Everyday drugs could give extra years of life

 

Evidence is emerging that some widely used drugs can prolong lifespan for well people – and insiders have started taking them off-label

MILLIONS of people are taking anti-ageing drugs every day – they just don't know it. Drugs to slow ageing sound futuristic but they already exist in the form of relatively cheap medicines that have been used for other purposes for decades.

Now that their promise is emerging, some scientists have started using them off-label in the hope of extending lifespan – and healthspan. "We are already treating ageing," said gerontologist Brian Kennedy at the International Symposium on Geroprotectors in Basel, Switzerland, last week, where the latest results were presented. "We have been doing ageing research all along but we didn't know it."

Last year Google took its first steps into longevity research with the launch of Calico, an R&D firm that aims to use technology to understand lifespan. Geneticist Craig Venter announced he is pursuing a similar goal via genome sequencing. Now pharmaceutical companies look set to join in. At the conference, the head of Swiss drug firm Novartis said research into "geroprotectors" or longevity drugs was a priority.

Google and Venter's plans may have injected an over-hyped field with a measure of credibility but they are unlikely to bear fruit for some time. Yet evidence is emerging that some existing drugs have modest effects on lifespan, giving an extra 10 years or so of life. "We can develop effective combinations for life extension right now using available drugs," says Mikhail Blagosklonny of the Roswell Park Cancer Institute in New York.

One of the most promising groups of drugs is based on a compound called rapamycin. It was first used to suppress the immune system in organ transplant recipients, then later found to extend lifespan in yeast and worms. In 2009, mice were added to the list when the drug was found to lengthen the animals' lives by up to 14 per cent, even though they were started on the drug at 600 days old, the human equivalent of being about 60.

This led to an explosion of research into whether other structurally similar compounds – called rapalogs – might be more potent. Now the first evidence has emerged of one such drug having an apparent anti-ageing effect in humans. A drug called everolimus, used to treat certain cancers, partially reversed the immune deterioration that normally occurs with age in a pilot trial in people over 65 years old.

Immune system ageing is a major cause of disease and death. It is why older people are more susceptible to infections, and why they normally have a weaker response to vaccines.

That weak response, however, has proved useful for studying ageing, as it provides an easy read-out of immune system health. "In humans you can't do decades-long clinical trials," says Novartis researcher Joan Mannick. Instead, the company looked at a proxy that would quickly show results.

They gave 218 people a six-week course of everolimus, followed by a regular flu vaccine after a two-week gap. Compared with those given a placebo, everolimus improved participants' immune response – as measured by the levels of antibodies in their blood – by more than 20 per cent, to two out of the three vaccine strains tested.

Of the three everolimus doses tested, the highest caused fatigue and mouth ulcers, while two lower doses had no apparent ill effects. Previous experiments in mice with rapamycin suggest this class of drug acts by inhibiting a protein called mTOR. mTOR also seems to be affected by calorie restriction – the strategy of trying to live longer by eating less.

mTOR is involved in sensing the level of nutrients available within cells, so one idea is that when times are scarce, cells shift into energy-conserving mode, which has knock-on anti-ageing effects, including on the immune system.

Mannick stresses that the study needs repeating, and the big question, of whether the drug keeps the participants healthier, can only be settled by long-term follow-up. There's also the issue of side effects beyond those seen in the trial. High doses of rapamycin used in organ transplants seem to nudge the recipient's metabolism into a prediabetic state – a harm that might outweigh its anti-ageing effect.

For now, it is an encouraging sign that rapalogs have similar effects in people as in mice, at least on the immune system, says Alex Zhavoronkov, CEO of biotech firm InSilico Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland.

Everyday remedies

And rapalogs are not the only game in town. The most commonly used medicine for type 2 diabetes, metformin, also seems to extend the lifespan of many small animals, including mice, by around 5 per cent.

There have been no trials of metformin as a longevity drug in people, but a recent study hinted that it might have a similar effect. The study was designed to compare metformin with another diabetes medicine, using records of 180,000 UK patients. To tease out the differences between the drugs, people who started taking them were compared with people without diabetes who had been closely matched for age and other health factors, and tracked over five years.

Embryonic stem cells to tackle major killer diseases

 

Stem cells are getting serious. Two decades after they were discovered, human embryonic stem cells (hESCs) are being tested as a treatment for two major diseases: heart failure and type 1 diabetes.

Treatments based on hESCs have been slow coming because of controversy over their source and fears that they could turn into tumours once implanted. They have enormous potential because hESCs can be grown into any of the body's 200 tissue types, unlike the stems cells isolated from adult tissues that have mostly been used in treatments until now.

In the most rigorous test of embryonic stems cells' potential yet, six people with heart failure will be treated in France with a patch of immature heart cells made from hESCs, and 40 people with diabetes in the US will receive pouches containing immature pancreatic cells made from hESCs.

The hope is that the heart patch will help to regenerate heart muscle destroyed by heart attacks. Trials in monkeys showed that the patch could regenerate up to 20 per cent of the lost muscle within two months.

The pancreatic cells are supposed to mature into beta cells, which produce the hormone insulin. These would act as a substitute for the cells that are destroyed by the immune systems of people with type 1 diabetes.

Although treatments based on hESCs have already been given to people with a type of age-related blindness and with spinal paralysis, the latest trials are the therapy's first foray into major fatal diseases. Heart disease is the biggest killer in the world, and cases of type 1 diabetes are growing.

Into the mainstream

"Both are landmark studies, and are different from what we've had up to now," says Chris Mason, head of regenerative medicine at University College London. "The blindness already being treated is serious, but diabetes and heart failure are killers, and things we don't have solutions for, so this brings hESCs into the mainstream."

Some people with heart disease and diabetes have received experimental treatments based on stem cells isolated from adult tissue, often from bone marrow, with varying degrees of success. These mesenchymal stem cells, or MSCs, can mature into several tissues including muscle, bone, cartilage and fat but there is no guarantee that they will grow into cardiac muscle.

A recent review of 23 trials involving 1255 people with heart disease found that there is some evidence that recipients of stem cell therapy are less likely to die or be readmitted to hospital a year or more after treatment than people who received standard treatment.

