Category Archives: Singularity

Just under a year ago, one of the biggest production facilities for cultured meat opened in Israel. Future Meat Technologies Rehovot plant produces 500 kilograms of lab-grown meat per day (thats equivalent to about 5,000 burger patties). Last week, plans for an even bigger facility were revealed, this one in the US. Its specific location has yet to be finalized, but the project will bring cultured meat production to an unprecedented scale.

The bioreactors planned for the US facility will be over 40 feet tall and will hold 250,000 liters (thats 66,043 gallons) of meat. This is a massive scale-up from existing technology; the same manufacturer thats making the US equipment, ABEC, is also making a 6,000-liter bioreactor for a facility in Singapore, and when it goes online in 2023 it will be the biggest of its kind installed to date. Multiplying that by more than a factor of 40, thenand making sure the quality of the final product is still the samewill be no small feat.

The company behind the project is California-based Good Meat. Though the company has been selling its lab-grown chicken in Singapore since 2020, its still awaiting FDA approval to sell its products in the US. Thats not stopping it from going ahead with the ambitious plans for the new facility, though.

The bioreactors will be far and away the largest, not only in the cultivated meat industry, but in the biopharma industry too, said Josh Tetrick, CEO of Good Meats parent company, Eat Just. So the design and engineering challenges are significant, the capital investments are significant, and the potential to take another step toward shifting society away from slaughtered meat is significant.

Cultured meatnot to be confused with plant-based meatis grown from animal cells and is biologically the same as meat that comes from an animal. The process starts with harvesting muscle cells from an animal, then feeding those cells a mixture of nutrients and naturally-occurring growth factors (or, as Good Meats process specifies, amino acids, fats, and vitamins) so that they multiply, differentiate, then grow to form muscle tissuein much the same way muscle grows inside animals bodies.

According to Good Meats website, they use cells from only the best chickens and cows (what makes them the best isnt spelled out), and carefully choose cells most likely to produce flavorful, sustainable meat. Besides being used as starters to grow edible meat in bioreactors, the cells are also immortalized, growing and dividing over and over; cells from one chicken could end up producing thousands of breasts.

Cultivated meat matters because it will enable us to eat meat without all the harm, without bulldozing forests, without the need to slaughter an animal, without the need to use antibiotics, without accelerating zoonotic diseases, Tetrick said.

Meat can be harvested (their word, not mine) just four to six weeks after initiating the growth processbut its not a matter of plucking a ready-to-package breast from a vat and shipping it off to the grocery store. Besides going through safety and regulatory reviews, the harvested cells need to be turned into something resembling traditional meat. Good Meat says it uses 3D printing, extrusion cooking, and molding to refine the shape and texture of the product.

This all starts to sound a little Franken-meaty, but the company emphasizes that its products have nutritional profiles identical to those of conventionally-raised meat. A few of the final formats the meat comes in include chicken nugget bites, sausages, shredded chicken, and chicken breasts.

Its going to take a long time for factory farming to stop being a thing, but as cultured meat continues to become more scalable, that day could be on the horizon. Tetrick thinks itll happen within his generations lifetime. I think our grandchildren are going to ask us about why we ate meat from slaughtered animals back in 2022, he said.

Good Meat is expected to finalize the location of its US plant before summers end, and theyre aiming for domestic production to start by late 2024.

Image Credit: Good Meat

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The World's Biggest Cultured Meat Factory Will Soon Be Built in the US - Singularity Hub

Scientists working with the Event Horizon Telescope recently released an image of the supermassive black hole at the center of our galaxy, the first-ever picture of our local singularity. Named Sagittarius A* (pronounced A star), the black hole has the mass of four million suns, and is surrounded by a vortex of glowing material heated to extreme temperatures as its sucked into the unknown world of the black hole.

The picture is just the second black hole to be imaged, following the release in 2019 of a picture of the black hole at the center of the galaxy M87. These stunning snapshots come thanks to the EHT, which is not one telescope but many spread out across the planet. Combining these observations lets astronomers effectively create a telescope that is as large as Earth, and which can see objects much farther away than anything else. For scale, consider that the EHT is powerful enough that from Earth it could see an orange placed on the Moon.

Peering inside a black hole for the first time is an undeniably important achievement, and one that captured the imaginations of astronomers and the public alike. But with the worlds most powerful telescope, surely there are other cool things to find out there in the universe like, say, extraterrestrial intelligence. Could we turn the EHT on distant planets, using its superior resolution to spy on potential alien civilizations?

It sounds like an amazing idea, but, unfortunately, the EHT isnt really right for the search for extraterrestrial intelligence (SETI), says Cherry Ng, a radio astronomer working with the Breakthrough Listen SETI project.

When it comes to SETI research, our primary goal is in finding a signal, Ng says in an email to Inverse. For that, the EHT is, ironically, too powerful.

