StemCell Therapy

Former Republican Congressman Chris Collins lied and cheated during his term in office all the way into a 26-month prison sentence.

He was charged with wire fraud, conspiracy to commit securities fraud, securities fraud, and lying to the FBI. The evidence prior to his guilty plea was overwhelming, yet that did not prevent Collins from constantly lying that he was innocent, nor did it deter the Republican Party from re-nominating him and extolling him as a paragon of virtue and most importantly, an ardent and unwavering supporter of his majesty, and liar-in-chief, Donald Trump.

Because in the final analysis that is what the Republican Party is now all about, blindness devotion to Donald Trump, the most prolific liar and con man to ever come upon the American political scene. We will soon see the candidates to replace convict Collins on the Republican ballot tripping over themselves to out Trumpian one another in order to earn the nomination of the now cult of Trump.

Truthfulness be damned, for the nomination will go to the candidate who is most willing to abandon decency, honor, integrity and adherence to the Constitution in order to gain the blessing of the golden idol now sitting upon the throne of the presidency.

I can only pray that the voters of the 27th Congressional District will finally wake up and realize that they deserve better, that the economy can flourish without deserting all the values that have set the United States apart from the other nations of the world and that the Republican party has cheated them before and will cheat them again.

Richard Kirisits

Kenmore

Read this article:
Letter: Voters in the 27th District deserve better treatment - Buffalo News

A mother-of-two from Yeovil faces the heartbreaking prospect of losing her sight within a year if she is unable to raise enough money to undergo pioneering treatment.

Jemma Jackson says the thought of no longer being able to see Oscar, 14, and Alfie, 6, has left her with a "pain like I've never known and a fear I could never have imagined".

The 32-year-old single mum has lived with type one diabetes since the age of three, but in recent years, she has developed proliferative retinopathy, a disease that can cause rapid and progressive blindness if left untreated.

The only treatment available on the NHS has been unsuccessful, leaving her needing to raise at least 5,000 to enable her to receive injections privately.

It involves injecting a chemical into the eyeball, stopping the growth of blood vessels inside the retina, with the hope of preventing sight from deteriorating any further.

Jemma said: "Any parent can relate and understand how painful the prospect of not being able to see your childrens faces ever again would be.

"Its a pain like Ive never known and a fear I could never have imagined.

"I struggle but I am able to carry on a normal-ish life with the vision I do have left.

"If I were to lose anymore, or all of my vision, I honestly dont know what I would do. The thought makes me feel sick to my stomach.

"I know I am lucky in many other ways, I should and would be blind already if it was not for the treatments Ive already had, but I am so scared at what my future might hold.

"I just really want to keep my vision for as long as possible, so I can see my kids grow up, and then my eyes can finally give up.

"Until then, I desperately want to keep fighting."

Anyone who wishes to donate to the cost of Jemma's treatment can do so via GoFundMe .

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Mum fears never seeing kids' faces again due to condition causing blindness - Somerset Live

More than mere information, the gift of knowledge refashions the heart to love and serve God, and his people. (CNS illustration/Tyler Orsburn)

By Mike Nelson Catholic News Service Posted January 24, 2020

What is knowledge? More specifically, what is knowledge in relation to our Catholic faith?

Several years ago, I came upon St. Bonaventures Prayer for the Seven Gifts of the Holy Spirit. A 13th-century cardinal and follower of St. Francis of Assisi, St. Bonaventure is also a patron saint of our parish, Mission San Buenaventura in Ventura, California, where my wife directs music and liturgy and I play piano.

Reading this prayer inspired me to set St. Bonaventures prayer to music, in which I combined two gifts to make part of a verse: Grant us courage, grant us knowledge, so we may know and protect what is good.

The actual words of St. Bonaventures prayer suggest I was, hopefully, on the right track: May he impart to us the gift of knowledge, which will enable us to discern your teaching and distinguish good from evil.

Knowledge can be a tricky quality (or gift, if you will) to assess. Many of us have heard that it doesnt take an active Catholic to know what the Catholic Church teaches. Inactive Catholics, non-Catholics and even atheists can be just as knowledgeable about Catholic teaching as those who practice their faith in some cases, more so.

The key, of course, is taking to heart what we know and acting on it. Or, as bishops instruct diaconate candidates during the rite of ordination: Believe what you read, teach what you believe and practice what you teach.

That, in the context of our Catholic faith, should give us a clue as to what knowledge actually means. Knowledge simply for knowledges sake, St. James suggested rather pointedly, means nothing without action inspired by that knowledge: What good is it, my brothers, if someone says he has faith but does not have works? (Jas 2:14).

As an adult, I attended confirmation preparation classes at another parish (it was a pre-RCIA preparation process), designed to teach us facts about the faith I would profess at the Easter Vigil. We even took a midterm to test our knowledge.

Fortunately, I was already of the mind to become Catholic, not because of its teaching but because I was seeking a community of faith that sought to know and follow Jesus Christ. The words I once heard during a parish retreat, We are the body of Christ, we are a community of believers, and the ministries that serve church and community in Jesus name, are why I became and remain a Catholic.

This was long before I knew anything about St. Bonaventure or any of the saints, or anything about the Catechism of the Catholic Church, or very much about Scripture. But I learned very quickly about the person of Jesus, and how he was more interested in how people lived their lives than in how much they knew.

(Related: Discerning a path with the gift of knowledge.)

The Pharisees knew all too well how Jesus felt about learned people. When he healed the man born blind, the Pharisees were outraged that Jesus had performed his healing work on the Sabbath, in violation of the law.

And, believing that blindness was a result of sin, they were outraged further when Jesus suggested that blindness was more than a physical affliction.

If you were blind, Jesus told the Pharisees, you would have no sin; but now you are saying, We see, so your sin remains (Jn 9:41).

The blind man, now healed, understood as well as anyone that knowledge of Jesus, and his message to heal and serve those most in need, leads to hope for all, and calls us into action to meet those needs.

For if knowledge impacts only the mind and not the heart, what is its purpose? As St. Paul told the people of Ephesus, May the eyes of your hearts be enlightened, that you may know what is the hope that belongs to his call (Eph 1:18).

St. Thomas Aquinas a doctor of the church like his contemporary, St. Bonaventure suggested in Summa Theologica that all gifts of the Holy Spirit are very much connected to the cardinal virtues rooted in ancient Greece and later proclaimed by church leaders in the Middle Ages.

The gift of knowledge, St. Aquinas said, corresponds to the virtue of hope, which better helps us to understand the meaning of God.

