Lifeboat Foundation

Tissues take shape during development through a series of morphogenetic movements guided by local cell-scale forces. While current in vitro approaches subjecting tissues to homogenous stresses, it is currently no possible to recapitulate highly local spatially varying forces. Here we develop a method for local actuation of organoids using embedded magnetic nanoparticles. Sequential aggregation of magnetically labelled human pluripotent stem cells followed by actuation by a magnetic field produces localized magnetic clusters within the organoid. These clusters impose local mechanical forces on the surrounding tissue in response to applied global magnetic fields. We show that precise, spatially defined actuation provides short-term mechanical tissue perturbations as well as long-term cytoskeleton remodeling. We demonstrate that local magnetically-driven actuation guides asymmetric growth and proliferation, leading to enhanced patterning in human neural organoids. We show that this approach is applicable to other model systems by observing polarized patterning in paraxial mesoderm organoids upon local magnetic actuation. This versatile approach allows for local, controllable mechanical actuation in multicellular constructs, and is widely applicable to interrogate the role of local mechanotransduction in developmental and disease model systems.

The authors have declared no competing interest.

The magnet coil also reached a record for stored energy by 3.7 megajoules.

Commonwealth Fusion Systems has completed testing of its Central Solenoid Model Coil, a critical component in building its SPARC tokamak reactor.

Japan’s combination of artificial intelligence and robotics may be the answer to its rapidly shrinking labor force

Todd Schneider, Gee Hee Hong, and Anh Van Le

While automation will eliminate very few occupations entirely in the coming decades, it is likely to have an impact on portions of almost all jobs to some degree—depending on the type of work and the tasks involved. Set to move beyond routine and repetitive manufacturing activities, automation has the potential to appear in a much broader range of activities than seen until now, and to redefine human labor and work style in services and other sectors. In Japan, the rapid decline in the labor force and the limited influx of immigrants create a powerful incentive for automation, which makes the country a particularly useful laboratory for the study of the future landscape of work.

The industry showed out in spades for this year’s list, highlighting devices in medical AI, surgical robotics, wearables, and femtech, among others.

Choanoflagellates, animals’ closest relatives, have pluripotency genes, reshaping views on their evolution.

The research highlights how evolution repurposes existing genetic tools, turning them into versatile drivers of innovation. This adaptability underscores how foundational processes in unicellular organisms laid the groundwork for the development of complex life forms.

Continue reading “Scientists use DNA from 422-million-year-old cells to create a mouse” »

Scientists from the Biology Centre of the Czech Academy of Sciences found forty new freshwater viruses infecting aquatic microorganisms this year. The first one, which they isolated and described in detail, was named Budvirus after the South Bohemian capital České Budějovice. It belongs to “Giant Viruses” and it infects unicellular algae called cryptophytes.

Researchers have confirmed that this virus has an important role in the ecosystem, as it controls algal bloom, helping to maintain balance in the aquatic environment. The discoveries of all the viruses were made at the Římov reservoir near České Budějovice, which has been regularly monitored by South Bohemian hydrobiologists for five decades and is one of the most studied freshwater reservoirs in Europe. The work is published in The ISME Journal.

Although we have freshwater ecosystems such as lakes, ponds, reservoirs and rivers all around us, their microscopic representatives, especially viruses and bacteria, are still a little-explored area. A drop of water can contain a million bacteria and ten times more viruses, but only a handful of them have been described. Recent methods, such as environmental DNA analysis, are making great strides in the study of the aquatic microworld. This is also one of the methods used by the Czech scientific team.

Octopi are smart 👌 👏 😎 👍

Octopuses are among the most intelligent, adaptable, and ingenious creatures on Earth, says researcher.

This robotic Labrador puppy has been created in collaboration with the legendary Jim Henson’s Creature Shop.

A US-based company, Tombot, has unveiled Jennie – a realistic robotic puppy. This battery-powered Lab reacts to human touch, wags its tail, and even barks when you tell it to.

This robotic companion is designed to bring joy and comfort to those who need it most. Jennie has been designed to offer companionship to people battling dementia, stress, anxiety, Posttraumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), and depression.

Continue reading “Meet Jennie: Super-realistic robotic puppy to help people with anxiety” »

Our bodies divest themselves of 60 billion cells every day through a natural process of cell culling and turnover called apoptosis.

These cells — mainly blood and gut cells — are all replaced with new ones, but the way our bodies rid themselves of material could have profound implications for cancer therapies in a new approach developed by Stanford Medicine researchers.

They aim to use this natural method of cell death to trick cancer cells into disposing of themselves. Their method accomplishes this by artificially bringing together two proteins in such a way that the new compound switches on a set of cell death genes, ultimately driving tumor cells to turn on themselves. The researchers describe their latest such compound in a paper published Oct. 4 in Science.