The hope is that using hESCs in place of MSCs will improve these outcomes further because they can be grown from scratch into cells exactly suited to their medical purpose. "We think our cells are more committed to the heart lineage," says Philippe Menasché, head of the French trial at the Georges Pompidou European Hospital in Paris.

The primary aim of both Menasché's trial and the pancreas trial – carried out by the San Diego based biotech firm Viacyte – is to check that the treatments are safe, although both teams will also be watching to see if the health of the trial participants improves.

Life-extending drugs take humanity into new territory

 

The reasons to be cautious about taking longevity drugs probably won’t hold us back. They will just be too tempting to turn down

BENJAMIN FRANKLIN once wrote that "in this world nothing can be said to be certain, except death and taxes". That has not deterred a good many people – usually wealthy, ageing men – from trying to dodge one, or the other, or both.

Tax avoidance is one thing, but as yet nobody has achieved immortality, or even modest life extension beyond the apparent upper limit of about 120 years. The well of human optimism runs deep, though, and on a fairly regular basis somebody with deep pockets unveils ambitious plans to tackle or end ageing. The latest is Google, which a year ago announced plans to get into the longevity business with a biotech start-up called Calico.

It is easy to be cynical about such ventures. Around a decade ago there was a similar flurry of interest from Silicon Valley as the backers of the Ansari X Prize – fresh from awarding $10 million to aviation pioneer Burt Rutan for putting a private vehicle into space – announced plans for an institute to solve the "problem" of death. The science of ageing was sufficiently advanced, it claimed, for us to be able to intervene to slow or even stop it.

Like so many quests for immortality, this one proved quixotic. But one of its main goals – to extend human lifespan by reducing the rate of ageing – appears to have unexpectedly been achieved (see "Everyday drugs could give extra years of life"). A number of drugs that were developed for other purposes seem to have the happy side effect of increasing lifespan in animals. Some researchers who work on them are now so convinced of their potential to add about 10 years to a human life that they have started self-medicating.

The appropriate warnings need to be wheeled out: the history of life-extension research is virtually defined by cycles of hype and disappointment. The evidence is little more than suggestive and the side effects unknown. But if the drugs work as the researchers believe – by slowing the ageing process itself – humanity is about to enter new territory.

There will be many scientific and regulatory hoops to jump through – the inevitable rise of a black market notwithstanding. There are also important political and ethical issues to chew over.

A critical one concerns overpopulation: if everybody alive today added a decade to their life expectancy, the world's already bloated population would inevitably rise even further. Quality of life is another concern: life extension could lead to a nightmarish "nursing home world" full of decrepit people who need to be supported by an ever-dwindling supply of youngsters. Yet another is inequality: drugs cost money, so could exacerbate the divide between haves and have-nots.

These are important questions. But it is hard to see them standing in the way. The temptation of extending our lives is too great.

It need not lead to a dystopian future. There has long been a strand of thought within gerontology that rejects radical life extension or immortality in favour of more modest goals. If we could slow ageing by about seven years, the argument goes, people would live longer, healthier lives, and then decline and die quickly with minimal decrepitude. The effects on population would be negligible, and the drugs are as cheap as aspirin and statins.

Some bioethicists will retort, do we really want this? Should we not just accept the lifespans that nature (or god) gave us? To which most people will surely respond, yes, and no.

This article appeared in print under the headline "A life extended"

Mind expanding: 7 ways to fine-tune your brain

 

(Image: Nigel Sussman)
The human mind is the most complex information processing system we know. It has all sorts of useful design features but also many glitches and weaknesses. The problem is, it doesn't come with a user's manual. You just have to plug and play.
But if anyone knows how to get the best out of our brains, it's neuroscientists. So we asked some of the best to explain how the human brain performs many of its most useful functions and how to use them to the max.

1: ATTENTION

How to hack your attention span

Boost your ability to stay focused and you can improve at almost anything. Here are the latest tips for bringing your brain's two attention systems to heel
Read more

2: WORKING MEMORY

Get your memory working

Working memory is your brain's scratch pad and contributes to anything that needs effortful, focused thought. Here's how to keep your mental pencils sharp
Read more

3: LOGICAL AND RATIONAL THOUGHT

Become a logical and rational being

Logic doesn't come easily to humans, but it is possible to go beyond your gut reactions - if you practice
Read more

4: LEARNING

Think like a child to learn faster

Learning a new skill can rewire your brain within hours. But to keep those circuits strong, you may need to think back to a time when you knew nothing
Read more

5: KNOWLEDGE

Harness the power of knowledge

Knowledge goes beyond memory, forming a a rich and detailed understanding of your world. But you can know too much
Read more

6: CREATIVITY

Creativity on demand

Great ideas sometimes come out of the blue, but we don't always have time to wait around. Here are the latest tips to get your creativity flowing
Read more

7: INTELLIGENCE

Can you increase your IQ?

Like it or not, most of our intelligence is genetic - but there's one part of our brain power that we can count on improving with age
Read more

THE RIGHT TIME?

Set your watch for genius

From razor-sharp focus to creative thinking, your brain is at its best at different hours of the day. Here's how to plan your schedule for greatness
Read more

Why Coconuts Could Be The Hydrogen Storage Material Of The Future

 

Coconut flesh contains secret ingredients that dramatically enhance its ability to store hydrogen, say material scientists.

Hydrogen is a potential renewable fuel because it can easily be generated from water using electrolysis. It also burns cleanly to produce water vapour. The hope is that it could also be distributed using the same global network of liquid fuel transport that moves petrol around the planet.

But there numerous problems with this dream of a hydrogen-based economy. One of them is that hydrogen is difficult to store efficiently. Hydrogen gas has a poor energy density by volume compared to petrol. In fact, there is at least 60 percent more hydrogen in a litre of gasoline then there is in a litre of pure liquid hydrogen. In other words, hydrogen will always require bigger tanks.

So finding ways to store more of it is a huge challenge. One option is to store it as a liquid but hydrogen boils temperatures above -250 degrees centigrade and so requires bulky insulation to keep it in this state.