God desires all men to be saved and to come to the knowledge of the truth: that is, of Christ Jesus, declares the catechism (No. 74). Christ must be proclaimed to all nations and individuals, so that this revelation may reach to the ends of the earth.

It is important, too, to realize that, as St. Bonaventure (inspired by Isaiah, St. Paul and others) proclaimed, there is a relationship between knowledge and the other gifts of the Holy Spirit.

If you receive my words and treasure my commands, turning your ear to wisdom, inclining your heart to understanding; yes, if you call for intelligence, and to understanding raise your voice; if you seek her like silver, and like hidden treasures search her out, then will you understand the fear of the Lord; the knowledge of God you will find. For the Lord gives wisdom; from his mouth come knowledge and understanding (Prv 2:1-6).

***

Catholic journalist Mike Nelson writes from Southern California.

Read this article:
True knowledge renews the heart - CatholicPhilly.com

ABU DHABI, 23rd January, 2020 (WAM) -- The Zayed Higher Organisation for People of Determination, ZHO, launched the initiative, "Bridges of Hope to Support People of Determination", in cooperation with the Emirates Red Crescent, ERC, for the Syrian refugee families of People of Determination at the Mrajeeb Camp in Jordan, as part of the ZHOs efforts to support People of Determination in foreign countries by collaborating with the ERC'S initiatives and projects.

The initiative aims to provide 148 families of Syrian "refugees with determination" guidance to mitigate psychological pressures and stress and provide families with background information, practical training sessions, and psychological and social counselling.

Abdullah Abdulaali Al Humaidan, Secretary-General of ZHO, who accompanied the ZHOs team, stated that the organisation had launched the initiative under the guidance of the wise leadership, as well as the supervision and concern of H.H. Sheikh Khalid bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Chairman of the Board of Directors.

Al Humaidan extended his appreciation to the ERC, headed by H.H. Sheikh Hamdan bin Zayed Al Nahyan, Ruler's Representative in Al Dhafra Region, and to all the employees there for their genuine and fruitful cooperation with the ZHO. He also thanked the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and International Cooperation and its minister, Abdullah bin Zayed Al Nahyan, as well as the UAE Embassy in Jordan for supporting this initiative and collaborating with the ZHO. He finally thanked the parents at the Mrajeeb Camp for joining the initiative, as well as the ZHOs employees.

Ahmed Ali Al Balushi, UAE Ambassador to Jordan, received Al Humaidan and the accompanying delegation as part of the delegations visit to the Kingdom of Jordan to implement the initiative and praised the delegations efforts and the wonderful humanitarian initiative for the People of Determination.

Moza Ahmad Al Salami, Director of ZHOs Al Ain Autism Centre and the head of the team, said, "This initiative was launched in collaboration with the ERC after signing a cooperation agreement with the ZHO. The team includes Moza Ahmad Al Salami, initiatives coordinator and supervisor; Ghadeer Al Oteibi, senior social worker; Anoud Al Hajri, psychologist; Sheikha Salem Al Kabi, specialised teacher, and Ahmad Al Zoghbi, specialised teacher."

She added that 148 families were part of the initiative, including those suffering from cases of Autism Spectrum Disorder, intellectual disabilities, physical impairment, deafness, and blindness and Down syndrome.

Moza Al Salami revealed that a team of staff members had created a sensory room called the "Bridges of Hope Initiative Room to Support People of Determination", where the staff was trained by a specialist in special educational needs from the camp on how to best utilise the room to serve families and people of determination.

Al Salami pointed out that the initiative is aimed at providing participants with skills to help them lead independent lives, acquire appropriate habits, and protect themselves.

This is in addition to helping children develop different intellectual skills and language capabilities and teaching them to rely on themselves, acquire appropriate eating habits, and inculcate major and minor life skills and kinetic synergy capabilities.

WAM/Rasha Abubaker

Original post:
People of Determination at Syrian refugee Mrajeeb Camp in Jordan provided with psychological support - Jordan - ReliefWeb

By James Hall, Commercial Director, Striata UK

While most people understand the importance of making the physical world as accessible to as many people as possible, including those with disabilities, digital accessibility is less well-regarded but equally important. And while a lot of ground has been covered with regard to the websites, attention is now slowly turning to email.

Much time is spent designing, developing and testing emails to ensure they render correctly on different screen sizes and in the most commonly used email clients, to provide a good email experience. Not enough attention is paid, however, to ensuring people who have disabilities are able to consume these emails.

To put that into perspective, according to the World Health Organisation, at least 2.2 billion people globally have a vision impairment, which ranges from needing glasses to total blindness. Thats more than the total user base of Gmail (1.5 billion) and logically would make up a significant portion of the 4 billion email users, worldwide. Why should there be any less effort spent on them to ensure an email renders well on the assistive device they use.

But what does email accessibility look like and how can you ensure that your emails are as accessible as possible?

What is email accessibility?

Email accessibility is the practice of making an email easy to read for as wide an audience as possible, including those with visual, auditory, motor or cognitive disabilities. Email accessibility is an important part of User Experience (UX) and applying accessibility principles will result in the best possible experience for all users.

There are a number of assistive technologies that help people with disabilities access the web and email. These include screen readers (used by people with visual impairment, mobility limitations and learning disabilities), which read the content of a screen aloud using text-to-speech, and screen magnifiers (used by people with low or partial vision) which enlarge a portion of the screen so that the content is readable.

Content

Most email writers already know the importance of ensuring that the content has a logical flow, and the message is easy to understand. This becomes more important when one considers how email will be read by a visually impaired person or anyone with cognitive disabilities such as dyslexia.

So, for example, subject lines should be short and to the point in order to perform best when read aloud through a screen reader. Language should be similarly clear and concise. Rather use simple words and language making it easier to understand for both those with cognitive difficulties, as well easier to understand when read through a screen reader.

For the same reason paragraphs should be short and well structured, and long lists and tables should be avoided.

Designing for accessibility

Layout and design accounts for a large part of how accessible an email will be, from color, font size and font choices, to the way images are treated. As with design for different screen sizes, there are guidelines for designing emails that are suitable for screen readers and magnifiers.

Making judicious use of whitespace around paragraphs, bulleted copy and images is not only good for accessibility, it makes skim-reading easier too. Another important factor when designing for accessibility is color, especially for users that are color blind. Blue is a good color to use, because it is not affected by red and green color blindness.