Most SETI research involves looking at broad swathes of the night sky to search for signals that look like they may have come from intelligent beings. These kinds of surveys dont zoom in on things like the EHT does, but they can cover a lot of space quickly. And with trillions of stars out there, covering a lot of space is crucial.

Pointing the EHT at even the roughly 5,000 known exoplanets for ten minutes each would take 36 days of continuous observing, estimates Chenoa Tremblay, a researcher at the SETI Institute. And thats not even accounting for telescope downtime, calibration, and aiming.

The EHT as an organization is not very well set up to chase down every hint of ET, says Sofia Sheikh, a postdoctoral researcher at the University of California, Berkeleys SETI Research Center.

The EHT is a collaboration between many different telescopes around the world, Sheikh says in an email to Inverse. Getting coordinated observations with them all is expensive and time-consuming, and we'd have to have a really good argument to access that level of resources for SETI.

The EHT is also optimized to collect data in a very specific wavelength: 1.3 millimeters. Radio waves at this frequency can travel through the clouds of hot gas surrounding a black hole, allowing us to peer inside to get a clear image. These wavelengths are nearly as short as radio waves get, something thats crucial for getting high-resolution images.

But ET would need to be broadcasting signals at that very specific wavelength, says Dan Werthimer, an astronomer at the University of California, Berkeley. Astronomers looking for extraterrestrial intelligence do look for radio waves, but they tend to look for signals at much longer wavelengths, similar to those we use on Earth for communication.

Where the EHT could potentially come into play in SETI would be if we had already found a signal and wanted to zoom in on it, Sheikh says. Assuming the signal happened to include the 1.3-millimeter wavelength, and we had a good idea of where it was coming from, astronomers could follow up on an interesting signal with the EHT to learn more about where it came from.

If a signal was coming from a transmitter on a planet orbiting a star, for example, we could see the planet go around the star, we could see the transmitter orbit the star, Werthimer says. We could actually see that even if you were on the other side of the galaxy, with the resolution of the EHT.

The EHT might also be good for finding something like a cool Dyson sphere, Sheikh says. These are hypothetical structures, first proposed by the physicist Freeman Dyson, built around entire stars that capture most or all of the energy from them. Its something an advanced civilization might build to meet its massive energy needs.

Most Dyson spheres would radiate most of their energy in the infrared, at higher frequencies than radio waves. But one thats much cooler, and therefore releases energy at lower frequencies, might be observable by the EHT.

Still, that eventuality is fairly unlikely. But astronomers are already using telescopes like the EHT to carry out SETI research at wavelengths where were more likely to actually see something. The EHT is just one example of what astronomers call very long baseline interferometry (VLBI), which means using multiple telescopes spread out from each other.

There are a number of projects around the world that use multiple spaced out telescopes to find things in the universe (though none are as big as the EHT). The Very Large Array (VLA), in New Mexico, for example, consists of 27 radio antennas that can be moved as much as 23 miles apart from each to search for events such as radio waves from clouds of gas in our galaxy or plasma emitted from black holes. Similarly, the Atacama Large Millimeter/submillimeter Array (ALMA) radio telescope is made of 66 radio antennae spread across Chiles Atacama desert. And other telescope arrays keeping tabs on signals in a range of wavelengths can be found in Australia, South Africa, and elsewhere.

These kinds of telescopes consisting of multiple receivers working together are called interferometers, and theyre crucial for SETI research. The signals scientists think we might find from aliens, called technosignatures, look very similar to the kinds of signals being emitted from all over Earth today.

There are a lot of radio signals on Earth, we call it radio frequency interference, or radiofrequency pollution, Werthimer says. This false alarm problem is getting worse and worse its getting harder and harder to do SETI from the Earth.

Using multiple receivers, however, lets scientists distinguish signals from Earth from those that come from much farther away. Thats where interferometers like the VLA come in, helping astronomers peer beyond Earthly interference. Future telescopes, like the planned next-generation Very Large Array (ngVLA) will be even bigger, and should give astronomers an even better look at far-away radio signals. That means were better equipped than ever before to find potential signals of extraterrestrial intelligence in the universe, and to follow up on them should one appear.

As for the EHT, its been busy in the past few years adding new telescopes to the array, and following up on its black hole observations. Future plans include the addition of even more telescopes and increasingly detailed observations of black holes, potentially even including video imagery. And maybe, just maybe, being called into action to take a picture of aliens.

LEARN SOMETHING NEW EVERY DAY.

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Can the worlds most powerful telescope find alien civilizations? - Inverse

I've known a lot of fourth-graders in my life. Three quite intimately. Fourth-graders running about and tugging at my arms and legs no matter what else might be going on to "watch me do this" or to "play with me". They're all about the interruption and the attention. They probably would want us now to take a moment and at least "watch" what has happened, don't you think?

But the world continues to spin. From the sublime to the ridiculous, things go on. This means that despite the numbing and enveloping sorrow, this morning I had to think about linear algebra for a class I was teaching.