Another idea is to compress it. But this raises issues of safety should a hydrogen-fuelled car be involved in a collision.

That is why much of the material science research in this area has focused on chemical storage: finding materials that adsorb hydrogen efficiently and then release it again when it is required.

Now Viney Dixit and buddies at the Hydrogen Energy Center of Banaras Hindu University in India say they have discovered that carbonised coconut flesh is particularly good at this task. Today, they show that it outperforms a number of other hydrogen storage materials, particularly in its ability to work over many charging cycles.

To help evaluate hydrogen storage materials, the US Department of Energy has set a number of targets that these materials must meet to be considered viable technologies for future transport systems. For example, the current criteria is that a hydrogen storage system must store at least 5.5 per cent of hydrogen by mass (5.5 wt %).

This is the mass of the entire storage system and not just the mass of the storage material. So clearly the mass fraction of the storage material must be considerably higher.

Material scientists originally focused their efforts on metal hydrides, some of which can store hydrogen at higher fractions than the DoE criteria. However, these materials have a number of disadvantages. First, they need to be heated to release the hydrogen and this takes energy. Worse, the materials tend to physically break down as the number of charging cycles increase beyond 100 or so.

So in recent years, researchers have turned their attention to carbon. The bond between hydrogen and carbon is known to be quick and reversible. What’s more, it is relatively straightforward to create strong, porous carbon with a high surface area.

One way of doing this is to carbonise biological material, such as fruit or coconut shell. This means heating the material to few hundred degrees centigrade in a nitrogen atmosphere which ensures that the carbon retains its porous biological structure.

Instead of coconut shell, Dixit and co carbonised coconut flesh. They say this has the advantage of containing a wide variety of additional elements, such as potassium, sodium, calcium and magnesium, which are evenly distributed throughout the carbon matrix. And they say this turns out to be significant in their experiments.

These guys have measured the amount of hydrogen that carbonised coconut flesh can hold and say it compares well with more conventional materials. “The synthesized material adsorbs 2.30 wt % at room temperature and 8.00 wt %  at liquid nitrogen temperature under 70 atm pressure,” say Dixit and co.

What’s more, the material releases hydrogen quickly and efficiently and does not appear to degrade over many charging cycles.

Whether that is good enough to meet the DoE’s 5.5 wt % criterion for an entire storage system has yet to be seen.

The team spent some time studying the microstructure of the carbonised coconut flesh to work out why it perform so well. And they have pinpointed two mechanisms.

The first is that the carbonised coconut flesh contains a significant amount of potassium chloride, which polarises the carbon matrix in which it is embedded.  “This will enhance the hydrogen adsorption capacity,” they say.

The second is that the carbon matrix also contains significant amounts of magnesium, which is known to enhance the dissociation of hydrogen molecules, making them easier to adsorb.

That is an interesting result that suggests some promising avenues for future research. The presence of molecules that catalyse the adsorption of hydrogen looks to be an important mechanism. It may even be possible to adjust these proportions by growing coconuts in different environments. Another possibility might be to artificially synthesise carbon that matches some of the characteristics of carbonised coconut flesh.

Either way, material scientists might profitably hang their hammocks between some coconut trees in future.

Ref: arxiv.org/abs/1409.7219  : Hydrogen Storage In Carbon Derived From Solid Endosperm Of Coconut

Obama’s Brain Project Backs Neurotechnology

 

The U.S. announces $46 million to develop new technologies for exploring the brain.

 

Why It Matters

The three-pound mass between our ears is the next great frontier for science.

The retinal nerve cells shown in this close-up transmit information to the brain.

The White House said that President Obama’s BRAIN Initiative is generating interest from companies and philanthropies in a sign of what it calls a wider partnership developing around the U.S. administration’s most prominent science initiative, first unveiled in 2013.

The White House had committed to spending $100 million this year on the project, which seeks to develop new technologies for studying the brain. As part of that, today the U.S. National Institutes of Health announced $46 million in awards to 58 research groups.

The diverse technologies the NIH is backing include development of a wearable PET scanner, which could monitor patients’ brains during everyday activities, lasers able to control how neurons fire, and diamond-coated electrodes that can detect the neurotransmitter dopamine in living brains.

During a press briefing, NIH director Francis Collins said the research grants  would speed the “development of exciting new tools and technologies to understand how [brain] circuits work.” He said the BRAIN Initiative could spend $4.5 billion on such neurotechnologies over the next decade or so.

The effort, whose full name is Brain Research through Advancing Innovative Neurotechnologies, reflects a government strategy to invest widely in better techniques to measure the brain. That’s necessary not only because the brain’s functioning remains enigmatic, but because it is difficult to study neurons in living animals, limiting scientific progress.

Collins compared the NIH’s approach to that taken during the Human Genome Project, which he also oversaw starting in 1999. That effort was vastly accelerated thanks to better technology for sequencing DNA. “There was a lot of uncertainty, but it worked out,” said Collins. “No one can quite predict the twists and turns.”

But the brain is so much more complex than DNA that several scientists said the role for technology is not as clear cut this time. “With the Genome Project, we knew what the technology needed to be. Here, we are not even sure what technologies are most useful because the questions still need to be defined,” says Gerald Fischbach, scientific director of the Simons Foundation, a private charity in New York that is investing millions in brain science. Fischbach was not part of the NIH announcement.

Around the world, other large neuroscience efforts have also had to pick where to place their bets. In Europe, a heavily-funded Human Brain Project is seeking to create large-scale computer simulations of the human brain, although that strategy that has been criticized as premature (see “Neuroscientists Object to Europe’s Human Brain Project”).

One reason the U.S. project doesn’t satisfy all neuroscientists is that it strongly embraces the idea that there are “circuits” in the brain, or that one neuron would excite another, and so on, leading to behaviors. While that certainly happens, some say the circuit analogy is an antiquated anatomical notion insufficient to explain how the 86 billion neurons in the brain actually operate.

“But generating data is a good first step,” says Konrad Kording, a neuroscientist at Northwestern University.