There should also be adequate contrast between the text and background color of your call to action buttons, and links should be prominent and easy to click.

HTML Developers

Understanding how an email is read using a screen reader and how it appears using a magnifier is something all HTML coders should know.

Some basic guidelines include using heading styles in logical sequence (making it easier for someone using a screen reader to navigate by sections), limiting the animation to 3 seconds in animated gifs, avoiding tables, and cutting back on the use of multiple spaces in your code as a screen reader will read these out loud as blank.

Testers

Whilst an email is often tested across all major device types, screen sizes, and email clients, its worth making the extra effort when it comes to accessibility.

Fortunately, there are tools that make this easier. For example, some email testing platforms such as Litmus and Email on Acid now offer accessibility testing features as part of their service.

Even with the use of these tools, however, one should still test email with images off to see how readable it is for people who dont see the images (for whatever reason). Check the flow of information and whether the essence of the message is conveyed, even if no images are present. Additionally, skim-read the email in a few seconds as this is how most people read online.

Worthwhile effort

While ensuring that your emails are fully accessible does take effort, there can be no denying that its worth the investment.

Most of the work required to ensure that blind people and those with visual impairment can access your emails is in line with email best practice.

The overall email experience, therefore, wont just be improved for customers with disabilities but for everyone.

Read the original:
Email accessibility is crucial: here's how to get it right - Global Banking And Finance Review

Vision provides a rich source of information that most peoples lives revolve around. Yet, for blind people, how do they conceive of visual intake and what happens to regions of the brain dedicated to vision if a person doesnt have typical visual input? These are questions that drive Marina Bedny PhD, an Assistant Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences and principal investigator of a neuroplasticity and development lab at John Hopkins University.

Bedny spoke at Dukes Institute for Brain Sciences on Friday, January 17th, about her work with congenitally blind adults. Her lab explores similarities and distinctions of visual perceptions between blind and seeing people and seeks to understand how nuanced, natural variation in experience shapes the human mind and brain.

Many of the studies Bedny discussed have very important linguistic components. In one trial, she investigated the meaning of verbs pertaining to light events and visual perception as compared to touch, amodal, auditory, and motion verbs.

Both blind and sighted people displayed nearly identical results when comparing the different types of verbs used in the study. This showed that there were no differences in what blind people knew about the terms. Analysis of the verbs revealed that linguistic dimensions of intensity and instability were used to evaluate the words comparative meanings. Blind people agreed more on the comparison of sound emission and touch perception words. This shows that blind participants have more aligned comprehension of the meanings of other sensory terms compared to sighted people.

In other cases, Bednys lab assessed what blind individuals know about color. One study used three object types natural kinds, functional artifacts, and non-functional artifacts. These categories were used to evaluate agreeance not only on color, but the relevancy of color to certain objects functions as well.

Another crucial question of Bednys work looks at how the innate structure of the brain constrains cortical function. The findings show that the visual system in blind participants has been repurposed for higher cognitive functions and that portions of the visual system connected to high cognitive abilities are invaded by the visual systems. Along with repurposing visual regions for linguistic use, Bednys lab found that visual regions of the brain are active during numerical processing tasks too.

Blind people display additionalactivity in the visual centers of their brain in numerous studies beyond havingthe same regional brain responsiveness as sighted people. Though furtherresearch is necessary, Bedny proposes that there is a sensitive period duringdevelopment that is critical to the specialization of the brain. Study participantswho have adult-onset blindness do not show the same sensitivity and patternedresponses in visual cortices repurposed for different functions as congenitallyblind subjects.

At birth, the human cortex is pluripotent providing the best of both worlds, Bedny said. The brain is prepared but highly flexible. Her studies have repeatedly shown that the brain is built for and transformed by language, and they underscore the importance of nature and nurture in human development.

Post by Cydney Livingston

More:
Visual Perception in Congenitally Blind Adults - Duke Today

With triple the number of sepsis cases in Australia, small cap biotech company Cynata Therapeutics (ASX:CYP) hopes to wage a new war on blood infections.

Last Friday the world learned blood infections were on the rise, with researchers showing in the international medical journal The Lancet that sepsis infections had increased 201 per cent Down Under.

Young children, the elderly, indigenous or those with compromised immune systems are at risk of sepsis.

Lancets Global Burden of Disease study of 195 countries and territories was based on records such as Australian death certificates, rather than just what medical professionals put on their paperwork, and showed a dramatic increase in cases from previous estimates.

The study showed that in 2017 there were about 55,000 cases of sepsis in Oz more than three times the number of cases than the 18,000 incidences previously estimated.

The death count that year from the infection was 8,700 people in Australia. It was a dramatic 74 per cent increase on the 5,000-deaths estimated previously.

Some people experience multiple cases of sepsis in a year but mortality rates are still grim.

A 2016 study by the Canadian Institute for Health Information and the Canadian Patient Safety Institute found that the mortality rate for sepsis was 20 to 30 per cent in Western nations.

Sepsis is a life-threatening blood infection that people can rapidly lose their lives to.

Its a threat taken seriously in medical facilities across the globe, and a challenge Cynata hopes to address with stem cells to put peoples immune response in check.

Cynata researchers have shown its Cymerus mesenchymal stem cells (MSCs) can work well in battling blood infections in animals.

The company wants to expand its research to human studies, Cynata managing director and CEO Dr Ross Macdonald told Stockhead.

The recent feature article in the highly respected medical journal The Lancet and the worldwide media attention it garnered outlines the chilling reality of just how devastating, prevalent and widespread sepsis is, Dr Macdonald said.

It is now acknowledged as one the most common and lethal conditions faced in medicine and which existing treatments are not capable of addressing.

Cynatas very promising findings in the recent pre-clinical study of its Cymerus mesenchymal stem cells provide a new potential treatment option for this exceedingly challenging problem.

Cynatas early-stage research out of Ireland effectively showed its stem cells calm down the animals immune system, Macdonald explained.

Known as the silent killer, sepsis is seen by some as an overreaction of the immune system to infection.

The Lancets study found the number of cases of sepsis worldwide had doubled to 49 million a year.

Deaths from the condition stood at 11 million people, equating to one in five deaths globally.

Researchers called it the leading cause of death worldwide.

Australian Sepsis Network (ASN) founder Professor Simon Finfer from The George Institute for Global Health was one of The Lancet studys authors and said it was concerning so many lives were lost to a largely preventable condition.

People need to act fast with sepsis, which can quickly damage a persons tissues and organs and lead to shock, organ failure and death.

