February Ideas and Innovation

Read the articles selected in February 2017

La Planète X, cette grande inconnue

by Vahé Ter Minassian

Source: Le Monde, 22 February

The astronomers are haunting the Planet-9, object of a mere mathematical intuition that should explain the queer orbits of the heavenly bodies around the Kuiper Belt, on the extreme ends of our solar system. Its image hasn’t been caught by telescopes yet ,but it could be already and unnoticed in some archives.

See attached

These seven alien worlds could help explain how planets form

by Alexandra Witze

Source: Nature, 22 February

The TRAPPIST-1 system of seven planets just discovered by the NASA and spinning around the called dwarf star so close and influencing each other to explain through comparison how planets evolve, makes us imagine how many others nearby stars might harbor an astonishing quantity and diversity of worlds.

Bill Ford’s vision for a world beyond cars

by Alex Davies

Source: Wired, 4 November 2015

The core strategy of historically successful car companies like Ford was vertical integration and the notion of one car for one person. The booming global population, especially in the developing world and in urban cities urges to change this vision for a world where all modes of moving are connected and integrated.

Wind and solar power are disrupting electricity systems

Source: The Economist, 25 February

Until the 1980’s privatizations, the electricity production was due to the State. Now that the renewables have become so competitive as to lower the price of fossil fuels, the electricity system is being re-regulated, whereas the shift to an era of clean power would require vast amounts of investment.

Winston Churchill’s essay on alien life found

by Mario Livio

Source: Nature, 15 February

The great Winston Churchill, who was a humanistic advocate of science, decades before the discoveries of thousands of planets, in a just found writing mused on the Copernican possibility of the existence of extrasolar planets that could be what we define today as a habitable zone.

Les excréments se transforment en or à l’INRA

by Florence Rosier

Source: Le Monde, 15 February

In Juoy-en-Josas, the INRA is analyzing thousands of biological samples to study our intestinal microbiota, sounded in dozens of million genetic sequences. At stake is the understanding and treatment of diseases based on a chronicle inflammation, including cancer, and anxious-depressing disorders.

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Geologists spy an eighth continent: Zealandia

by Alexandra Witze

Source: Nature, 16 February

Although it won’t change the world’s geo-political maps, the identification of a distinct continent in the southwest Pacific Ocean, including New Zealand and New Caledonia and mostly submerged, will change the traditional definition of geological continental landmasses.

Fat tissue can “talk” to other organs, paving way for possible treatments for diabetes, obesity

by Emma Hiolski

Source: Science, 16 February

A study has discovered a new way of cell-to-cell communication between fat tissues and other parts of the body, through tiny molecules, the so-called MiRNAs, conditioning the genic expression and almost packed in exomes that circulate and could be engineered as vehicles to deliver drugs to specific cell types.

Consulta l’articolo:

http://www.sciencemag.org/news/2017/02/fat-tissue-can-talk-other-organs-paving-way-possible-treatments-diabetes-obesity

Scientists are trading in lab mice for hundreds of mini-brains on a chip

by Megan Molteni

Source: Wired, 9 February

Researchers at Harvard’s Wyss Institute have engineered micro-organs grown from a few mouse cells reared in a Petri dish and put on chips that mimic a mini-circulation source. These organoids will be able to test on humans the toxicity of drugs, opening a new era of personalized medicine.

The AI threat isn’t Skynet. It’s the end of the middle class

by Cade Metz

Source: Wired, 10 February

The most practical concerns AI raises are about economy. New data show a sharp decline in middle-class job since the 1980s. If improved education and the enhancement of entrepreneurship can push forward a new growth, AI endangers not only blue-collar jobs. But the answer is not back in the past.

Schreiben Roboter bald Romane?

by Adrian Lobe

Source: Die Zeit, 7 February

If a computer programme today can produce articles, novels, screenplays, and even pathetic poetries, it’s not to say that literary creativity is just a copying, assembling, re-elaborating handwritten masterpieces. Poetry is not a matter of computation.

Calculating the day humans began changing the Earth forever

by Nick Stockton

Source: Wired, 9 February

A group of scientists has pinpointed in the 1950s the date when human activity prevailed on the planet life. Focusing this irreversible change brought on a global scale by the production and consumption of goods by the world’s upper and middle class can have an impact equivalent to a paradigm shift.

Brain-activity device could give a voice to “locked-in” patients

Source: The Guardian, 1 February

A team of researchers at Tübingen University has invented a device to read “yes” or “no” answers in locked-in disabled interviewed with simple questions. This technology could also be used in neurovegetative patients. The responses of the patients about their quality of life are surprising.

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Think states alone can’t handle sea level rise? Watch California

by Chelsea Lu

Source: Wired, 2 February

The governor of California has convened a team of scientists to calculate on the base of new research updated projections for sea level rise on the California’s coast, for a long-term infrastructure planning taking advantage of a close collaboration of scientists and planners.

Is our earliest known ancestor a tiny, gobby blob?

by Nicola Davis

Source: The Guardian, 31 January

The discovery of a microscopic fossil found in China, belonging to the group of deuterostomes, which includes vertebrates and human,s is important to fill the gaps of our evolutionary history and to understand the so-called “molecular clock”.

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The promise of augmented reality

Source: The Economist, 4 February

Instead of building an artificial world like virtual reality, augmented reality integrates the real world with computer-generated data. Despite its enthusiastic hipe, it is still a technology at an early stage, and it is promising especially for consumers.

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Pubblicato il : 19/12/2017
Modificato il : 04/04/2019

February Ideas and Innovation

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