The grants announced by the NIH support development of some proven technologies, such as optogenetics, a technique to turn neurons on and off in lab animals using light pulses. Elsewhere, the agency took bigger risks, like the $539,000 it awarded to develop a wearable PET scanner whose “ultimate goal is to be able to image subjects during a proverbial ‘walk in the park’ and other natural activities,” according to West Virginia University’s Julie-Anne Brefczynski-Lewis, who is one of about 100 scientists who will share in the NIH awards.

Separately, the White House held an event to highlight its efforts and what it calls $300 million in ongoing private R&D investments in brain science. Groups attending today’s White House event included the Simons Foundation, which this year independently announced plans to spend $62 million to understand how brains generate thought. Fischbach says that by convening different groups, the White House hoped to demonstrate that “we can benefit from, or help the Obama initiative.”

“I don’t know what is cause and what is effect, but it’s a definitely hot area,” he says. “There has been an upswing in this type of neuroscience, which is really quite remarkable.”

Infectious diseases -- Changing Planet

Infectious diseases

With the threat of a warmer, wetter world and a larger global population,
scientists are researching how climate change may impact the spread
of infectious diseases, such as cholera and dengue fever, and how
outbreaks may be prevented.
Credit: NBC Learn and the National Science Foundation

 

Surfing the Web in class? Bad idea

 

Even the smartest college students suffer academically when they use the Internet in class for non-academic purposes.

The study, funded by the National Science Foundation, speaks to typical lecture-hall culture in which professors compete for students' attention with laptops and smartphones.

"Students of all intellectual abilities should be responsible for not letting themselves be distracted by use of the Internet," said Susan Ravizza, associate professor of psychology and lead investigator on the study.

Ravizza and colleagues studied non-academic Internet use in an introductory psychology class at MSU with 500 students. The working theory: Heavy Internet users with lower intellectual abilities -- determined by ACT scores -- would perform worse on exams. Past research suggests smarter people are better at multitasking and filtering out distractions.

But surprisingly, that wasn't the case. All students, regardless of intellectual ability, had lower exam scores the more they used the Internet for non-academic purposes such as reading the news, sending emails and posting Facebook updates.

Ravizza said that might be because Internet use is a different type of multitasking, in that it can be so engaging.

The study also showed students discounted the effects of Internet use on academic performance, reinforcing past findings that students have poor awareness of how their smartphones and laptops affect learning.

Ravizza said it would be nearly impossible to attempt to ban smartphones or other electronic devices from lecture halls. "What would you do, have hundreds of people put their cell phones in a pile and pick them up after class?" Such a ban might also be a safety issue, since cell phones have become a primary source of receiving emergency messages.

The buzz about entomophagy: Is eating insects more than a novelty?

 

'The major question is, why would we not eat insects?' (Photo: Shutterstock)

Jiminy Cricket may be able to do more than guide our consciences: he, or his kin, may also provide food security solutions for a growing and hungry world. However, the notion of insects-as-food struggles to find widespread traction amid problems with standardization of food safety standards, government disinterest and only a small body of research. So is there a future for cricket sushi or fried silk worms?

Insects as food has become something of a stalwart "weird" news story in the press, giving hacks plenty to buzz about (sorry). However there are many reasons to push the benefits: low environmental costs, high nutritive value, low farming costs, high value as a cash crop for poor families and a possible solution to what may be a looming food security crisis as the population grows and land for farms shrinks. These claims are all true – in fact some kinds of insects contain as much as 65 percent protein for every hundred grams, far above beef or chicken – but there are still some pretty serious roadblocks for any kind of mass cultivation.

Some two billion people eat insects as part of their diets worldwide but this occurs largely in the developing world; insects as food fell out of favor completely in Europe by the mid- to late-Nineteenth Century as the march of civilization made such diets seem “primitive”. Geographers Peter Illgner and Etienne Nel argued in a 2000 paper on consumption and harvesting of the mopane worm in sub-Saharan Africa that the global food system had to a certain extent marginalized traditional or alternate forms of food in favor of a more westernized style of dining, and that entomophagy was now seen in some quarters as primitive even as the moth grubs became a more important source of cash for some families.

Certain insects, notably bees and silk worms, have been cultivated across the planet by humans for centuries, but wider scale farming of insects for food lags. There are 20,000 cricket farms in Thailand, though little legislative support or government oversight, according to the United Nations Food and Agriculture Organisation (FAO).

The FAO has been studying entomophagy for over ten years now but even it admits, "the science of edible insects is still at a relatively pioneering stage, it boasts only a few scientists of renown." Until his death last year Dr Gene DeFoliart was one of the best-known and most-referenced. He ran the Food Insects Newsletter (which is still online and being updated) and the FAO’s 2013 report dedicates itself to him.

The FAO has bemoaned the lack of standardization or legislation that can deal with broader scale industrial farming. Many nations’ food safety laws can be applied to insects, or certain kinds of insect, but there is little being done to improve the situation, though the European Council has expressed political will. One of the few government initiatives was a partnership between the FAO and the Laos government a few years ago to set a series of standards on the commercial farming of insects. The Laos Technical Cooperation Project sought to impose Codex Alimentarius type food safety standards, but the project has since gone quiet. In fact, it is industry that seems to be taking up the slack and the insects-as-feed (not human food) is expanding rapidly; certain kinds of insects can be turned into fish, poultry or pig feed and are environmentally friendly, not requiring the same amount of land for grain or fishing from the seas to feed fish stocks. There are also many smaller gourmet companies providing insects, or insect products (such as cricket flour) and reports suggest interest in the West, where it remains a novelty, niche market, is growing.

Food safety when it comes to edible insects is a key issue: improper treatment or collection of insects that may have been sprayed with pesticides can cause health issues. Some other health risks identified by the FAO include heavy metals, mycotoxins, pesticide residues, pathogens, natural toxins, allergens, processing contaminates and veterinary residues.

In Vietnam some months ago media noted some deaths and comas associated with eating cicada nymphs carrying an apparently toxic fungi. The health department issued a warning against eating insects. Dan Dockery, a longtime British expat and one of the founders of Highway 4 restaurant chain in Vietnam told Gizmag that his restaurant did often serve insects.