Australia has good systems in place to treat people early but more needs to be done, according to Professor Finfer.

We urgently need a coordinated national approach that addresses pre-hospital and in-hospital recognition and treatment, to address the significant death and disability caused by sepsis in Australia, he said.

ASN is housed at the George Institute and has $1.5m in federal government backing to develop treatment guidelines and run public awareness campaigns.

Current treatments can include antibiotics given within an hour of medics suspecting sepsis, intravenous fluid therapy, vasopressordrugs to support organ systems, mechanical ventilation and renal replacement therapy.

More females than males experienced sepsis, while 40 per cent of cases are in kids.

The most affected regions worldwide are sub-Saharan Africa, the South Pacific islands near Australia and South-East Asia.

Cynata is not the only ASX-listed company looking at sepsis.

Recce Pharmaceuticals (ASX:RCE) has an antibiotic known as RECCE 327 that targets sepsis and blood infection.

The company raised about $7m last October to progress the drug through early stage clinical trials to test its safety and work out the right doses.

Medtech Uscom (ASX:UCM) is targeting the monitoring market with a non-invasive medical device to measure heart flow that can be used in sepsis patients.

Resources company Surefire Resources (ASX:SRN) had a sepsis program that it licensed from the University of Western Australia in the mid-naughties, when it was known as Genesis Biomedical (ASX:GBL).

Genesis opted to terminate the program in 2006 and become Black Ridge Mining (ASX:BRD) before rebranding to Surefire.

Read more from the original source:
Sepsis has tripled in Australia and these small caps are tackling it head on - Stockhead

The market is estimated to grow with a CAGR of 17. 2% from 2018-2025. The growth of the genome editing market is primarily attributed to the rise in the production of genetically modified crops and rising prevalence of the genetic diseases.

New York, Jan. 24, 2020 (GLOBE NEWSWIRE) -- Reportlinker.com announces the release of the report "North America Genome Editing Market to 2025 - Regional Analysis and Forecasts by Technology, Application End User, and Country" - https://www.reportlinker.com/p05774528/?utm_source=GNW However, the stringent regulatory framework and limitations in genome editing are likely to pose a negative impact on the market growth.

On the other hand, emerging markets for precision and regenerative medicines is likely to have a positive impact on the growth of the North America genome editing market in the coming years.The genome editing has proved itself to be the most promising way of feeding the fast growing population across the world.The changes in the climatic conditions due to the global warming and others conditions such as droughts floods are witnessed more across the world.

Therefore, the feeding the rising population is question among the people across the world.Due to the genome editing the concerns are being reduced to a great level, the two types of the genetically modified crops are widely grown.

Firstly, these crops are altered in a ways that they are not affected by the herbicide glyphosate.Secondly, crops are produced to protect themselves from the insecticides.

The advantages of the genetically modified crops includes diseases resistance, improvement of the photosynthesis, improvement of the nutrition, and more. The genetic modification helps to enhance the productivity without hampering the health of the crops. In addition, for the genetically modified crops the limited resources are required and it require less or no pesticides for its growth. The time required for the growth of the genetically modified crops is less, therefore these are highly preferred crops in the western world. The demand for the genetically modified crops is rising in the eastern region due to the benefits offered by these crops.According to the International Service For The Acquisition Of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA), 2017 statistics, 19 developing countries have planted 53% which is approximately to 100.6 million hectares of the global biotech hectares, whereas the 5 industrial countries have took the 47% which is near about 89.2 million hectares share. The trend of growing genetically modified crop is expected to grow in the coming future.In 2017, the CRISPR segment segment held a largest market share of 53.6% of the genome editing market, by technology. This segment is also expected to dominate the market in 2025 owing to the simple, fast and accurate property of the CRISPR. Moreover, the TALENs segment is anticipated to witness the significant growth rate of 17.1% during the forecast period, 2018 to 2025 owing to the properties provided by the TALENs the market for it is expected to rise in the coming near future.North America genome editing market, based on application was segmented into genetic engineering, cell line engineering and others. The cell line engineering segment is anticipated to grow at a CAGR of 18.0% during the forecast period. Moreover, the genetic engineering segment is expected to grow at the significant rate during the coming years owing to its sub segments such as animal genetic engineering and plant genetic engineering that are being carried out extensively. In 2017, the biotechnology & pharmaceutical companies segment held a largest market share of 61.2% of the genome editing market, by end user. This segment is also expected to dominate the market in 2025 owing to the advantages of the CRISPR, the companies have enhanced their research and development for the drug discoveries that can treat various diseases. Hence, the market is likely to propel in the coming years.Some of the major primary and secondary sources for genome editing included in the report are, Contract Research Organizations (CRO), United States Department of Agriculture (USDA), National Institutes of Health (NIH), Abu Dhabi Fund for Development (ADFD), Ministry of Science and Technology (MST), International Service For The Acquisition Of Agri-Biotech Applications (ISAAA), Food and Drug Administration (FDA), Department of Biotechnology (DBT) and others.Read the full report: https://www.reportlinker.com/p05774528/?utm_source=GNW

About ReportlinkerReportLinker is an award-winning market research solution. Reportlinker finds and organizes the latest industry data so you get all the market research you need - instantly, in one place.

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The rest is here:
The North America genome editing market is expected to reach US$ 4,148.1 Mn in 2025 from US$ 1,234.5 Mn in 2017 - Yahoo Finance

On a daily basis, we interact with hundreds or thousands of materials that range in complexity from the water we drink to the OLED screens on our smartphones. The development of new materials can be linked to nearly every major advance in human history, and breakthroughs made by material scientists have profoundly affected our society and daily lives from transportation to how we receive information.

Some of the most expensive materials on this list are naturally occurring, while others, such as two-dimensional materials, have been developed in laboratories and are on the cutting edge of scientific progress.

Human epochs are defined by the materials that enabled advancement, First the Stone Age, then bronze, then iron, then steel, then plastics, and now were firmly in the semiconductor age, said Alex Kozen, an assistant research scientist at the University of Maryland, College Park. I expect the next great advance in materials to be biological materials, where genetic engineering could be used to create organisms that provide better nutrition, grow structural materials and much more.

The following is a list of some of the most expensive materials used today in manufacturing, tech products, research, and other applications. They include precious metals, compounds, rare earth elements, and ultra-thin two-dimensional materials.

