Science & Technology

Bacteria are waging war with each other inside your gut

Laurel Hamers
Science
Mon, 07 Mar 2016 15:13 UTC

The beneficial bacteria in our gut seem like a cooperative bunch: We give them a warm and nutrient-rich home, and they work together to keep us healthy. But with hundreds of microbial species crammed together in tight quarters, new research suggests that our intestinal innards might resemble a battlefield more than a conference room.

Researchers have found that gut bacteria continually wage war on their neighbors, perhaps as a way to stake out space.

The team injected different strains of Bacteroides fragilis, the species of gut-dwelling bacteria (pictured here), into mice that lacked their own microbes. When they analyzed the rodents' stools over time, they found evidence that the strains were attacking each other.

Different strains of B. fragilis inject different combinations of toxins into neighboring bacteria. Bacteria within the same strain fight back: They're immune to the toxins secreted by their strain-mates. But different species or strains of bacteria can succumb to the assault, giving the attacking strain more room to spread out.

The researchers estimate that a billion of these toxin transfers happen per minute per gram of stool inside any given gut, they report online today in the Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.

The weaponry only works at close range, however: The warring bacteria have to actually make contact with each other.

The contact-based approach may be a way for microbes to stake out a space in their immediate vicinity without affecting faraway bacteria that could be helpful.

MIT's new quantum computer could render today's encryption useless

RT
Mon, 07 Mar 2016 03:47 UTC

Researchers at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology have created the first scalable quantum computer that could make current data encryption methods obsolete with its ability to factor very large numbers. The new device uses only five atoms.

In a paper published Friday in the journal Science, researchers from MIT and Austria's University of Innsbruck said that they devised a working quantum computer that runs on just five atoms in an ion trap.

Sea-nomad children can see underwater like dolphins

sciencealert.com
Mon, 07 Mar 2016 02:16 UTC

If you want proof of how adaptable the human body can be, look no further than the Moken people - a nomadic seafaring tribe that lives in the island archipelagos on the Andaman Sea, and along the west coast of Thailand.

Also known as sea-nomads, the Moken were once entirely dependent the ocean, and the children spent much of their time diving for food on the seafloor. Experiments have shown that they could see underwater with total clarity - a unique adaptation that other children can learn within weeks.

Wishful thinking: High-powered laser beam in development to defend earth from approaching space objects

Andre Mitchell
Christian Today
Mon, 07 Mar 2016 01:45 UTC

© Wikipedia
A meteor fireball is seen over Chelyabinsk, Russia, on Feb. 15, 2013. The resulting blast injured more than 1,600 people.

For the past few months, asteroids have been making close approaches to Earth, fuelling fears that these space objects may someday hit our planet and cause countless deaths and massive destruction.

We can, however, ease our fears now because American scientists are already developing a high-powered laser beam to defend Earth from these approaching asteroids.

A team of researchers at the University of California has conducted tests on a weapon called De-Star, which stands for Directed Energy System for Targeting of Asteroids and exploration. The researchers are becoming more and more convinced that this technology may actually work.

"Generally speaking, the technology is available today," said Qicheng Zhang of the University of California, Santa Barbara, one of the authors of the project, as quoted by The Telegraph.

The author nevertheless acknowledged that the team would have to develop a device that will be powerful enough to destroy giant asteroids.

"The main challenge with building a full De-Star is the necessary scale to be effective," Zhang said.

The research team has nevertheless succeeded in testing the De-Star's technique on Earth, by blasting a piece of basalt using laser beams. Basalt is a type of rock from frozen magma that has a similar composition as asteroids.

Comment: With all of the 'newly discovered' asteroids and considering impact records, these lasers could not do much to prevent any cataclysms. For more on the reality of our situation here on planet Earth and the potential for bombardment from space objects, read our Comets and Catastrophe series:

Researchers discover a new kind of stem cell

MSUToday
Thu, 03 Mar 2016 00:00 UTC

Scientists at Michigan State University have discovered a new kind of stem cell, one that could lead to advances in regenerative medicine as well as offer new ways to study birth defects and other reproductive problems.

In the current issue of the journal Stem Cell Reports, Tony Parenti, lead author and MSU cell and molecular biology graduate student, unearthed the new cells - induced XEN cells, or iXEN - in a cellular trash pile, of sorts.

"Other scientists may have seen these cells before, but they were considered to be defective, or cancer-like," said Parenti, who works in the lab of Amy Ralston, MSU biochemist, cell and molecular biologist and co-author of the study. "Rather than ignore these cells that have been mislabeled as waste byproducts, we found gold in the garbage."

A great deal of stem cell research focuses on new ways to make and use pluripotent stem cells. Pluripotent stem cells can be created by reactivating embryonic genes to "reprogram" mature adult cells. Reprogramming mature cells into induced pluripotent stem cells, or iPS cells, allows them to become malleable building blocks that can morph into any cell in the body.

For example, if a patient has a defective liver, healthy cells could be taken from the patient, reprogrammed into iPS cells, which could then be used to help regenerate the person's failing organ. Taking cells from the same patient may greatly reduce the chance of the body rejecting the new treatment, Parenti said.