”Consumption of insects is [even now] a rare thing in major urban centers in Vietnam and is a much more widespread phenomenon in the countryside," said Dockery. "Why? Because there insects are readily available, to all intents and purposes they are 'free', and they taste damn good as a drinking snack. However careful cleaning and processing is essential in order to guarantee a 'safe' product.”

Start ups have done well. In the case of Exo bars, the two Ivy League graduate founders received over $1 million in funding money from some major venture capital firms as well as running a crowdfunding campaign. Others, such as Ento, offer varied snacks and are, according to a draft FAO paper, leading the way in terms of standardizing treatments and farming for some insects. Other companies produce small farms for use in the home; live bugs are fed kitchen scraps and are later turned into food that can be thrown into a stirfry, rather like a pot of herbs on a windowsill.

Earlier this year the FAO gathered 450 experts from 45 nations and varied disciplines to discuss the potential of insects-as-food. All seemed excited by the progress made. For a quick, jump-cut precis of that conference and the many benefits of entomophagy and insects as feed this video is worth a watch. There are also fascinating nuggets of information such as the fact that given the tremendous variety of edible insects worldwide (between 1,500 to 1,900 different species according to varied reports) not only does treatment to make them safe for eating differ, but also, as Gizmag can attest, their taste – from ants with a fruity punch to of tea-flavored sun-dried emperor moth caterpillars.

Ultimately, food security may be one of the more pressing questions for the planet’s population but a move, either by governments, entrepreneurs, or both, towards finding a way to solve the problem will be needed and taking advantage of food that is environmentally safe and also high in protein and calories seems an intelligent move.

As Marcel Dicke, professor of entomology at the Wageningen University in the Netherlands, puts it: "The major question is, why would we not eat insects?" 

The answer for professor Dicke is this one : Consider that the people allover the world have been eating only insects for milleniums And, suddenly, they are disappearing. Well, we have a solution, let’s start eating beef, chicken, pork ….Ughhhhh, Oh, no, that’s impossible…..(Note from the blogger)

Acontece de vez em quando

Hoje prestando mais atenção, é inacreditável como ela sincroniza tudo ao falar: Meiguice, expressão corpórea angelical que se destaca plenamente quando está fazendo o papel de apresentadora do tempo, e tomara que não apareça outra, porque éla é ainda mais sublime nessa tarefa.  Expressão vocal e facial de acordo com cada detalhe da notícia, uma tonalidade de voz de extrema candura,.  Meus amigos da Bandeirantes, vocês tem um filão de diamantes na figura extasiante, fulgurante, plenamente dominante no cenário de apresentadores noticiariaristas, da minha amada virtual, a insuperável (espero que por muito tempo) ,TICIANE. 

Uma outra letra de música, desta vez em português, que eu gostaria muito que tivesse acontecido entre eu e esta pantera maravilhosa. Eu teria que voltar 40/50 anos no tempo, mas mentalmente isso é possível.

Olha, não importa a idade, mas de vez em quando, nós homens solteirões nos apaixonamos por alguma figura feminina. Antes dela, Grace Kelly,  ( e continua como uma das favoritas, embora não esteja mais entre nós, mas era muito linda, embora não tivesse todas os predicados de Ticiane.) . Marilyn Monroe, quem não se apaixonou por ela?  Mas finalmente encontrei uma brazuca para amar. Bem tem muitas outras brazucas amáveis, mas não creio que se aproximem da Ticiane tal como a vejo e admiro. E já li ou ouvi que amor platônico é amor homossexual, mas não, eu ainda pertenço à época do romantismo que está esmaecendo cada vez mais.

Ah, o marido dela? Sugiro umas férias de 10 anos no Caribe.

(Esse texto eu postei quando ainda não estava tomando Finasterida. Hoje, o bem-amado despencou….), e faz tempo que não a vejo, mas creio que ainda continua muito linda e com aquela voz maravilhosa. 

Vagamente

Só me lembro muito vagamente
Correndo você vinha quando de repente
Teu sorriso que era muito branco
Me encontrou

Só me lembro que depois andamos
Mil estrelas, só nós dois contamos
E o vento soprou de manhã
Mil canções

Só me lembro muito vagamente
Da tarde que morria quando de repente
Eu sozinho fiquei te esperando
E chorei

Só me lembro muito vagamente
O quanto a gente amou
E foi tão de repente, que nem lembro
Se foi com você que eu perdi meu amor.

You Tube :  https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=BCML9MhWf70

Your own helicopter for under US$20,000

 

Your own helicopter for under US$20,000

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September 21, 2005 Flying is not a sport generally associated with those people who are light of wallet – which makes the Mosquito Ultralight helicopter something of a rarity. The entire kit for the Mosquito can be purchased for US$20,000 and if you think the minimalist Mosquito leaves you a bit vulnerable, there’s the fully enclosed Mosquito XE and XEL which can be purchased for US$23,000.. Building the kits will cost you about 200 to 300 hours to build or you can have the plane built for you for a flat US$4000. Getting airborn for under US$20,000 in your own, new helicopter is quite a feat – we’re not aware of any other helicopter in this price category and on top of that, both Mosquito variants offer very low maintenance and operating costs.

The Mosquito’s designer John Uptigrove is a mech engineer by trade and like a lot of people always dreamed of being able to fly. “By creating an ultralight helicopter it offers that ability without all the cost and hassle of dealing with air regs,” says Uptigrove. To date, Uptigrove’s Innovator Technologies has sold 37 mosquito kits (two in Japan, two in Canada, one in Spain, one in France, one in Belgium and the remainder in the US) and a dozen have been built to airworthiness by their purchasers at the time of going to press. The open frame Mosquito first became available in 2002 and the XE model was brought on in 2004.

All of the mosquitoes sold so far have been built in kit form, though the company has just begun offering a factory build program and the first factory-finished Mosquito is being finished as you read this.

The birds are typically used for “recreational flight for the most part,” says Uptigrove.

“Some plan to use them for flying into their favorite fishing hole. As a work machine they are ideal for ranch herding, flying fence lines or flying out to your farm machinery. I think every farmer and rancher should have one,” he jokes.