Click here to see the most expensive materials on Earth

The cost of different materials is determined by several factors, including supply and demand, mining costs, raw materials costs, how rare or abundant a material is, purity of the material, engineering costs whether it is a complex material to produce among many other factors. The materials on this list are not meant to represent a complete list of every expensive material. The materials on our list were selected in part because they are used commonly in industry and research.

To compile our list, we used various scientific journals, the Defense Logistics Agencys list of Strategic Materials, the USGSs Mineral Commodities Summary 2019, and prices were estimated from various suppliers websites.

Go here to read the rest:
The Most Expensive Materials on Earth - 24/7 Wall St.

The impending need to feed almost 10 billion people by 2050 is fuelling innovation in the agri-food sector.

Vertical farming is one such example. Tipped to play an increasingly important role in global agriculture, plant factories as they are otherwise termed are vertically-stacked, fully controlled environments used to produce food.

The technology has been praised for its potential to help societies meet elevated demand for food, without the need for additional farmland.

Analysts appear similarly persuaded. According to Global Market Insights, the vertical farming market is expected to expand by 25% by 2024, to reach a value of 11.4bn.

However, feeding growing populations with vertical farms, and using the same seeds and plants used in conventional agriculture today to do so, demonstrates a lag in innovation, suggests Aberystwyth Universitys Professor Huw Jones.

Vertical farming technologies are advancing, and fast. Today, it is possible to automate a number of processes in urban agriculture, including the sowing of seeds, and monitoring of LED lighting.

Climate including temperature, humidity, and CO levels can also be controlled externally, and machine learning can be leveraged to help save electricity and water use.

In order to get the most out of urban agriculture innovations, plant technology will have to similarly advance, said the professor of translational genomics for plant breeding at the Westminster Food & Nutrition Forum last week in London. The kinds of plants that we are going to ultimately have in [plant factories] are not going to be the same kind of plants that we have in soil.

We have huge innovation in hydroponic vertical farming, the professor continued, but we are still using the old seeds. What we are lacking, therefore, is the plant architecture itself, he stressed.

Professor Jones does predict this will change, but it will require gene editing to do so.

Greater understanding of DNA sequencing and genome editing, alongside reduced costs in gene sequencing, has helped to encourage interest in plant technology, he explained.

Plant-specific transcription factors, for example, have garnered much attention in food science. Transcription factors are genes that control the transcription of other genes in fruit and vegetable colour, texture, and aroma, we were told.

As a result, scientists can alter the colour of tomatoes, or the smell of fruits, he continued. We can make completely new fruits by harnessing these genes that control genes [with] these MYB transcription factors.

In vertical farming, gene sequencing could also help bridge the technology gap between vertical farming and plant architecture.There is a lot of research underpinned by the understanding of the gene sequence. We understand how to change the internode length of these sorts of plants. [We know] how to change the fruiting patterns, so that we can make plants that are much more suitable to those kinds of new agricultures.

In Europe, the scientific community regularly voices its support of genetic technologies. Both conventional genetically modified organisms (GMOs) and genetic editing tools such as CRISPR/Cas have been praised for their potential to help develop more robust crops in the face of climate change.

Genetic editing using CRISPR/Cas technology involves removing part of the genetic code, as opposed to GMO methods, which uses genetic engineering to insert new code.

However, EU regulation has put Europe out of step with the rest of the world, argued Professor Jones, particularly in countries where very simple genome editing falls outside of their GMO legislation.

Here, the professor is referring to the European Court of Justices (ECJ) July 2018 ruling. According to its decision, crops obtained by mutagenesis are classified as GMOs in Europe, as the techniques and methods of mutagenesis alter the genetic material of a plant in a way that does not occur naturally.

Describing this legislation as too heavily politicised to onboard biotechnology, Professor Jones suggested the UKs impending departure from the EU could present an opportunity for the sector.

This is an area that the UK, post-Brexit, could look at to really rationalise the regulation of mutation breeding, he said. That has always been outside the GMO scope. And to think about simple genome editing where that is synonymous with old mutation breeding techniques and also to exclude that.

In the case that such editing, which in the future may fall outside of GMO legislation, produces a novel food, the professor agreed it should be categorised by novel foods legislation.

In any case, Professor Jones is convinced that over the next ten years, there will be significant innovation in food biotechnology. Some of which, wont fall neatly into novel food or biotechnology regulations. So, I think we have some interesting times ahead to see how these things are going to be regulated.

Continued here:
Vertical farms of the future require genetically edited plants, says scientist - FoodNavigator.com

As the labour market rapidly changes, new, nearly real-time data and metrics give us better insight than ever before into what the jobs of the future will look like.

The kinds of jobs emerging in the global economy span a wide range of professions and skills, reflecting the opportunities for workers of all backgrounds and educational levels to take advantage of emerging jobs and the new economy. Identifying emerging jobs and the skills that they require provides valuable insights to inform training investments, and paves the way for a Reskilling Revolution, as individuals seek new skills to keep pace with change.

But for all of the opportunities that the new economy will bring, there are stark skills gaps and gender gaps that must be addressed. If we dont, they will continue to widen in the future.

Here are five things we can learn from this new data:

Not every emerging job requires hard tech skills, but every emerging job does require basic tech skills such as digital literacy, web development or graphic design. Three of the jobs in the World Economic Forum's Jobs of Tomorrow report cloud, engineering and data clusters, which are also among the fastest-growing overall require disruptive tech skills like artificial intelligence (AI), robotics, or cloud computing. Because technologies like AI are so pervasive, many roles in areas like sales and marketing will require a basic understanding of AI.

These disruptive tech skills are in high demand across the board. Blockchain, cloud computing, analytical reasoning and AI are among the most in-demand tech skills we see on LinkedIn.

While they arent growing as quickly as tech-dominated jobs, new sales, content production and HR roles are also emerging as a complement to the rapidly growing tech industry. Our research shows talent acquisition specialists, customer success specialists and social media assistants among the fastest growing professions all roles that rely on more diverse skills sets, especially soft skills.

Share of skills clusters by selected professional cluster

Image: World Economic Forum

Demand for soft skills is likely to continue to increase as automation becomes more widespread. Our latest Global Talent Trends Report shows that HR professionals are identifying the demand for soft skills as the most important trend globally. Skills like creativity, persuasion, and collaboration which all top our list of most in-demand soft skills are all virtually impossible to automate, which means if you have these skills youll be even more valuable to organizations in the future.