Linear algebra is the math of making sense of a cloud of points, which do double duty serving not only as locations in space, but also as vectors. Vectors are characterized by having both magnitude and direction, like force or velocity. It's not just how hard you push or how fast you are going, but toward what end? For many purposes and in many settings we are each lists of numbers we're not meat puppets, we're data puppets so we're all vectors. We've all got magnitude and direction.

It's all a big mess in my mind this morning. Perfect equations drift about a broken world and heartbroken families.

There is a famous theorem about vectors from the Dutch mathematician L.E.J. Brouwer. Among other things Brouwer was known for founding the intuitionistschool of mathematics, a movement that declared that the only true mathematics was mathematics that was careful with its infinities and didn't prove theorems through the use of the law of the excluded middle. The law of the excluded middle is a technique of logical argumentation that most famously rears its head in "proofs by contradiction", wherein you show a statement is true by assuming otherwise and use this contrary assumption as a starting point of an argument that leads to a known mathematical falsehood, like 0=1. Once you arrive at that blatant falsehood, you know that first step was a misstep and that the original statement must be true.

For many purposes and in many settings we are each lists of numbers vectors.

At that point, most mathematicians would declare QED. No construction required a direct argument would be nice, but unnecessary for everyone except Brouwer and his followers.

But, despite Brouwer's objections, math is a world of either/or a world of sharp divides, a world of excluded middles, a stripped-down version of experience. And as I'm preparing, I'm thinking about that world and our world. I'm thinking there is maybe another form of the law, a meta-form, that storytelling and sense-making either use math or they don't. Like the aphorism attributed to Stalin, "one death is a tragedy, one million deaths is statistics." The story of a single death can worm its way into your soul in a way that one million deaths can't, that at that scale, at that altitude, the heart is left behind and the brain kicks in. But another reading is that when death becomes statistics, when death intersects mathematics, tragedy is side-lined. We're either talking feelings or we're talking fractions and never the twain shall meet.

When, last week, my students walked into class, still mourning last week's tragedy since when did teaching require training in grief counseling? I felt I couldn't just jump into our discussion of high-dimensional spaces. I we had to deal with the reality of what had happened in the low-dimensional space three, or four dimensions if you include time, and, well, we've got to include time.

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This is about something that happened space around us. It's more difficult to work in this smaller more intimate space, but we tried. Eventually we brought it back to linear algebra and its place as the engine of the internet, the web, and thus a part of the dark energy that drives social media. Its place in the online architecting of the virtual dark corners of radicalization. We talked about the idea of linear algebra for good, and that maybe they might be a part of that kind of radical move. We explored the middle. Eventually we just talked about linear algebra.

And here we are again. Once more I find myself stuck in the excluded middle and this time I'm thinking about Brouwer's Theorem. It's about vectors and alignment. I'm thinking about people all around the world, each with magnitude, each with direction. It's the direction that's bugging me, the misalignment, which when amplified or enabled with tools that give some people disproportionate magnitude to create places of pain and sadness. It's because I've got to go teach this class, but I'm a lousy compartmentalizer and I'm thinking about tragedy in terms of vectors and I feel like I need to have another moment that this moment requires its own moment of recognition everywhere, that we should all be aligned in sadness and anger and at least a moment in our class so that we can air it all out before entering the safe place of Platonic objects. I need a space as much as they do. Grief counseling goes both ways in my classroom.

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Brouwer's discovery sometimes goes by the cringeworthy name "The Hairy Ball Theorem" (I kid you not). It's about a field of vector on a perfect sphere, like the surface of a cue ball, and where each vector, one for each of the infinity of points on the sphere, has the further stipulation that it be tangent to the sphere, meaning that if at that point you placed a playing card (if there is a pool table around can a deck of cards be far away?) then the vector must lie on the card. Replace all those vectors by stray strands of hair and you've got your hairy ball. Brouwer's Theorem says that there is no way to comb those glancing locks to get them all aligned while keeping them tangent, that no matter how carefully you nudge them like the balding man carefully arranging his combover, you'll always end up with a cowlick, a place where suddenly the flow goes the other way. Mathematically, it's the necessity of a singularity. So as I was preparing for class, I was thinking about vectors and matrices and how we are a vector field glancing off the surface of the ball that is the Earth. That we can't align is a mathematical fact. If only the singularity were singular.

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Teaching and grieving in a classroom where perfect math meets a broken world - Salon

Hendrik Meurkens is set to play at Mezzrow in celebration of his recent album, which is out now. The album features Hendrik Meurkens on vibes and harmonica, Steve Ash on piano, Chris Berger on bass, and Andy Watson on drums. The concert is set to take place at Mezzrow on Wednesday, June 8th at 7:30 & 9:00PM. Mezzrow is located at 163 W 10th St, New York, NY 10014. For tickets, call the Box Office at 646-476-4346 or click here for tickets.