The Ultralight legal Mosquito and Mosquito XEL are only permitted to carry five gallons of fuel and hence have a range of just 60 miles. The XE can carry 12 gallons of fuel and so has a range of 150 miles.

Canadian-based Uptigrove originally charged less for his offspring, but as he explains, “I sell in US dollars as that is the primary market, but I live in Canada and the Canadian dollar keeps going up which is cutting into my profit in a bad way, so I have to keep raising my price to match.” You can actually start building your Mosquito for a lot less as the kit is sold in bite size chunks and the first kit group, the frame kit, sells for only US$2,995.00.

Uptigrove believes safety is paramount in aviation and puts his money where his mouth is. Provide proof that you have had helicopter training from a certified instructor to at least the "solo" signoff, or a minimum of 10 hours dual instruction by the time of your purchase of the last group (Rotor System and Blades) and Innovator will discount the final price by US$2,000 to help pay for your training.

If you’d like more info on the Mosquito, there’s a Mosquito information video pack that sells for US$30.00

 

Airplanes Flying Incredibly Close To The Ground At Maho Beach in St. Maarten

 

By H.Q. Roosevelt / 21 August 2014

Maho Beach in St. Maarten is one of the few places in the world where airliners pass just a few feet overhead upon landing. All the images of  airplanes floating just a few meters above the ground look unbelievable but they are real.

 

 

      

 

 

 

 

Reprieve Bicycle Saddle goes for comfort with a dip and a bladder

 

3 West Design's Reprieve Bicycle Saddle

If there's one recurring complaint about conventional bicycles, it's that the saddles hurt peoples' nether regions. As a result, we've seen ergonomic seats that have no material in the middle, that are made up of independently-moving ribs, and that move around with the rider. One of the latest, the Reprieve Bicycle Saddle, combines a dipped middle with an inflatable nose.

Designed by Texas-based 3 West Design, the Reprieve features a fairly normal rear end that supports the rider's "sit bones" much like any other saddle. Its mid-section, however, drops down by three-quarters of an inch (19 mm). This is to relive pressure on the rider's perineum, by not requiring it to take as much of the rider's weight as it would otherwise.

Additionally, the rider's soft tissues are supported by an inflatable polyurethane bladder in the nose of the saddle. This allows the seat surface to deform in response to pressure applied by the perineum (and by ... other things), instead of simply pressing back against it.

The saddle itself features a genuine leather surface, titanium rails, and weighs about 210 grams (7.4 oz).

If you're interested, 3 West Design is currently raising production funds for the Reprieve on Kickstarter. A pledge of US$100 will get you one, when and if they're ready to go. The planned retail price is $185.

Sources: 3 West Design, Kickstarter

 

 

How to Lose More Weight with Home Workouts

 

Schedule workouts to get the best results.  Barry Yee/Photographer's Choice/Getty Images

Updated September 30, 2014.

Do you work out at home? If you don't, you should give it a try. Gym memberships are expensive and health clubs are often overcrowded and intimidating.  And now that many workouts are available online, more exercisers are jumping on the home workout bandwagon.  So who wouldn't want to stay home and exercise in private?

The problem is that when you exercise at home, you don't get any feedback.  It's hard to know if your workout is really effective. At the gym, you have an instructor or a trainer to guide your program, but at home you're on your own.  So I went to a few trainers who work specifically with home exercisers. They gave me their best tips to burn more calories and make your home workout both safe and effective.

How to Make Your Home Workout More Effective

• Schedule your sessions.  Home exercisers often believe that extra time to exercise will just magically appear on their schedule.  But when you are home, there are always other priorities that pull your attention away from working out.  So if you work out at home,  schedule your exercise sessions (and healthy meals!) just like you would schedule a class at the gym.  Then put your workout calendar in a place where you see it everyday.
• Use high quality equipment.  If you buy home exercise equipment, invest in the best machine that you can afford.  According to the folks at Precor, "the best way to keep a treadmill or elliptical from becoming a coat rack is to not shortchange yourself on both feel and features."  Do your homework and learn how to buy the best treadmill or elliptical so that you can use it effectively to lose weight.
• Do a wide variety of workouts.  If you are trying to change your body, you should mix up your workouts to get faster results. That means you can't do the same old DVD day after day.  Visit a website like DailyBurn or Vidergize to get a wider variety of workouts.  This will help you to use different muscles and burn more calories.  Need a simpler option? Try one of these home strength workouts or this short 30-minute celebrity-inspired total body workout developed by JR Allen.
• Get personalized attention.  Just because you aren't at the gym, doesn't mean you can't get personalized attention. Websites like Wello allow you to work out with a trainer one-on-one with the use of a computer camera and microphone.  If you like to spin, consider investing in a Peloton bike. These specially designed cycles allow you to take part in virtual spin classes where the studio instructor monitors your ride at home and provides personalized feedback.

Home Workout Tips from the Pros

So how do the pros keep home exercisers on track?  I talked to a few trainers to find out what they recommend to their clients who exercise at home.

Celebrity trainer JR Allen works with superstar clients like Mary J. Blige. But he also trains regular folks like you and me.  He stresses the importance of safety and common sense. "If you work out at home you should be aware of the space you have available. Make sure the area is clear so that you can move safely."  He also says that you should include enough time for a 5-10 minute dynamic warm-up before every session.

And of course, home exercisers need to work hard enough to lose weight.  This can be a challenge without the dynamic energy of a gym environment.  But Peloton cycling coach Marion Berrian Roaman keeps her home riders accountable by using social media.  When she streams her live classes into people's homes she encourages them to work harder if she sees that their intensity is lacking.  To reward them when they do, "we follow up with posts, tweets and emails...all fantastic ways to keep our riders on track to achieve their goals," she says.

What habits should home exercisers avoid? JR says that you should be careful not to do too much too soon. "Don't lift weights that are too heavy," he says, "and never overexert yourself.  Always stop if you feel sick in any way."

Nanotechnology in Finland: Market Report

 

Introduction

Finland is located between Sweden and Russia in Northern Europe. It covers an area of 338,145 km² and had a population of 5,262,930 as of July 2012.

