Some laboratory mice were given specially engineered insuling-producing genes. These genes were then remotely activated using radio waves. This could mean a whole new field of medical procedures in which we turn genes on and off at will.

This breakthrough is the work of geneticists at New York’s Rockefeller University. It’s a pretty circuitous path from the initial burst of radio waves to the activation of the gene, and there’s still a lot of refinement and improvement that needs to be made before this can be used in medical treatments, but still - we’re talking about the ability to modify the behavior of genes without ever going inside a patient’s body. That’s a potentially colossal advance.

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A team of astronomers at Johns Hopkins University recently used space and ground-based telescopes to capture the death of a star that was “shredded” by the gravity of a supermassive black hole. 

This violent event itself was no space oddity. Black holes routinely swallow stars. Yet it is rare for us to get a visualization, which shows us who the ‘victim’ is. In this case the star is one that is rich in helium gas and is located in a galaxy 2.7 billion light-years away.

According to NASA, this is “the most direct evidence yet of a supermassive black hole shredding a star that wandered too close.” 

Watch the computer simulation here:

Source: BigThink

Their DNA proves what language has long suggested.

We often say that kids who get bullied on the playground or who live in violent homes are forced to grow up faster, but the idiom reveals a kernel of truth.

Children who’ve gone through violent experiences are more likely to have older DNA, a study fromDuke University has discovered:

The findings suggest a mechanism linking cumulative childhood stress to telomere maintenance and accelerated aging, even at a young age. It appears to be an important way that childhood stress may get “under the skin” at the fundamental level of our cells.

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Comic book hero superpowers may be one step closer to reality after the latest technological feats made by researchers at UT Dallas. They have designed an imager chip that could turn mobile phones into devices that can see through walls, wood, plastics, paper and other objects.

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In the business of everyday life, it’s easy to overlook things that could cause a serious disruption to how life is lived; floods happen, hurricanes, volcanoes and tsunamis like the one that devastated Japan last year. And now it seems, there is one more potential disaster we should add to the list: geomagnetic storms caused by coronal mass ejections from the sun. Mike Hapgood head of the space environment group with RAL Space, part of the UK Science and Technology Facilities Council, has written a commentary published in the journal Nature, suggesting that it’s time we quit burying our heads in the sand regarding the devastating impact a serious solar storm could have on modern populations.

Artist’s depiction of solar wind particles interacting with Earth’s magnetosphere. Sizes are not to scale. Image: NASA

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Threats range from governments trying to control citizens to the rise of Facebook and Apple-style ‘walled gardens’

Sergey Brin says he and Google co-founder Larry Page would not have been able to create their search giant if the internet was dominated by Facebook. Photograph: Justin Sullivan/Getty Images

The principles of openness and universal access that underpinned the creation of the internet three decades ago are under greater threat than ever, according to Google co-founder Sergey Brin.

In an interview with the Guardian, Brin warned there were “very powerful forces that have lined up against the open internet on all sides and around the world”. “I am more worried than I have been in the past,” he said. “It’s scary.”

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People who place a high value on wealth, status, and stuff are more depressed and anxious and less sociable than those who do not, say researchers.

They also indicated that materialism is not just a personal problem. It’s also environmental.

“We found that irrespective of personality, in situations that activate a consumer mindset, people show the same sorts of problematic patterns in wellbeing, including negative affect and social disengagement,” said Northwestern Universitypsychologist Galen V. Bodenhausen.

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Cornell materials scientists have developed an inexpensive, environmentally friendly way of synthesizing oxide crystal sheets, just nanometers thick, which have useful properties for electronics and alternative energy applications.

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A vaccine that can train cancer patients’ own bodies to seek out and destroy tumour cells has been developed by scientists.

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As United States lawmakers continue to consider anti-piracy legislation in Congress, they’ve found an ally in Netflix. Now the streaming content giant has created its own super PAC, whose main goal is to promote SOPA-like legislation.

Hollywood and record industry support didn’t help Congress get SOPA and PIPA to pass the House and Senate, but now they have a new accomplice in their continuing fight to try and push for anti-piracy legislation. Netflix, the number one name in (legally) streaming video services in the US has announced the formation of their own political action committee. Appropriately titled FLIXPAC, the just established-agency will be able to endorse politicians by way of stuffing their pockets, which in turn could influence even more congressmen to condone increasingly controversial bills that are being considered in the House and the Senate.

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