Maestro Hendrik Meurkens isn't just an acclaimed artist, whom we have all come to admire. He's a man brimming with incandescent ideas which manifest into musical gold. What makes Meurkens so special is the singularity of his sound. A German-born, New York-based harmonica player who performs Latin Jazz. If there is a Venn diagram of these attributes, he would be one of the few in the middle. That he has carved such a niche over a storied career should put this album under a special light. Samba Jazz Odyssey is an adventure with seven pieces composed by Meurkens, which were undoubtedly informed by his trailblazing musical journeys around the world. The maestro pairs with the august WDR Big Band, from Cologne, Germany, with arrangements which were also conducted by Michael Philip Mossman, a Grammy-nominated arranger. "This project is very special to me," said Meurkens. "It is everybody's dream to record with the WDR Big Band, and I was honored to collaborate with them." The resulting production is a vivid voyage through samba jazz in its many forms.

A Night in Jakarta isn't just a get-up samba with feel good effect. It exemplifies the theme of this project, a veritable tour of samba jazz, which begins in the South Pacific. Meurkens wrote the piece as an honorific for the Java Jazz Festival organizers based in Jakarta. He and his Samba Jazz Quartet have played at this well-regarded festival many times. Meurkens has fond memories, particularly of the late-night jam sessions at the hotel. Paul Heller (tenor saxophone) and Raphael Klemm (trombone) deliver dazzling solos to get this album going.

Meurkens first recorded Manhattan Samba on his album Poema Brasileiro (Concord, 1996). It's a tune of many layers, runs, and hits. The band plays as one, navigating the sections with aplomb. Pascal Bartoszak (flute) offers an uplifting and thoughtful solo. Meurkens' harmonica solo is beautiful and buoyant, bright and bluesy. The maestro is at home at this piece because well...he's at home. After all, he's a New Yorker. And this piece is a musical dedication to the vibrant samba jazz scene in New York, as many terrific Brazilian artists live in the Big Apple.

Next stop, central Europe. Prague in March is one of Meurkens' veritable hits, as many accomplished artists have recorded it over the years, including Claudio Roditi, the Brazilian trumpeter. This particular arrangement is by Carlos Franzetti for a project on which he and Meurkens collaborated. In fact, Meurkens wrote this masterpiece before he immigrated to the US, just one year after the Berlin Wall fell. The namesake of the song, Prague, is also its inspiration. Meurkens was fascinated with this beautiful city, and on this rendition, check out Ludwig Nuss' refined trombone solo.

Sambatropolis is another of Meurkens' popular compositions, recorded previously with English and Portuguese lyrics. It's a terrific ode to the samba jazz scene of New York. The back-and-forth trades between Meurkens and Johan Hrln (alto saxophone) are pure delight. This juxtaposition of virtuosity may spark memories or engender one to imagine the music geniuses found at many New York jazz clubs.

On Mountain Drive, we find ourselves somewhere in the American West, driving amid the Rocky Mountains. Meurkens named his piece after a car ride from Denver to Aspen. The natural beauty of the jagged mountains and greenery enveloped Meurkens' mind. For this particular rendition, Andi Haderer (trumpet) goes to work with a terrific solo. "I love the groove that Mossman found for the band. He added a totally new perspective with his arrangement," reflects Meurkens.

Beginning with pulsing drum hits, You Again is Mossman's composition, and it unfolds with a steady groove and blooming harmonies. The band is put through the paces, and it's clearly up to the task as the full sonic and dynamic range is on display. Meurkens contributes an epic harmonica solo that demonstrates his effortless mastery. Joining him with remarkable solos: Jens Neufang (baritone sax), Andy Hunter (trombone), Mattis Cederberg (bass trombone), Hans Dekker (drums), Paul Shigihara (guitar), and Rob Bruynen (trumpet). This piece is a jam session.

Meurkens wrote Bolero Para Paquito for Paquito D'Rivera, the legendary jazz saxophonist and clarinetist. "Paquito remains one of my main inspirations in Latin Jazz, and he has so much positive energy," said Meurkens. In fact, Paquito recorded the piece, too. And this particular arrangement by Franzetti is a thoughtful and well-placed work. One highlight is indeed Billy Test's piano solo.The premiere recording of Samba Tonto is a high point of this album. A samba in seven with a bridge that undulates between 2/4 and 3/8 could make your head spin. But the move among meters is handled gracefully, with colorful woodwinds and lush harmonies. Paul Shigihara (guitar) adds his stamp with a modern and soulful solo. The album ends with Choro, the well-known piece composed by A.C.Jobim. But you've never heard it like this before. Mossman's cinematic arrangement frames the number in a special manner, giving space for solos by Billy Test (piano), Ludwig Nuss (trombone), Ruud Breuls (trumpet), and Meurkens (harmonica).