Finland has the 4th largest knowledge economy in Europe behind Sweden, Denmark and the UK.

Finland has a diversified modern industrial free-market economy with fields such as electronics (e.g. Nokia), metrology (e.g. Vaisala), transport fuels (Neste Oil), engineering consulting (Pöyry), chemicals (Kemira), and information technology (e.g. Rovio). Services is the largest economic centre contributing to the GDP, followed by manufacturing and refining.

The GDP of Finland was $194.3 billion in 2011.

 

Nanotechnology Organisations

Finland has many world-leading organisations and networks committed to promoting nanoscience as well as exploring the challenges and future of nanotechnology. A brief introduction to the key nanotechnology-related organisations in Finland is given below:

Spinverse- Spinverse commercialises emerging technologies and creates new business by combining industrial, financial and scientific expertise with worldwide networks. Their customers and partners include innovative growth companies, global industrial leaders, the world’s leading universities, venture capital firms and public funding organizations. Their services include business development, technology and market studies, fundraising and large programme management. Their technology experience covers new innovations in energy, electronics, environment, materials and nanotechnology.

Tekes - The Tekes’ initiative is implementing nanotechnology partnerships between China and Finland. The principles of strategic co-operation have been agreed between Ministry of Science and Technology of China (MOST) and Ministry of Employment and the Economy of Finland. The main guideline is supporting new nanotechnology innovations, their utilization and commercialization to enhance industrial competitiveness in both countries.

Finnish Nanotechnology Cluster Programme- Nanotechnology Cluster Programme initiated by the Ministry of Employment and Economy promotes nanotechnology based business in Finland. The mission of the Nanotechnology Cluster Programme is to foster the growth of Nanotechnology based business, supporting implementation of nano and micro technologies and future materials in Finnish companies.

HelsinkiNano -The initial idea for the HelsinkiNano initiative arose from the recognition of the fact that the region has considerable expertise in nanoscience, but nobody to gather together the research groups that are spread out in different universities. HelsinkiNano was thus started to act as a catalyst to create contacts within the science world and also between companies and universities.

NanoCenter Finland - gathers together the nanoscience centres and research departments in Finland to maintain and develop national co-operation as well as internationally competent nanoscience and nanotechnology infrastructure in Finland.

Academy of Finland - The Academy of Finland’s mission is to finance high-quality scientific research, act as a science and science policy expert, and strengthen the position of science and research.

 

Nanotechnology Companies

The major nanotechnology companies in Finland that cater to the diverse nature of nanotechnology sectors are listed below along with a brief introduction to each of them:

• Attension- Attension is one of the product organizations within the Biolin Scientific group, a global provider of high-tech analytical instruments for nanoscale study of interfaces. Their product range consists of optical, force and bubble tensiometers for education, research and development. They also provide solutions for high-throughput development, quality control and process control in such industries as chemicals, pharmaceuticals, electronics, food, energy, paper and packing.
• Optitune - Optitune is a cleantech company of Finnish origin with R&D and manufacturing capabilities in Singapore and Finland. Optitune nano-science is a revolutionary coating technology offering cost effective and environmentally friendly light management solutions for the solar, touchscreen, electronics and construction industries.
• Canatu Ltd. - Canatu Ltd. is a leading developer of a new class of versatile carbon nanomaterial based components with industry transforming qualities. Based on their three key innovations - their novel NanoBud® nanomaterial having outstanding physical and chemical properties, their environmentally friendly and low cost Direct Dry Printing® process, and their superior proprietary methods for cost effective production of high-quality carbon NanoBuds® - Canatu is actively transforming cutting edge research into cutting edge business.
• DCA Instruments- DCA Instruments is a company specializing in the design and manufacture of Molecular Beam Epitaxy (MBE) and UHV thin film deposition systems and components. DCA is a Finnish company located in Turku, in the southwest corner of Finland. Since the company was founded in 1989, DCA has installed more than 100 UHV systems around the world. Finnish high tech is at its best at DCA. A large part of their business has always been building complex, custom design deposition systems. They utilize their custom design background in the manufacturing of standard systems. Their design flexibility is valued by their customers. Many of their standard systems have started as a solution to a customer's particular deposition process.
• Dekati - Dekati develops, manufactures and markets instrumentation needed in fine particle measurement and sampling. In 1995, Dekati introduced the world’s first real-time fine particle concentration and size distribution measurement instrument. Since then, their R&D department has continually increased the range of products which now consists of nearly 15 products for various different particle measurement needs.
• Hydrocell - Hydrocell is a leading developer and manufacturer of high-quality energy and fuel-cell technology and a range of air cleaners that employ related technology. They have been a leader in the sector in northern Europe since 1993. They manufacture CO₂ filters for industrial and laboratory use, and filters and filter solutions for handling tobacco smoke. Their product range includes efficient brush-type heat exchangers, and easy-to-install heat-storage, heating and cooling solutions. Our company values are high-quality products, satisfied clients and excellent service.
• Picosun - Picosun is an international equipment manufacturer with a world-wide sales and service organization. They develop and manufacture Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) reactors for micro- and nanotechnology applications. Picosun provides their customers with versatile, reliable, and user-friendly ALD process tools, which offer unique scalability from research to production. Picosun is based in Espoo, Finland and has its US headquarters in Detroit. PICOSUN™ ALD process tools have been installed in various universities, research institutes, and companies across Europe, USA, Asia and Australia. 
• Beneq Oy - Beneq Oy,Vantaa, Finland, is a supplier of industrial equipment for global markets. Beneq is addressing the market of industrial equipment for producing functional surfaces with latest technology, typically utilizing nanosize materials. Beneq acts as a business facilitator adding value for high-tech partner companies by converting proven innovations into industrial equipment. 
• Nanoway - Nanoway commercializes the top innovations created in the research of low-temperature physics in Finnish universities. In particular, they own the patents which cover the CBT-thermometer and SINIS-cooler. They have made an agreement with Aivon on marketing and delivery of CBT thermometers.
• Fluilogic - Fluilogic develops, produces and markets micro and nanoliter dispensing modules for applications used in precise liquid handling on global markets. The patented Electro-Magnetic Bellows technology (EMB-technology), invented in 2000, has enabled them to reach a new era in cost-effective and precise liquid handling.
• Genano Ltd - Genano Ltd is a Finnish high tech company specialized in air purifiers. Their solution is GENANO TOTAL AIR CARE™.
• KSV NIMA - With 30 years of expertise and 97% of the world’s top one hundred natural Life Science Universities using their instruments, they are the leading provider of instruments for thin film fabrication and characterization in research and development globally. Their instruments are being utilized in nanotechnology research, surface chemistry, surface physics, biophysics, colloidal research, biochemistry and materials development.
• Millidyne - Millidyne is an innovative materials technology company providing advanced coating materials and surface treatment technologies for customers in the metal, electronics, construction and process industries. They develop and manufacture specialty coating raw materials combining nanotechnology and surface engineering.
• Nanocomp - Nanocomp is a privately-held company established in 1997 to implement strong expertise in basic and applied optics research into advanced technology products. Focusing on design, manufacture and replication of optical components, Nanocomp carries out continuous research and development to provide versatile services for various branches of industry.
• Puraliq - Puraliq is a company that specialises in manufacturing ultra pure metal based chemicals for nanoparticle production. They offer customer solutions, flexible and responsive production and fast delivery.  Puraliq is incorporated in Finland. Their headquarters and their research, development and manufacturing operations are located in Lohja.  They use state of the art reaction equipment to maintain the highest possible purity during processing phases. They also offer purification services especially for laboratory scale applications.
• Carbodeon - is a privately owned Nordic company with corporate headquarters in Helsinki, Finland. Carbodeon NanoMaterial manufacturing is located in Vantaa, Finland, together with an R&D and an applications laboratory which serves in house and customer projects. uDiamond® and Nicanite® are Carbodeon registered trade marks. Carbodeon's technology including its material specifications, production and applications are covered by patents.
• Picodeon - Picodeon is a privately owned Finnish nanotechnology company specialized on thin film coatings and surface treatments with its patented Coldab® Ultra-Short Pulsed Laser Deposition (USPLD) process. We are located in Ii, northern Finland and providing equipment, solutions and services for our clients worldwide.

