant. I hope antivaxxers are proud of that one.
4) Orac once again leaps into the fray with a magnificent exposure of some bold antivax lies. It’s amazing to me just how low some antivaxxers are wiling to go — cheating, twisting, distorting, and out-and-out lying — to promote their agenda of bringing back preventable diseases.
They say they care about kids. Maybe they do. But making sure children get measles, rubella, pertussis, and other life-and-limb-threatening diseases is sure a funny way of showing it.
Preparation for EIT
Does anyone know of ways or material to study for the EIT?
I will probably chose EE for the second portion of the test.
what is the purpose of the TVSS in the attached schematic?
Does anyone know why you would want to put a TVSS in parallel with a solenoid? See attached PDF.
64GB Zune HD Will Cost $350; Other Models Slashed By $20 [Zune]
Well hey, here's a nice little complement to the Zune's updated software: As expected, there's a new 64GB model, which is otherwise unchanged, and sells for a hefty $350. As for the 16GB and 32GB models, they're $20 cheaper now. More »
This Is Why You Should Always Flash Boobs on Chatroulette [Chatroulette]
This is what happens when you don't flash boobs on ChatRoulette: The snake WILL eat the bird. [via Twitter] More »
Movies of life show the dance of dividing cells | Not Exactly Rocket Science
Imagine filming a movie hundreds of thousands of times with an infinitely patient crew. Every time you shoot it, you remove just one thing, be it an actor, a line of dialogue or a crew member. By comparing the resulting films, you’d soon work out which elements were vital to the movie’s success, and which could be lost without consequence. Beate Neumann, Thomas Walter and a group of scientists known as the Mitocheck Consortium have taken just such an approach to better understand one of the most fundamental processes of life.
Some directors employ inanimate objects like Keanu Reeves, but Neumann and Walter wanted to work with far more dramatic stars – DNA, proteins and the like. Their task was to work out which genes were vital for the process of mitosis, the immensely complicated operation where one cell divides into two. To do that, they systematically went through each of the 21,000 or so genes in the human genome and inactivated them, one by one, in different cells. They then filmed these subtly different actors as they divided in two.
This incredible library of around 190,000 films, all shot in time-lapse photography, is publicly available at the Mitocheck website. It’s a treasure trove of data, whose doors have been left for the entire scientific community to walk through, and no doubt they will. Name a gene, any gene, and with a couple of mouse clicks, you can find a movie that shows you what happens when it’s knocked out. You can work out if your favourite gene is essential to cell division, and you can even find other genes that have similar effects.
The study’s leader Jan Ellenberg says, “The response of human cells to silencing each gene is already pre-recorded and scientists can simply log in to our database to check the result, rather than spending weeks or months of time in the laboratory to obtain the data.”
The movies are certainly useful, but they are beautiful in their own right. For a daily and microscopic process, mitosis is an astonishingly beautiful dance. It begins with cells creating the right number of partners, by duplicating all of their chromosomes. At first, the dancers haphazardly mingle with each other but as things get underway, they separate and line up in a neat row. Then, dramatically, they shimmy across to opposite ends of the room, following long spindles of protein. Once the partners split up, the cell pinches down its middle and separates them forevermore. Without this courtly dance, you would never have been anything more than a fertilised egg. Life simply wouldn’t work.
Clearly, mitosis already has all the makings of a good drama. Neumann and Walter just needed to develop the right filming techniques. To prep their actors, they used short RNA molecules designed to silence individual genes. To sort out the cinematography, they set their microscopes to automatically record time-lapse movies as soon as the nullifying RNA molecules were introduced into cells. Finally, to get the lighting right, the duo labelled all the chromosomes in their cells using proteins that glow in the dark.
The video below shows mitosis working normally, when no genes have been silenced. Each cell is green and its chromosomes are decked out in red. It’s all very festive. Two days are condensed into 36 seconds, and two cells become eight. Once things happen, they happen very quickly, so the series of screengrabs below the video shows what happens to the bottom cell.
This next video shows the chaos that ensues when a single gene called OGG1 is turned off. No longer is mitosis the orderly tango of before; this is more like a rave. Cells fail to separate properly, leaving multiple bundles of chromosomes jangling about in the same space. Just look at what happens at 00:16.
For each inactivated gene, Neumann and Walter shot footage of around 67 cells over the course of two days, capturing an astonishing total of 19 million cell divisions. Analysing so much data would be unfeasible for a human scientist, even a graduate student, so that work fell to computers. The group created a program that analysed all their footage. Whenever mitosis wasn’t quite happening in the usual way, the program flagged the video, and even grouped together genes that had similar effects.
In the end, Neumann and Walter identified 572 genes that play a role in mitosis and less than half of these had been linked to the process before. The rest were new, and they reveal just how much we still don’t know about this most fundamental of processes.
To check that their new candidates are actually involved in mitosis, the team shoved the mouse version of each gene into the deficient cells. The mouse versions are different enough from ours that the silencing RNA molecules ignored them, but similar enough that they managed to restore some decorum to the disordered mitotic dances. These sorts of experiments are crucial because RNA-silencing experiments can sometimes go astray if the molecules deactivate genes other than their designated targets.