Jazz Samba Odyssey exemplifies basic addition. One plus one equals two. But the combination of Meurkens, Mossman, and the WDR Big Band have given us something ever more. This album is a calculus of creativity, a diagram of distinction, and a watershed work for the jazz and samba communities. It has been a distinct honor for Doug Davis, Matthew Mayer, and I to help produce this album for maestro Meurkens and the entire group. The project has indeed been an odyssey - into the music, from the heart, and out of this world.

Kabir SehgalMulti-GRAMMY & Latin GRAMMY Award winning producer. He is a New York Times bestselling author.

http://www.hendrikmeurkens.comwww.zohomusic.com/cds/meurkins_wdr.html

Photo Credits: Chris Drukker

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Hendrik Meurkens and The WDR Big Band to Play at Mezzrow - Broadway World

When Wenbo Shi started Singularity Energy, a carbon intelligence platform that today raised a $4.5 million seed round, he never thought he would focus the company on a greenhouse gas. But one conversation with a customer changed the way he viewed his product and, ultimately, his company and the type of customers it now serves.

The journey was really customer driven, to be honest. When I started the company three years ago, I wasnt thinking of carbon at all, Shi said. The first idea that I had for Singularity was that wed do intelligent control for batteries, for EV charging, for those types of things. The objective for battery control is always going to be, How can I save money for the customers?'

A few years ago, Shi and Singularity had that goal in mind when working with the Harvard Innovation Lab, which houses entrepreneurial resources for Harvard Business School students. The university was looking to pair a battery with solar panels on the buildings roof.

During one of the conversations, they brought up carbon. Can you actually consider carbon as a signal? Shi recalls them asking. The university wanted to install a battery not just to save money, but to lower the campuss carbon footprint.

I had never thought of carbon because I was like, Oh, Im a power system guy, Shi recalled. But after the conversation with Harvard, then I was like, Oh, thats a very neat idea. If I know how clean or how dirty the power grid is, then to me its another control signal. Its an optimization objective, which should be pretty straightforward to integrate with the software.

It turned out that incorporating carbon as a control signal changed the math for Harvards battery project. Shi had discovered that optimizing for cost alone would increase pollution, a revelation that occurred after he started analyzing the grids carbon emissions on an hourly basis as opposed to the more commonly used annual averages.

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A single question changed how Singularity viewed its market - TechCrunch

Reno, NV May 18, 2022 Sylabs, provider of tools and services for performance-intensive container technology, today announced that it has released SingularityCE 3.10. The newest update makes significant steps towards full OCI compatibility, giving Singularity the ability to natively run OCI-based container workflows. The release also adds functionality for resource limits using cgroups to give developers more control over the environments in which Singularity is being run.

Features of the 3.10 release include:

These new features are big steps toward better compatibility with the OCI world, which will give Singularity greater utility across the entire spectrum of workloads, said Dave Trudgian, Software Engineer at Sylabs and the lead developer within the Singularity ecosystem. The release also introduces the ability for all users to apply RAM, CPU, and other resource limits directly to individual containers. This is very useful when developing and testing scientific software on your laptop or desktop. Benchmarking tasks becomes easier, and you can avoid your workstation grinding to a halt. It also allows balancing the needs of multiple containers within a single HPC job, optimizing for overall productivity.

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Sylabs Readies for Native OCI Compatibility with Release of SingularityCE 3.10 - insideHPC

Purple Badlands

While spending some time down in the Southgate area of the Springs (family was visiting and Airbnbing in a cozy spot near Stratton Open Space) I decided to dip over to Good Weed for some, well, good weed. As I looked online, I found only a handful of strains on the stores shelves, but some promising ones that got my attention with names Id not heard before.

When I arrived in the land of Good Weed, I found a spacious waiting area with a more compact and focused showroom. The budtender was knowledgeable and proudly reported on the all-organic, in-house-grown, glass slow-cured cannabis they curated and crafted. And while Good Weed may have been somewhat short on choices, that was the only category where you could accuse the weed of leaving you wanting. Good? Nay, the green was looking great that day.

The budtenders showed two Indicas and two Sativas, I leaned Indica and decided to play with their purple The Purple Badlands that is. Blueberry (Flo) crossed with Stardawg carved the path to the Purple Badlands, and that path has led to dense, thick buds that are swimming in rich red hairs through the trichome-covered forests of green. Testing out at just over 16 percent THC, the buds were so pungent and alluring in that aromatic way that I was instantly taken with the strain and eager to get it fired, for I could tell these nugs were promising paradise.

With some boss buds in hand to review, I brought The Boss along for the ride and rolled the track Badlands to provide the soulful symmetry such a strain was owed. The Badlands was odoriferous, just so fruity and gassy. Almost like Juicy Fruit released a diesel flavor of chewing gum while still keeping that deeply fruity and sweet profile. Similarly, warm, bitter orange rind bites burst forth from the bowl as things started to get lit.

Still split in its profile playing equally to spicy and sweet notes the Badlands goes a bit binary with its palate play, bouncing back and forth between these two areas of flavor as I burned through the top chords, reaching deeper into the bowl. More of a minty hint reveals itself through the warmer bites as it burns on and the sweeter side fades into the background.

