Gamers beat algorithms at finding protein structures Today's issue of Nature contains a paper with a rather unusual author list. Read past the standard collection of academics, and the final author credited is... an online gaming community. Scientists have turned to games for a variety of reasons, having studied virtual epidemics and tracked online communities and behavior, or simply used games to drum up excitement for the science. But this may be the first time that the gamers played an active role in producing the results, having solved problems in protein structure through the Foldit game. According to a news feature on Foldit, the project arose from an earlier distributed computing effort called Rosetta@home. That project used what has become the standard approach for home-based scientific work: a screensaver that provided a graphical frontend to a program that uses spare processor time to solve weighty scientific problems. This is typically an energy minimization problem. Starting with algorithms, ending with brains
In World First, Monkeys Cloned Like Dolly the Sheep The years-long effort, led by Chinese Academy of Sciences postdoctoral fellow Zhen Liu, culminated in the recent birth of two female macaques, Zhong Zhong and Hua Hua. The macaques’ names are drawn from the word zhonghua, an adjective for the Chinese people. The two macaques—eight weeks and six weeks old—are genetically identical, both clones of the same donor culture of fetal monkey cells. The young monkeys are reportedly healthy and currently live in an incubator. The discovery potentially leads to a brave new world of biomedical research and will unquestionably spark debate over cloning another primate species: humans. Here’s everything you need to know about these potentially controversial clones. Technically, no. “It’s about time, because I thought it would never happen,” says Shoukhrat Mitalipov, the head of Oregon Health and Science University’s Center for Embryonic Cell and Gene Therapy. They then chemically prod the egg into developing, as if it had been naturally fertilized.
Evolution, why I don't understand it Massive Open Lab gets volunteers to beat computers in designing RNA Citizen science, the movement to draft non-specialists into areas of scientific research, doesn't require the volunteers to put on lab coats. In at least one case, scientists turned a prickly biochemical problem into a game and found that the gamers could typically beat the best computer algorithms out there. But all that work was done on cases where we already knew the answers, which was how we were able to measure the gamers' success. Now some researchers have taken this approach one step further and created a hybrid project that mixes volunteers with lab-coated workers. 37,000 enthusiasts were given the chance to take on algorithms in designing new RNA molecules. And once the gamers had a chance to vote on the best designs, the winning designs were sent to a lab, synthesized, and tested. A consortium of researchers at Carnegie Mellon, Stanford, and Seoul National University put together what they called a Massive Open Laboratory. At least, energetically stable based on calculations.
Genetically modified babies given go ahead by UK ethics body | Science The creation of babies whose DNA has been altered to give them what parents perceive to be the best chances in life has received a cautious green light in a landmark report from a leading UK ethics body. The Nuffield Council on Bioethics said that changing the DNA of a human embryo could be “morally permissible” if it was in the future child’s interests and did not add to the kinds of inequalities that already divide society. The report does not call for a change in UK law to permit genetically altered babies, but instead urges research into the safety and effectiveness of the approach, its societal impact, and a widespread debate of its implications. “It is our view that genome editing is not morally unacceptable in itself,” said Karen Yeung, chair of the Nuffield working group and professor of law, ethics and informatics at the University of Birmingham. “There is no reason to rule it out in principle.” The prospect of modifying genes in human embryos has long been controversial though.
Making Makers | Learning Labs Together, Kids Learning Code, Maker Kids, TIFF and Toronto Public Library, have developed comprehensive, maker curriculum for educators who work in formal and informal learning environments with the objective of increasing Toronto youth access and engagement with advanced technology and digital tools! Our workshops and activities allow youth to create something with purpose, driven by their own vision and also empower teachers to be makers. We are hosting Train the Trainer Symposiums wherein the educators can learn how to run and modify activities by doing them. Toy Hacking at Maker Kids: Wednesday, Feb 12th from 8pm to 10pm (Download the module here and the materials here) Arduino Rovers at Maker Kids: Wednesday, Feb 19th from 8pm to 10pm (Download the module here and the materials here) Introduction to HTML & CSS at Kids Learning Code: Tuesday, Feb 25th from 6:30pm to 8:30pm (Download the module here and the materials here) Register here!
Scientists alter DNA to cure blood disorder in embryo A New Scientific Model that Defines Alien Intelligence I have two thoughts in response to this: 1) This is interesting, but humans have enough trouble applying concepts of diverse intelligences and diverse personalities to other humans, let alone other species. It'll be a while before we can easily interact with or understand actual aliens. 2) I still think this is interesting, but... really, it would save a lot of time and energy if we could all just agree that any form of life is an expression of some sort of intelligence; and that therefore, it's all uniquely valuable and worthy of our respect—we're not superior to any of it, in any sense. The universe is full of (made of) ambient intelligence. ... it would save a lot of time and energy if we could all just agree that any form of life is an expression of some sort of intelligence; Yeah, let's totally stop researching things. Is that what I said?
Diagnosing and Treating Genetic Diseases - A Revolution in Progress: Human Genetics and Medical Research When you know the genetic mutations that cause a disease, you may be able to intervene to lessen the disease’s effects. And you may also be able to develop genetic tests for the mutations so that people can learn if they are more likely to develop a disease, or if they are carriers of the trait and may pass it on to their children. Searching for the genes involved in a genetic disease involves discovering which gene has been mutated and how it has been mutated. Because there may be more than one mutation in a gene which can cause a genetic disease, the search is often long. To intervene in the disease, you have to know what the gene is supposed to do, and what it isn’t doing. Courtesy of the National Human Genome Research Institute One way researchers discover which genes go with what disease is through a technique called linkage analysis. Here are the stories of four genetic diseases. Familial Hypercholesterolemia (one form of inherited high cholesterol) Chronic Granulomatous Disease