So the researchers have a list of 600 or so mitosis genes. The movies provide a rough idea about what these players do and which stages of mitosis they influence. Now, the real work begins in trying to pick apart their individual roles.
If there is one caveat to this study, it’s that it was done in HeLa cells, an immortal line of human cancer cells that’s commonly used in laboratory work. Being cancerous, HeLa cells already have a few faulty genes. Their style of cell division might not quite represent the “normal” situation and it’s important that the team confirms their results in other cell lines.
But already, the sheer scale of the data that have been collected is a tremendous boon to scientific research. There implications for cancer alone are huge. Cancer cells divide all too often and many cancer drugs are designed to stop them from doing so. Scientists could use the Mitocheck data to find new targets for tomorrow’s drugs or to better understand how existing drugs work. They could also work out the genetic differences that cause cancer cells to divide differently from normal cells. “Now that we have narrowed down the gene set relevant for cell division to about 600, we can systematically investigate those differences in a number of different cell types, which would not be possible across the entire genome,” says Ellenberg.
Even cell division is just the tip of the iceberg. The movie library also contains shots of cells growing, moving and dying and they can be used to understand the genes that underlie these processes too. The Mitocheck team are even working on next-generation technologies that will allow them to watch proteins interacting in living cells, revealing the dances of not just mitotic chromosomes but of all a cell’s molecular characters.
For years to come, scientists will be watching, poring over, and adding to the movies that have been unveiled today. There has surely never been a more informative or intimate video collection of our lives.
Reference: Nature http://dx.doi.org/10.1038/nature08869
Images and videos: Thomas Walter & Jutta Bulkescher / EMBL
More on molecular biology:
- Stem cells produce new tissues by recruiting executioners to damage their DNA
- ‘Brainbow’ paints individual neurons with different colours
- Molecule’s constant efforts keep our memories intact
- Dinosaur proteins, cells and blood vessels recovered from Bracyhlophosaurus
- Vaccinia virus tricks its way into hosts by mimicking dead cells
Industrial Induction Heater Coil
Dear Gurus ,
I am having a problem with the industrial induction heater.Recently due to interlock problem , a metal bar hit the induction coil.( made of copper tube )The coil broken and the cooling water started to leak.
Due to tight schedule , i need to run the machine as soon as
AC Voltage Range
For one of my document the following detail is required
Is there is any bandwidth of voltage level, based on its descriptions like LV,MV,HV,EHV (ie. upto 1000 v it is LV)?
Control System Selection
1) There are 28 Sump Lift station spread over a Vast area,Our client wants to upgrade the existing System
2) There is a proposal for Automatic Dewatering from Hydrocarbon Tanks
If we use Conevtional 4-20 ma System then we will have to dig the entire refinery to bring it to Central system,plus
Google Exposes a Cyber Attack on Vietnamese Activists | 80beats
Is the Vietnamese government following China’s example, and muffling online dissent to pursue its own political ends? Internet giant Google seems to think so. Writing on the company’s online security blog, Neel Mehta of Google’s security team has revealed that tens of thousands of Vietnamese computers were subject to a potent virus attack this week–and that the attack targeted activists who are opposed to a Chinese mining project in Vietnam.
Google writes that the activists mistakenly downloaded malicious software that infected their computers. The infected machines could be used to spy on the users, and were also used to attack Web sites and blogs that voiced opposition to the mining project. This cyber attack, Google says, was an attempt to “squelch” opposition to bauxite mining in Vietnam, a highly controversial issue in the country. The computer security firm, McAfee Inc, which detected the malware, went a step further, saying its creators “may have some allegiance to the government of the Socialist Republic of Vietnam.” The Vietnamese Foreign Ministry had no immediate comment [Moneycontrol].
Google’s current spat with China began with a similar accusation, when the company accused Beijing of hacking into and spying on Chinese activists’ gmail accounts. Just this week, journalists in China said their email accounts were compromised because of yet another spyware attack.
In Vietnam, activists were angered by state plans to allow Chinese mining company, Chinalco, to start mining in the country’s central highlands. Bauxite is used in making aluminum and is an important natural resource for Vietnam, but critics have argued that the new project will have serious environmental consequences and will also displace ethnic minorities. Online discussion of the project soon erupted. Although the discussion was mostly centered on social and environmental concerns, it veered into sensitive territory when bloggers started tapping into the country’s latent Sinophobia [Financial Times]. Some bloggers worried about the influx of Chinese workers, while others were distressed that a Chinese state-owned company would run the project. Vietnam was a tributary state of China for 1,000 years and was invaded by China in 1979, and the two countries continue to joust for sovereignty in the South China Sea [The New York Times].
Several prominent Vietnamese Internet activists have already been thrown into jail for voicing their dissent. McAfee added that the current cyber attack underscores that not every attack is motivated by data theft or money, saying: “This is likely the latest example of hacktivism and politically motivated cyberattacks, which are on the rise” [The New York Times].