As The Boss bids, just start burning away till these badlands start treating us good. But the wait is short when those lands are Purple. And the results? Well, theyre more than good. Theyre absolutely wondrous extremely euphoric, so chill and heavy. The high is weighty as it settles in, initially felt right behind the eyes as the perspective-shift kicks in, a feeling like youre being washed over with weeded rapture.

A definite spirit-raiser, the Badlands takes the proverbial edge off. Like, all of it. No edge left. Just a looped and connected singularity. An infinity form of floral indulgence and bliss. Talk about a dream, Good Weed makes it real. Spend your life waiting for a moment that just dont come, well dont waste your time waiting, the Purple gets it done. Badlands, you gotta smoke it every day. As The Boss would say (probably).

The Badlands takes the proverbial edge off. Like, all of it. No edge left. Just a looped and connected singularity.

When you see a name like Good Weed, you might think, well thats a bit loaded, and it automatically sets high expectations. What you probably wouldnt think is that its an excessively humble name (and assessment of their weedy wares), and that this shop vaults over that high bar with the ease of a seasoned Olympian. Because with that name, to quote The Boss once more, You gotta live it every day, and Good Weed most definitely does. The Purple Badlands are an absolute 10.

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Good Weed? Nay, the greatest weed according to the Purple Badlands - Colorado Springs Independent

NEW YORK, May 22, 2022 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C., a nationally recognized shareholder rights law firm, is investigating potential claims against Cassava Sciences, Inc. SAVA, Dentsply Sirona, Inc. XRAY, IonQ, Inc. IONQ, and Singularity Future Technology, Inc. SGLY. Our investigations concern whether these companies have violated the federal securities laws and/or engaged in other unlawful business practices. Additional information about each case can be found at the link provided.

Cassava Sciences, Inc. SAVA

On April 18, 2022,The New York Timespublished an article entitled "Scientists Question Data Behind an Experimental Alzheimer's Drug." The article addressed Cassava's experimental Alzheimer's drug, simufilam, and reported that one of Cassava's advisers, Dr. H.Y. Wang, had five papers he authored retracted from the scientific journal PLoS One after an in-depth investigation revealed "serious concerns about the integrity and the reliability of the results."

On this news, Cassava's stock price fell sharply during intraday trading on April 19, 2022.

For more information on the Cassava investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/SAVA

Dentsply Sirona, Inc. XRAY

On April 19, 2022, the Company issued a press release announcing the termination of Chief Executive Officer, Don Casey, effective immediately, and that Casey will also cease to serve as a member of the Company's Board.

Following this news, shares of Dentsply Sirona dropped sharply by $6.52 per share, over 13%, to close at $42.20 per share on April 19, 2022.

For more information on the Dentsply Sirona investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/XRAY

IonQ, Inc. IONQ

On May 3, 2022, Scorpion Capital released a 183-page short report regarding IonQ's management, operations, and business. The Scorpion Capital report stated that "We conducted 25 research interviews including 7 former employees and executives; 11 leading quantum computing experts including seminal names in the field, some who have published papers with IonQ's founders and are intimately familiar with its technology; and 5 of its key "customers" and partners. We believe our research represents the most in-depth due diligence to date on IonQ, leading us to conclude it is just another VC-backed SPAC scam."

Following this news, IonQ's stock closed down 9.03%, to close at $7.15 per share on May 3, 2022.

For more information on the IonQ investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/IONQ

Singularity Future Technology, Inc. SGLY

On May 5, 2022, Hindenburg Research ("Hindenburg") published a report entitled "Singularity Future Technology: This Nasdaq-Listed Company's CEO Is a fugitive, on the Run for Allegedly Operating a Massive Ponzi Scheme.' The Hindenburg report alleged, among other things, that singularity's CEO, Yang Jie, is a fugitive on the run from Chinese authorities for running an alleged $300 million Ponzi scheme that lured in over 20,000 victims" and "fled to the U.S. while at least 28 other individuals involved in the case were sentenced to prison terms ranging from 6 months to 15 years." The Hindenburg report further alleged that "Singularity's massive [cryptocurrency] mining rig deal appears to be a brazen undisclosed related party deal" and that "[w]e see little evidence that Singularity's proprietary' crypto mining rigs ever existed in the first place. The photos and descriptions of Singularity's miners match precisely with another brand called KOI Miner."

On this news, Singularity's stock price fell $1.95 per share, or 28.89%, to close at $4.80 per share on May 5, 2022.

For more information on the Singularity Future investigation go to: https://bespc.com/cases/SGLY

About Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.:

Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. is a nationally recognized law firm with offices in New York, California, and South Carolina. The firm represents individual and institutional investors in commercial, securities, derivative, and other complex litigation in state and federal courts across the country. For more information about the firm, please visit http://www.bespc.com. Attorney advertising. Prior results do not guarantee similar outcomes.