While the data reflects a diversity of opportunities for workers of all backgrounds and educational levels, further analysis shows a worrying imbalance in those obtaining the latest skills. In our ongoing research on gender with the World Economic Forum, we found that the largest gender gaps among emerging jobs are in roles that rely heavily on disruptive tech skills, with the share of women represented across cloud, engineering and data jobs below 30% (for cloud computing its as low as 12%). Its critical to close this gap because these disruptive tech skills will have an outsized impact on the direction of society and the economy.

While there is certainly room to improve gender parity by embracing greater diversity in hiring and more inclusive managerial practices, our data suggests that those gains, while important, will not be sufficient to achieve parity.

We have to think creatively about ways to fill these emerging skills and roles so that we prevent these gaps from intensifying in the future. Our research to understand these issues has uncovered some very achievable, scalable solutions.

Firstly, taking advantage of existing and adjacent talent can make a massive contribution to the rapid expansion of talent pipelines. Our research reveals that training and up-skilling near AI talent could double the pipeline of AI talent in Europe.

Opportunities by selected professional cluster and occupation, 2014-2019

Image: World Economic Forum

Taking a similar approach with the gender gap, weve found that sub-groups of disruptive tech skills where women have higher representation genetic engineering, data science, nanotechnology and human-computer interaction could expand the pipeline of talent for the broader set of tech roles that rely heavily on disruptive tech skills.

While both of these approaches can help us make meaningful progress, closing the skills and gender gaps depends on a lot more than just making sure talent has the right skills. Its a simple truth that who you know matters, so we also have to close the network gap the advantage some people have over others based purely on who they know.

Our research on the network gap shows that living in a high-income neighbourhood, going to a top school and working at a top company can lead to a 12x advantage in accessing opportunities. This means that two people with the exact same skills, but who were born into different neighbourhoods, may be worlds apart when it comes to the opportunities afforded them.

All of these new metrics and insights can help us pinpoint the skills and jobs of the future, but its going to take more than data to ensure that the Fourth Industrial Revolution is an equitable one. If we are going to make meaningful change, we need businesses and political leaders to re-evaluate the norms through which we shape policy, make hiring decisions and ultimately level the playing field for those who face barriers to opportunity.

As we convene at the Annual Meeting of the World Economic Forum in Davos, Im asking leaders to join us in making progress towards closing these gaps. It will create better, more innovative businesses, stronger economies and ultimately help create fairer societies.

License and Republishing

World Economic Forum articles may be republished in accordance with our Terms of Use.

Written by

Allen Blue, Co-Founder and Vice President, Product Management, LinkedIn

The views expressed in this article are those of the author alone and not the World Economic Forum.

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5 things we know about the jobs of the future - World Economic Forum

A little while ago, we covered the idea ofusing photovoltaic materials to drive enzymatic reactionsin order to produce specific chemicals. The concept is being considered mostly because doing the same reaction in a cell is often horribly inefficient, because everything else in the cell is trying to regulate the enzymes, trying to use the products, trying to convert the byproducts into something toxic, or up to something even more annoying. But in many cases, these reactions rely on chemicals that are only made by cells, leaving some researchers to suspect it still might be easier to use living things in the end.

A new paper in Nature Catalysis may support or contradict this argument, depending on your perspective. In the end, the authors of the new paper re-engineer standard brewers yeast to produce molecules that can be used as fuel for internal combustion engines. The full catalog of changes they have to make is a bit mind-numbing, and most achieve a small, incremental increase in production. The end result is a large step forward toward biofuel production, but the effort involved is intimidating.

Read original post

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Re-engineering yeast to create biofuel appears possible, 'but the effort involved is intimidating' - Genetic Literacy Project

In co-founding Ginkgo Bioworks, Reshma Shetty has helped enable the entire synthetic biology ... [+] industry while inspiring a generation of new biological engineers. Heres what she told me about starting a biotech company.

Dr. Reshma Shetty is no stranger within the synthetic biology community. In 2008 she co-founded Ginkgo Bioworksa company youll definitely hear about if you havent alreadyalong with fellow MIT grad students Austin Che, Barry Canton, and Jason Kelly, and their graduate adviser, Professor Tom Knight. They started with a simple but revolutionary goal: help people design and build organisms. A decade later, Ginkgo achieved unicorn statusa private company valued at over $1 billionand it finds itself at the fore of the synthetic biology revolution with customers seeking to build organisms for use in fields as diverse as health, food, agriculture, cosmetics and materials.

Shetty has been through the whole journey and has been a major influence in the synthetic biology community. She had a major role in the first International Genetic Engineering Machine (iGEM) Competition with her co-founders. In 2008, she was named one of Eight People Inventing the Future by Forbes and, in 2011, one of the 100 Most Creative People in Business by Fast Company.

Shetty is an upbeat talker. If theres any stress or jadedness from navigating a company from birth to unicorn over a decade, it doesnt show. There is a sincere enthusiasm in her voice, especially when we discuss the science. When I caught up with her a few weeks back, one of things I wanted to know was: what do you do when you realize youre riding a biotech unicorn?

What was the moment when you realized that Ginkgo was going to be big?

It was when we closed our Series B financing. It was a $45 million round or roughly speaking, so that was more dollars dumped into our bank account at one instance than we ever had before.

My thought was, well pretty serious people withserious capital are choosing to take a bet on us.

This was confirmed for her in 2017 when Bayer chose to work with Ginkgo on engineering biologicals for agriculture, proving the intrinsic value of their platform and cementing Ginkgo as a platform company.

It proved three things at the time. One, that engineered microbes in the environment could be a thing, that [they] could be a product category. There are serious people taking serious bets that we're going to be able to release engineered microbes in the future. Two, that Ginkgos platform had value even in areas that we hadn't previously been in. Three, it proved to the world that Ginkgo was really a platform company, that we weren't simply going after a few products in the industrial biotech market.

It wasnt easy sailing for Gingko from the start though. Right after the company was founded, the global economy took a nosedive.

I think we incorporated in July of 2008 and, like literally, within the next month or two, the fiscal crisis hit, says Shetty.

In many ways this was not the ideal time to be starting a business and looking for investment, leading to creative thinking in getting the company going.

What did you learn in those early days that biotech companies could benefit from?

At the time everybody said that the way to start a biotech start-up is to go raise money immediately because you need some amount of money to be able to start a lab and get going. The thing I had to learn and realize was that no, actually, it is possible. If you're creative enough, savvy enough and patient enough, then you can in fact bootstrap even a biotech start-up.

Shetty stresses the importance of having the space to figure out their technology platform and business model and ask themselves how to take it forward. Having Knight and his wealth of experience on the team certainly helped.