Related Content:
80beats: Google Defies China’s Censorship Rules; China Quickly Strikes Back
80beats: Iran Blocks Gmail; Will Offer Surveillance-Friendly National Email Instead
80beats: Hillary Clinton to China: Internet Censorship Is an “Information Curtain”
80beats: Google to China: No More Internet Censorship, or We Leave
Image: iStockphoto
Planet Boundaries and Breaking Growth
Bill McKibben in Times Square, during the International Day of Climate Action last October, 2009.
If you are interested in climate change and the environment, the entire April issue of Scientific American is great. The theme of most of the issue is managing Earth’s Future. Get a copy of it, because only a little bit of it is online. There are some gorgeous paintings in it too, called the 8 Wonders of the Solar System. There are several articles on global warming and planetary boundaries. From Boundaries for a Healthy Planet, “Scientists have set thresholds for key environmental processes that, if crossed, could threaten Earth’s habitability. Ominously, three have already been exceeded.” Key points of the article are:
1) Although climate change gets ample attention, species loss and nitrogen pollution exceed safe limits by greater degrees. Other environmental processes are also headed toward dangerous levels.
2) Promptly switching to low-carbon energy sources, curtailing land clearing and revolutionizing agricultural practices are crucial to making human life on Earth more sustainable.
As the article states, human growth has expanded to the point where we have literally changed the planet. Pollution used to be a local problem; now it’s global. Resources drying up locally affect everyone, everywhere. And population growth unchecked is a real problem. (Watch out in discussing population to certain conservatives, by the way. Glenn Beck and other right-wingers think Al Gore is in favor of Eugenics and forced sterilization.) But there’s no doubt that simple family planning could help slow down climate change.
“The sudden acceleration of population growth, resource consumption and environmental damage has changed the planet. We now live in a “full” world, with limited resources and a capacity to absorb waste. The rules for living on such a world are different, too. Most fundamentally, we must take steps to ensure that we function within the “safe operating space” of our environmental systems. If we do not revise our ways, we will cause catastrophic changes that could have disastrous consequences for humankind.”
The article is written by a scientist from the University of Minnesota who stars in a video in a post below, Jonathan Foley.
One of my favorite pieces is a book excerpt from Bill McKibben, activist, author and founder of 350.org. I like the new spelling to signify that we have a different earth we are living on– “Eaarth“. Here is an excerpt from their interview with him about his new book:
In his new book, Eaarth: Making a Life on a Tough New Planet, McKibben argues that humankind, because of its actions, now lives on a fundamentally different world, which he calls “Eaarth.” This celestial body can no longer support the economic growth model that has driven society for 200 years. To avoid our own collapse, we must instead seek to maintain wealth and resources, in large part by shifting to more durable, localized economies.
“SciAM: You [...]
Lovelock says ‘a lot of nonsense’ | The Intersection
At age 90, James Lovelock is a bit misguided. He's a quirky character and has had some good ideas in the past, but I hope he retires from the limelight soon and stops giving Drudge fodder for links by saying ridiculous things like trying to save the planet is 'a lot of nonsense.' But then again, this doomsday stuff always gets loads of press. The truth is that the world's not ending, it's changing. And we can still save the planet James--we just have to stop being so damn cheap and lazy about it.
Geothermal Energy
How Safe is Geothermal Energy?
The world may be trying to go green, but some places don't have to try very hard to create a small carbon footprint. Klamath Falls is one of them. The small Oregon city has been using geothermal energy to heat homes, businesses, and sidewalks since the early 199
Gear Box and Energy Saving
We have 2500 KW Slip ring Induction Motor 995 RPM attached to a Gear unit Output of the Gear unit gives 928 RPM. Gear Unit Drives a Fan (Raw Mill Fan in Cement Plant).
Motor Normally runs at 2250 KW. (Output torque of Motor is about 21615 N.m)
How to Determine the torque of the Load (
Evaporator Size
Dimension of a normal evaporator used in air conditioner.
Hydraulics Could Enable Fullscreen Braille Display
From Wired Top Stories:
For most blind computer users, surfing the internet or catching up on e-mail means reading just one line at a time, because commercially available braille displays can't show full pages of text. Researchers from North Carolina State University now say the
Clive Thompson on the Cyborg Advantage
From Wired Top Stories:
Which are smarter, humans or machines? Back in 1997, IBM's Deep Blue supercomputer struck a blow for bots when it beat Garry Kasparov at chess. Deep Blue won because computers can perform endless lightning-fast calculations; humans can't. It basically pre
Cooking Bacon with a Machine Gun
From Neatorama:
A simple but elegant solution to a common household problem: you have raw bacon, but you have no frying pan with which to cook it. You do, however, have a machine gun. All you have to do is wrap the bacon in tin foil, tie it around the barrel of your Rheinmetall M
The Hubble Telescope's Most Underrated Images
From Discover Magazine | rsslist:
The stunning pictures of Saturn, the deep field, the Eagle, Crab, and Butterfly nebulae -- in its 20 years of operation, the Hubble Space Telescope has taken what are now some of the most famous images in astronomy. But you've seen those over and o