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Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C.Brandon Walker, Esq. Melissa Fortunato, Esq.(212) 355-4648investigations@bespc.comwww.bespc.com

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Bragar Eagel & Squire, P.C. Is Investigating Cassava, Dentsply Sirona, IonQ, and Singularity Future and E - Benzinga

How old are you, really?

It seems like a simple question. Its based on when youre born. Yet we all know people who seem much younger than their chronological age. They have radiant skin and hair. They seem sharper than their age would suggest. Theyre highly active with astonishing energy.

Why? Studies have repeatedly shown that cells, tissues, and people have a biological age that may or may not correspond to how old they are in terms of birthdays. Longevity scientists have taken note. As they look into what makes us age, one main metric pops up: a biological aging clocka measure that reflects your bodys age irrespective of your years on Earth.

One of the most popular aging clocks dives deep into our cells. As we age, our genomes add on chunks of chemicals that alter their gene expression. These markers, dubbed epigenetic modifications, normally just tack on and off like Velcro. But with age, certain bits of the genome add far more chunks, which essentially work to shut the genes off.

In other words, our cells have an epigenetic age (EpiAge). But what, if anything, does the clock mean for longevity?

Dr. Steve Horvath had his eye on extending lifespan ever since he was a teenager. A biomathematician, he set his eyes on using computation modeling and AI to understand how to extend life.

But to find the key, he needed a focus. Horvaths idea stemmed from epigeneticsa powerful way our bodies control DNA expression without altering the DNA strands themselves. Epigenetics is an extremely fluid dance, with multiple chemical components latching onto or falling off of DNA strands. The epigenetic dance changes with age, though some changes seem consistent across time. This led Horvath to ask: can we use these epigenetic markers to gauge a cells age?

Apparently, the answer is yes. After gathering and analyzing over 13,000 human samples, Horvath found an impressive measuring tape for aging. The key was a type of epigenetic modification called methylation, which tends to rest on DNA spots dubbed CpG islands. (We all need a summer break!)

His team developed an algorithm for biological agea cellular biological clockthat impressed longevity researchers with its accuracy throughout the body. Rather than a one-off, EpiAge seems to work for multiple organs and tissues, potentially shining light on how aging happens.

I wanted to develop a method that would work in many or most tissues. It was a very risky project, Horvath said at the time.

The clocks median error was a measly 3.6 years, meaning that it could gauge a persons age within 43 months. Even more impressive, the clock used a simple statistical model, which looked at a certain type of epigenetic modificationDNA methylationat just two target sites on DNA. All it took was a saliva sample. With more work, Horvath found even more patterns that reflected the age of certain types of cells, such as neurons and blood cells. The test was amazingly good, said Kevin Bryant at Zymo Research, a biotechnology company in Irvine, California at the time.

EpiAge also began looking under the veil. The discrepancy between epigenetic age as estimated by these clocks, and chronological age is referred to as EpiAge acceleration, the authors said. Epidemiological studies have linked EpiAge acceleration to a wide variety of pathologies, health states, lifestyle, mental state, and environmental factors, indicating that epigenetic clocks tap into critical biological processes that are involved in aging.

Yet one glaring question remained: what exactly is the EpiAge clock measuring?

If youre having trouble linking epigenetic modifications to aging, I feel ya. How and why do what are essentially fridge magnets for the genome change anything?

Let me introduce you to the wheel of aging.

Zooming in on our genes, the genome becomes more unstablemeaning that theres more chances for mutations. Telomeres, the protective cap on the genes, waste away. Proteins start behaving wonkily, sometimes forming into clumps that clog up the cells waste disposal system, potentially leading to Alzheimers and other neurodegenerative disorders. The cells energy factory, the mitochondria, sputters and malfunctions. Cells can no longer sense nutrients floating around. Even worse, some cells give up completely and turn into senescent zombie cellsthey dont die, but dont perform normal functions, instead spewing out toxic immune chemicals.

The thing is, we dont know why these different types of aging behaviors happen. And when measuring age, we dont know how aging clocks correspond to these hallmarks. Its partly why there are multiple aging clocks. EpiAge is one. Another is (not kidding) Skin & blood, which predicts lifespan and relates to many age-related conditions.

In a new study, published in Nature Aging, Horvath and Dr. Ken Raj at Altos Labs took a first step at linking the epigenetic clock to the hallmarks of aging. Using donated human cells from 14 healthy peoplegrown inside containers in the labthe team split the cells into four groups. One was zapped with radiation, another tweaked to become cancerous, and a third that turned into zombie senescent cells. The fourth group was left alone without any treatment.

These treatments reflect major hallmarks of aging, the authors explained. Radiation in small doses, for example, destabilizes the genome that mimics aging, and the cells became senescent is just two weeks. Cancer-like cells also aged heavily in just a few days. Yet surprisingly, the cells didnt age according to EpiAge, even when tested in other cells. These results, obtained through investigation using different primary human and mouse cells and multiple radiation doses and regimens, demonstrate that epigenetic agingis not affected by genomic instability induced by radiation-induced DNA breaks, the authors said.