Tom always said Oh, its a good idea to bootstrap in the early years regardless, based on his prior experience starting companies. But circumstances certainly reinforced that and I think that was really helpful that we spent the first few years bootstrapping the company.

Was it natural having your former advisor on the team?

Yeah, very natural. Tom, hes a pretty low-key guy, but he's also been very ahead of his time when it comes to thinking about the technology and technology trends. Early on it was great because Tom has started and run a company before and there were some obvious pitfalls that he could help us avoid and talk a bit about options.

And your other co-founders, what is it about them that makes them special?

I think probably for me the biggest thing is that we've now been working together for almost 20 years, says Shetty, referencing their time at MIT in the years before Ginkgo.

And even now, if I'm struggling with something or I'm trying to dig through how to solve a problem, I would want to talk to Tom, Barry, Austin, and Jason. I always come away having learned something or clarified my thinking or somehow changed how I was approaching a problem. To me, that is the real hallmark of excellence.

Despite all those shared experiences, they still learn from one another and solve problems together. Shetty considers her colleagues to be mentors too, saying shes benefitted from them as much as from her supervisors through the years.

Anybody can be a mentor, she says.

They are all engineers at heart, so the most exciting things for the Ginkgo team are around potentially world-changing technologies that can jump quickly from dream to reality.

What are the engineering challenges youre most excited about these days?

Bayer and Ginkgo, through our joint venture in Joyn, are going after nitrogen fixation. It has long been a dream of folks. Could we reduce fertilizer usage by using biological nitrogen fixation instead?

This project has been close to Shetty since her academic days, but therapeutics and Ginkgos collaboration with Synlogic, who develop bacteria as living medicines, has also piqued her interest.

There's all these areas of metabolism that lead to devastating diseases and the idea that you could engineer microbes to basically treat them is a cool idea!

Is there any particular problem youd like to solve through engineering biology?

How do you think about leveraging biology to make a positive impact on the environment? That's one I think has been on our wish list for a while.

Enabling the future of synthetic biology is a big part of how Ginkgo operates, even since the early days. The founders were involved in establishing iGEM and their platform is well suited to collaborative efforts.

How do you see Ginkgos role to give back and enable the next generation of synthetic biology?

I think one thing that has been a longstanding ask from folks in the community is how are we going to open up our cell programming platform to more people? Early on, that seemed crazy to even think about, she says, citing the skill set required to use and build it. I think we've come a long way since then so we can say actually maybe we get started thinking about opening up the platform to more folks.

Shetty says initial collaborations like Joyn, (Ginkgo spin-out) Motif, and Synlogic mean they can learn how to open their platform better. Relationships with accelerators like YCombinator and Petri are the next steps. They acknowledge that opening their platform will only benefit and accelerate biological engineering.

Our conversation then moves onto a more human element of running a company, a reminder that its never all about the science.

Do you have any mistakes or regrets in how youve done things?

The biggest regret I have is actually not thinking consciously about diversity and inclusion issues earlier in Ginkgos history. We started thinking about them seriously in about 2015 or so, when we were still relatively small, about 30 people. But we could have thought about diversity and inclusion even earlier.

Shetty reveals its easier to change the balance in a company when its just a handful of people.

Can we be doing better on diversity as a whole?

I would say that synthetic biology as a field has always been pretty good in that it thought about issues outside of just the science and engineering itself. I think the field always fosters that broader perspective. So I think it's been more natural and more normal to think about diversity and inclusion issues in the synthetic biology community as a result, says Shetty, We're by no means beyond reproach but there's more of a willingness to talk about these issues and really try to take proactive steps.

Do you have any advice for those starting a company?

The thing I like to tell people is that, if you're going to start a company, don't do it for the money. There are a lot of easier ways to make money in the world. Start a company because you think a company is really the best way to go tackle a problem that you're passionate about.

Any final thoughts?

I think that we've come a long way in terms of our ability to engineer biology, but we still have a long way to go. Fundamentally, biology is still not yet a predictable engineering discipline and its important to remember that. Because its still not yet predictable, we have to iterate through different designs and search for a functional design whenever we're trying to engineer a GMO. We have more work to yet do to bring down the cost of doing genetic engineering so that we can explore more and more of design space.

Follow me on twitter at @johncumbers and @synbiobeta. Subscribe to my weekly newsletters in synthetic biology and space settlement.

Thank you to David Kirk and Kevin Costa for additional research and reporting in this article. Im the founder of SynBioBeta, and some of the companies that I write about including Ginkgo Bioworks are sponsors of the SynBioBeta conference and weekly digest heres the full list of SynBioBeta sponsors.

Read more from the original source:
An Interview with Ginkgo Bioworks Reshma Shetty On Co-Founding Synthetic Biologys First Unicorn - Forbes

The legendary Bulletin of the Atomic Scientists (BAS), which tracks issues related to technology and global security, has issued a terrifying warning: We are less than two minutes to midnight on the Doomsday clock. Its very bad news, representing the most dangerous situation that humanity has ever faced.

What makes this moment so perilous? The scientists statement includes warnings over the cyber-weaponization of information, the spread of artificial intelligence (AI) in making military decisions, the destruction of treaties meant to limit the spread of nuclear weapons, the abandonment of global agreements to limit climate chaos, the spread of genetic engineering and synthetic biology technologies, and more. It does not account for the escalated likelihood of atomic reactor disasters, but based on at least one BAS publication, it should.

Since 1947, this prestigious band of elite scientists and global thinkers has been putting out a clock meant to time the peril of a global apocalypse. First issued at the dawn of the Cold War, it has mostly focused on the dangers of atomic warfare. Its countdown to Armageddon has been set as far away as 17 minutes from midnight, a hypothetical time of human extinction. That relatively optimistic assessment came in 1991, with the fall of the Soviet Union and the definitive end of the Cold War.

Get the latest news and thought-provoking analysis from Truthout.

In 2018, the BAS set it at two minutes, the closest to catastrophe it had ever been. They repeated that estimate in 2019. But this years announcement has taken us inside the two-minute warning with a hair-raising litany of likely lethal catastrophes set to occur within 100 theoretical seconds.

Donald Trump is mentioned only once by name, in conjunction with his decision to trash the Paris Accords on climate change and greenhouse gas emissions. The scientists urge whoever wins the 2020 election to reinstate the U.S. commitment limiting carbon and other climate-destroying emissions. The BAS also cites Brazilian dictator Jair Bolsonaro for his decision to allow the destruction of the Amazon, with huge impacts on climate.