Prior to the discovery of reprogramming, scientists developed pluripotent stem cells from embryos. However, the embryo produces not only pluripotent stem cells, but also XEN cells, a stem cell type with unique properties. While pluripotent stem cells produce cells in the body, XEN cells produce extraembryonic tissues that play an essential but indirect role in fetal development.

Apple users fall victim to first ever ransomware attack able to penetrate Mac security

RT
Mon, 07 Mar 2016 21:05 UTC

Apple users have fallen prey to ransomware for the first time ever. The 'KeRanger' malware appeared hidden in the popular BitTorrent application, Transmission. Users' Macs were infected upon downloading the latest copy.

A ransomware is malicious code, like any other type of malware. The way it works is usually by hiding inside a program one may hastily download, irrespective of the risks. A message then appears, telling the user all or part of their files have been encrypted, and the only way to decrypt them is by paying a ransom - usually in digital currency, which is difficult to trace.

Deep sea recordings from Mariana Trench share eery sounds from the deep

Maddie Stone
Gizmodo
Thu, 03 Mar 2016 23:13 UTC

Deep rumbles, unearthly moans, high pitched screeching: these are but a few elements of the alien soundscape researchers have now recorded for the first time at Challenger Deep, the deepest known valley on the seafloor.

One might expect Challenger Deep—which sits at the bottom of the Mariana trench some 36,000 feet beneath the ocean surface—to be a quiet place. But in reality, we know very little about what life is like down there: as with most places where the sun never shines, the Mariana trench is shrouded in mystery.

"Light does not propagate underwater very far," oceanographer Bob Dziak of the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration (NOAA) told Gizmodo. "But sound waves travel long distances through the Earth's oceans. Acoustics is really the best way to get a good picture of deep ocean environments."

Super fast computers from quantum dots?

Bec Crew
ScienceAlert
Thu, 03 Mar 2016 00:00 UTC

Solid, crystalline structures of incredibly tiny particles known as quantum dots have been developed by engineers in the US, and they're so close to perfect, they could be a serious contender for a silicon alternative in the super-fast computers of the future.

Just as single-crystal silicon wafers revolutionised computing technology more than 60 years ago (your phone, laptop, PC, and iPad wouldn't exist without one), quantum dot solids could change everything about how we transmit and process information in the decades to come.

Comment: Also see:

Fossilized lizard found in Asia, may be 'missing link' to 'lost world' - age estimated to be 99-million-year-old

RT
Sun, 06 Mar 2016 18:58 UTC

A fossilized lizard preserved in amber and found in Southeast Asia is 99 million years old scientists have determined. That makes it the oldest ever specimen of its kind and could hold the key to a 'lost ecosystem'. The fossil is about 75 million years older than the previous oldest lizard discovered, researchers at Florida Museum of Natural History said.

"It was incredibly exciting to see these animals for the first time. It was exciting and startling, actually, how well they were preserved," researcher Edward Stanley said, as quoted by Reuters. He added that the reptile's entire body, including its eyes and scales, is preserved in "superb detail." Usually, reptiles' bodies decay quickly. "We can pretty much see how the animals looked when they were alive," Professor Juan Diego Daza, who led the research, said.

The lizard is thought to have been an infant reptile, living in a tropical forest in territory that is now Myanmar, Southeast Asia. However, its journey ended when it became trapped in sticky resin. Other animals trapped in the amber, are a gecko and an arctic lizard, although those are not as ancient as the 99-million-year-old reptile.

What might this amazing discovery lead to? It could help us learn more about the "lost ecosystem, the lost world" the creatures lived in. Researchers could also find out more about the animals' modern relatives. "It's kind of a missing link," the professor said, as cited by Reuters.

The research was published on Friday in Science Advances journal.

New species of octopus is discovered 4,000m under the sea near Hawaiian island

Cheyenne Macdonald
Daily Mail
Sat, 05 Mar 2016 13:48 UTC

During a recent deep-sea dive in the Hawaiian Archipelago, a remotely operated vehicle came across an unknown creature.

During a recent deep-sea dive in the Hawaiian Archipelago, a remotely operated vehicle came across an unknown creature.

Unlike most cephalopods, the little octopus found by the NOAA Deep Discoverer lacks pigment, making it ghostlike and mysterious, and every bit adorable.

At more than 4,000 meters below the surface, this is the deepest observation ever published of this type of cephalopod, and researchers say its cartoonish appearance has social media users pushing to name it 'Casper.'

The discovery was made during the first operational dive of Okeanos Explorer's 2016 season on February 27.

Researchers planned to collect geological samples from the Necker Ridge in order to determine its possible connection with Necker Island (Mokumanamana).

But, during its mission, the remotely operated vehicle called Deep Discoverer found something extraordinary - a small octopus sitting on a rock.

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Science & Technology

Bacteria are waging war with each other inside your gut

MIT's new quantum computer could render today's encryption useless

Sea-nomad children can see underwater like dolphins

Wishful thinking: High-powered laser beam in development to defend earth from approaching space objects

Researchers discover a new kind of stem cell

Apple users fall victim to first ever ransomware attack able to penetrate Mac security

Deep sea recordings from Mariana Trench share eery sounds from the deep

Super fast computers from quantum dots?

Fossilized lizard found in Asia, may be 'missing link' to 'lost world' - age estimated to be 99-million-year-old

New species of octopus is discovered 4,000m under the sea near Hawaiian island

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