In other words, what EpiAge measureschanges to a cells CpG epigenomedoesnt necessarily predict a cells zombie senescence status. Similarly, the clock didnt seem to match up with telomere problems or general genome stability.

What did match up? Energy. Breaking it down, EpiAge is associated with a cells ability to sense nutrientsa key signal that tells it to grow, reproduce, or shrivel. Another associate is mitochondria activity, which generates power for the cell. Finally, EpiAge also seems to reflect the amount of stem cells in the samples, which changes starting early.

The observation that aging begins so early in life is possible because age can now be measured based on the biology of the cell instead of the passing of time, the authors said. For aging clocks, this measurement allows interrogation of the link between age and longevity.

While aging clocks are increasingly becoming mainstream, the question is what exactly each measures. The excitement following the development of epigenetic clocks has been tinged with uncertainty as to the meaning of their measurements.

This study is one of the first to link a powerful aging clock to the hallmarks of aging. The connection of epigenetic aging to four of the hallmarks of aging implies that these hallmarks are also mutually connected at deeper levels, the authors wrote.

In other words, weve started peeking into what unites the multiple veins of aging. The absence of a connection between the other aging hallmarks and epigenetic aging suggests that aging is a consequence of multiparallel mechanisms, the authors said. Some may be because of epigenetic changes; others simply due to wear and tear. Bring on the aging multiverse of madness.

Image Credit:Icons8_team from Pixabay

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What's Your Biological Age? A New 'Aging Clock' Has the Answer - Singularity Hub

As Moores Law begins to slow, the search is on for new ways to keep the exponential rise in processing speeds going. New research suggests that an exotic approach known as lightwave electronics could be a promising new avenue.

While innovation in computer chips is far from dead, there are signs that the exponential increase in computing power weve gotten used to over the past 50 years is starting to slow. As transistors shrink to almost atomic scales, its becoming harder to squeeze ever more onto a computer chip, undercutting the trend that Gordon Moore first observed in 1965: that the number doubled roughly every two years.

But an equally important trend in processing power petered out much earlier: Dennard scaling, which stated that the power consumption of transistors fell in line with their size. This was a very useful tendency, because chips quickly heat up and get damaged if they draw too much power. Dennard scaling meant that every time transistors shrank, so did their power consumption, which made it possible to run chips faster without overheating them.

But this trend came unstuck back in 2005 due to the increased impact of current leakage at very tiny scales, and the exponential rise in chip clock rates petered out. Chipmakers responded by shifting to multi-core processing, where many small processors run in parallel to complete jobs faster, but clock rates have remained more or less stagnant since then.

Now though, researchers have demonstrated the foundations of a technology that could allow clock rates one million times higher than todays chips. The approach relies on using lasers to elicit ultra-fast bursts of electricity and has been used to create the fastest-ever logic gatethe fundamental building block of all computers.

So-called lightwave electronics relies on the fact that its possible to use laser light to excite electrons in conducting materials. Researchers have already demonstrated that ultra-fast laser pulses are able to generate bursts of current on femtosecond timescalesa millionth of a billionth of a second.

Doing anything useful with them has proven more elusive, but in a paper in Nature, researchers used a combination of theoretical studies and experimental work to devise a way to use this phenomena for information processing.

When the team fired their ultra-fast laser at a graphene wire strung between two gold electrodes, it produced two different kinds of currents. Some of the electrons excited by the light continued moving in a particular direction once the light was switched off, while others were transient and were only in motion while the light was on. The researchers found that they could control the type of current created by altering the shape of their laser pulses, which was then used as the basis of their logic gate.

Logic gates work by taking two inputseither 1 or 0processing them, and providing a single output. The exact processing rules depend on the kind of logic gate implementing them, but for example, an AND gate only outputs a 1 if both its inputs are 1, otherwise it outputs a 0.

In the researchers new scheme, two synchronized lasers are used to create bursts of either the transient or permanent currents, which act as the inputs to the logic gate. These currents can either add up or cancel each other to provide the equivalent of a 1 or 0 as an output.

And because of the extreme speeds of the laser pulses, the resulting gate is capable of operating at speeds in the petahertz, which is one million times faster than the gigahertz speeds that todays fastest computer chips can manage.

Obviously, the setup is vastly larger and more complex than the simple arrangement of transistors used for conventional logic gates, and shrinking it down to the scales required to make practical chips will be a mammoth task.

But while petahertz computing is not around the corner anytime soon, the new research suggests that lightwave electronics could be a promising and powerful new avenue to explore for the future of computing.

Image Credit: University of Rochester / Michael Osadciw

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New Logic Gates Are a Million Times Faster Than Those in Today's Chips - Singularity Hub