Nanotechnology Education and Research

Finland is home to a number of world-leading universities that offer research and educational opportunities in nanotechnology. Given below is a list of universities and academic institutions in Finland and the academic courses or research opportunities offered by them in various aspects of nanotechnology.

• Micronova - Micronova is Finland's National Research Infrastructure for micro- and nanotechnology. It is jointly run by VTT Technical Research Centre of Finland and Aalto University. Their mission is to develop innovative, enabling technologies, and to apply these in practical micro- and nanosystems.
• Aalto University - offersM.Sc. degrees in Micro- and Nanotechnology. The University promotes Computational Nanoscience (COMP). The basic strategy of COMP is to develop and apply cutting-edge theoretical and computational methods and the best available computing resources in attacking challenging problems in condensed-matter and materials physics.Aalto University also hosts the Nanomicroscopy Center.    
• VTT Technical Research Centre - VTT Finland is the largest multitechnological applied research organisation in Northern Europe. VTT provides high-end technology solutions and innovation services. One of the areas of interest is nanotechnology and VTT explores and develops nanomaterial applications using biomolecules.
• University of Helsinki - The Laboratory of Inorganic Chemistry at the university is involved in the research of Thin Films and Other Nanostructured Materials. One of the Department of Physics' key focus areas is Materials Physics where The research projects in nanoscience are multidisciplinary.
• University of Jyväskylä - offersM.Sc. Nanoscience and a National Doctoral Programme in Nanoscience. The university promotes the Nanoscience Center (NSC), which is a cross-disciplinary research center shared by the departments of physics, chemistry, and biological and environmental science.
• Vantaa Innovation Institute - helps to accelerate the growth of Vantaa and the Aviapolis area into an international business environment. Vantaa is an international innovation hub located next to the capital city of Helsinki. The Institute promotes the Nano Lab Finland- which is a showroom for new nanotechnology solutions and products in Vantaa.

Recent Developments

Reports revealed in March 2012 that nanotechnology-based businesses are growing rapidly in Finland and have been doing so since 2008. According to recent statistics, there are about 210 nanobusiness companies in Finland, whereas in 2008 there were only 65. The figures were published in an international coating seminar in Mikkeli, Finland.

Reports published in October 2012 stated that the nanotechnology is a strong growth sector in both Finland and Russia. The partnership between the two countries has worked really well and has led to this technology becoming a success. The Finnish-Russian Nanotechnology Innovation Alliance has helped accelerate commercialization of nanotechnology based innovations. Earlier in April, Rusnano announced a EUR25 million investment in Beneq.

In November 2012, Picosun Oy, a leading Atomic Layer Deposition (ALD) equipment manufacturer, joined the China-Finland Nano Innovation Center, which was opened on 2 November in the city of Suzhou, Jiangsu Province in the Eastern China. The Center was initiated by Ministry of Science and Technology (MOST) of China and Ministry of Employment and the Economy (TEM) of Finland to strengthen ties between the two nations in the field of nanotechnology.

In June 2013, VTT announced that they are able to produce metallic nanoparticles that are not yet commercially available. The process reactor used to produce these nanoparticles runs at atmospheric pressure, reducing running costs. Running costs are further improved through the use of affordable raw materials and a continuous process.

A workshop also held in June heard how nano-silver used by Vietnamese and Finnish researchers was able to save dying shrimp farms and preserve fruit for relatively long periods of time. A separate workshop has heard how Nordic countries including Finland have been racing to collaborate with China to exploit science and technology opportunities with areas such as nanotechnology, new materials and clean technology being of significant interest.

Researchers from Utrecht University (the Netherlands) and Aalto University in Finland have been able to attach tiny pieces of gold to graphene nanoribbons in such a way so as to create electrically transparent connections so that they could assess the electrical properties of the graphene.

 

References

Updated: Oct 3, 2014