Virtual reality is helping scientists discover new drugs faster
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Discovering new drugs is a laborious and expensive process, but VR is helping make it significantly faster and cheaper. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. Virtual Reality (VR), the same technology that’s revolutionising video games and cancer treatments by...
Synthetic lifeforms closer to reality after AI creates world’s first synthetic genome
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The creation of the world’s first fully synthetic genome by an AI is a major milestone in synthetic biology researchers quest to create the world’s first fully synthetic lifeforms. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. Scientists from ETH Zurich...
Designer cell with two genetic codes “give life on Earth one serious upgrade”
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF In the future not all life will be organic, increasingly more of it will be synthetic, and that’s a game changer that at the very least means aliens and the X-Men could become real. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore...
Researchers gene hacked human cells and turned them into dual core computers
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Computers have transformed human society, and next they’ll transform humans. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. The CRISPR gene-editing system is usually known for helping scientists create gene hacked twins resistant to HIV and cancer vaccines, cure blindness, genetic...
Mission Impossible style smart contact lens gets US military’s attention
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As technology gets smaller the world’s first true Smart Contact Lenses get closer than ever, and there are plenty of companies hungrily watching the space. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. The bleeding edge US military research organisation Defense...
2,000 Chinese schools are using robots to give students daily health checks
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Artificial Intelligence and robotics are helping China deliver healthcare in new ways. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. China is increasingly in love with technology, and the government, for a variety of reasons, is keen to develop and deploy...
World’s first autonomous robot completes its journey inside the human body
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As healthcare and robotics merge, from Robo-Surgeons to Nanobots, we need to find new ways to help them navigate to where they’re needed. Interested in the future and want to experience even more?! eXplore More. Surgeons have used robots operated by joysticks for more than...
Scientists hunt for “Kryptonite to stop CRISPR,” the world’s most powerful gene editing tool
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF In time the cost and ease of modifying any living organisms genome and genetic makeup, for better and worse, will fall to almost zero, and as gene editing tools become democratised and sought after by Bio-Terrorists, researchers are trying to find the technology’s Kryptonite –...
Just as 5G starts rolling out 6G is in the already in the works
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The march of technology never stops, and as users celebrate Gigabit mobile speeds Terabit mobile speeds are already on the drawing board. While countries around the world are just beginning to roll out their first 5G networks that operate at Gigabbit speeds, technologists at...
Scientists have created a decoder to turn brain activity into speech
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF For a wide range of reasons many people have speaking disabilities, but now a Brain to Speech breakthrough gives them their voices back. Scientists have announced a breakthrough in Brain Machine Interface (BMI) technology that has, for the first time, let them translate electrical...
AI and automation: The benefits for business and industry
On 4 August 1997, Skynet, a US military developed program, became self-aware and began to think for itself. Operators tried to deactivate the computer system but the now ‘intelligent’ system perceived this as a threat and in order to protect its mandate of ‘safeguarding the world’ Skynet launched a nuclear...
Electrical brain stimulation rejuvenates memory by 50 years
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As we age our memory capacity degrades, but his latest breakthrough turns the clock back over 50 years. Over the past couple of years I’ve been closely watching the field of Neuro-Training – an emerging technique that helps people with brain training, memory retention,...
Scientists bring 28,000 year old woolly mammoth cells back to life
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Many scientists see de-extinction, as well as immortality and re-incarnation, as a mystery we simply haven’t solved yet. In a world rife with movie plotlines about bringing extinct animals back from the dead, and actual scientists thinking about actually doing it, scientists in Osaka,...
Scientists gene hacked lizards to make them albino
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As gene editing tools become more powerful scientists are starting to push the boundaries by modifying the genes of more complex animals. For the first time reptiles, which are comparatively complex organisms, have been gene-edited with CRISPR technology after scientists at University of Georgia...
Scientists have unlocked the secret to whole body regeneration
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Humans genetic ability to regenerate body parts naturally was “turned off” millions of years ago, but now scientists have found a switch that turns it on – in worms. When it comes to regeneration some animals are capable of amazing feats. For example, if...
Revolutionary Bio-Compatible transistors will let AI’s interface with your brain
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Neural interfaces that let us communicate with each other and the machines around us, as well as stream our thoughts to TV, will revolutionise humanity, but we need bio-compatible hardware. It’s a fact that silicon transistors and the brain don’t mix, and while you...
Simple paper blood test diagnoses disease faster and cheaper
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF Not everyone has access to a lab that can process blood tests, so this breakthrough will help people in developing nations diagnose disease faster. Dutch and Japanese scientists have developed an inexpensive new paper-based blood test kit that quickly determines if patients have infectious...
China shows off its first official neurosurgery robot
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As the technologies needed to construct sophisticated robot surgeons advances, so too are the type and complexity of surgeries they can take on. Using robots in surgery isn’t new, and I’ve written about a bunch of them recently as the technology starts leaving the...
3D Printing with sound, new tech opens door to printed cosmetics, food, and drugs
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF As 3D printing becomes more popular the ability to control the size of droplets opens the door to 3D printing everything from cosmetics and materials, to pharmaceutical drugs. Harvard University has announced that its researchers have developed a way to print objects using sound....
A decade after the first person was cured of HIV, another is in remission
WHY THIS MATTERS IN BRIEF The HIV and AIDS epidemics have claimed the lives of millions of people, and now there may be a cure, but there’s a big catch. News has emerged from the UK that a man has been in remission from HIV for a year and...