The BAS strives to maintain a non-partisan image. But Trumps presence in the White House clearly hangs over any assessment of humankinds survivability. The specter of his finger on the nuclear, ecological and financial buttons for the next four years hangs over humankind like a pall but goes otherwise unmentioned in this Doomsday assessment.

Also unmentioned is the question of more than 450 atomic power reactors worldwide. A small but vocal outlier coterie has argued that nuclear energy combats global warming by emitting less carbon that coal burners. But the Bulletin recently enshrined a major assessment by the esteemed Dr. Robert Jay Lifton, warning that commercial reactors pose a serious threat to human survival on this planet.

Published in August 2019, The false promise of nuclear power in an age of climate change argues that the 450 atomic reactors now deteriorating worldwide pose an existential threat to our survival. Writing with Professor Naomi Oreskes, Lifton warns that atomic energy is expensive and poses grave dangers to our physical and psychological well-being. Citing costs of nuclear juice at $100 per megawatt-hour versus $50 for solar and $30-40 for onshore wind, the authors say that the industry suffers from a negative learning curve, driving nuke costs constantly higher while those for renewables head consistently down.

Citing the unsolved problem of radioactive waste management, the BAS article warns of the ongoing impacts of major disasters like Fukushima and Chernobyl (and potentially more to come), whose fallout kills humans and does untold damage to the global ecology. Lipton and Oreskes say we need to free ourselves from the false hope that a technology designed for ultimate destruction can lead to our salvation. They favor making renewable energies integral to the American way of life.

In addition to nuclear and climate issues, the 2020 Doomsday assessment emphasizes some relatively new concerns. In the last year, it says, many governments used cyber-enabled disinformation campaigns to sow distrust in institutions and among nations, undermining domestic and international efforts to foster peace and protect the planet.

By attacking both science and the fabric of international peace accords, some global leaders have created a situation that will, if unaddressed, lead to catastrophe, sooner rather than later.

That situation includes AI and hypersonic warfare, both escalating at a frenzied pace. Now used in ultra-fast attacks, AI is dangerously vulnerable to hacking and manipulation while making kill decisions without human supervision. In nuclear command and control systems, the BAS warns, research and experience have demonstrated the vulnerability of these systems to hacking and manipulation.

This is an absolutely terrifying brew. The spread of disinformation, the contempt for science and expert opinion, the undermining of global agreements on arms control, and climate change are all deadly. Add in the new world of AI and hyper-sonic warfare, then pile on autocrats like Trump and Bolsonaro, and finish with the certainty of more disasters from 450 crumbling, obsolete atomic reactors.

All in all, its small wonder the Bulletin has taken us past the two-minute warning. It will clearly take every ounce of our activist strength to save our species from the final whistle.

Read more from the original source:
Trump's Presidency Brings Us Closer to Midnight on the Doomsday Clock - Truthout

Even for the most elite of bacteria-killers, these superbugs were a challenge.

Theyd delayed Mallory Smith from getting a lung transplant, and when shed finally had the surgery, the bacteria quickly migrated into her new lungs. They shrugged off cocktail after cocktail of antibiotics. Finally, Smiths father proposed an unusual last resort: finding viruses that parasitize bacteria and injecting them into his daughter. But the experimental treatment came too late. Smith died on Nov. 15, 2017, a little over a month after shed turned 25.

Yet her bacterial infection lived on, passed from scientist to scientist, from freezer to freezer, traveling from Smiths hospital room in Pittsburgh, Pa., to a lab in Ann Arbor, Mich., eventually landing in a Petri dish in Jerusalem, some 6,000 miles away. Now, microbiologists at Israels Hebrew University have described a new virus thats especially good at combating Smiths superbug.

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Its a phage that kills the strain that killed Mallory, said Ronen Hazan, who led the team. This was the best one and we decided to name it after her.

It isnt the first bacteriophage as such bacteria-fighting viruses are known that can work against this sort of intractable infection. After all, there are trillions of phages out there, feasting on the bugs that fill our sewage and hunting for hosts in puddles after rain. Even if theyre extreme specialists, attacking only specific strains of a specific species of bacteria, theres usually more than one that infects a particular superbug. Smiths doctors had tried out a few that may have done the trick if injected earlier.

Yet the mere fact that researchers are looking for phages to try as therapies is a sign of how much has changed since and because of Smiths death. The hope is that next time theres a case like hers, a potentially lifesaving treatment will be ready sooner.

The recent surge of phage therapy enthusiasm is a revival of sorts. In the 1930s, you could get phage concoctions to treat everything from dysentery to urinary tract infections to outbreaks of the skin. But then, in the 1940s, penicillin hit the market, and antibiotics became the rage. Eastern European researchers continued to use phages as treatment, but such Soviet science was viewed with suspicion back in the United States.

It was only with the rise of antibiotic-resistant bacteria that Western interest in these viruses-as-treatments began to brew again. Even so, in 2017, many still considered the idea esoteric at best. That was part of the holdup for Smith. There was no established method for finding, purifying, and delivering the viruses her doctors hoped might save her life. When her father reached out to scientists who had a bit of experience with phage therapy, all they could do was send out a frantic flurry of emails and tweets.

Smiths story helped change that. Shed been born with cystic fibrosis, a genetic illness that fills the lungs with a particularly gluey sort of mucus. Not only does that make it hard to breathe it also acts as a cushy home for bacteria. When two friends whod met through swing dancing one a grad student, the other a tech consultant read about Smiths desperate attempt to find a virus that would beat back the bacteria within her, they created an online phage directory to help speed things up. Then, in 2018, the University of California, San Diego, established the first phage therapy center in the U.S.

Yet for a patient with Burkholderia cepacia the kind of bacterial infection that Smith had finding the right phage in time is hardly a shoo-in. Partially thats because its not the most common superbug infection, even among cystic fibrosis patients, so not all that many researchers are working on treating it with phage therapy. But its also because B. cepacia is an especially tricky type of bacteria to phage-hunt for. Some phages the ones that are easiest to use as therapies enter a superbug, replicate like crazy, and cause the host to explode. Others, though, simply integrate peaceably into the bacterial genome. And the phages discovered for B. cepacia often fall in the peaceful-coexistence camp. Plus, for other kinds of bacteria Pseudomonas, say, or Klebsiella a phage might be active against a large swathe of strains; for Burkholderia, Hazan explained, the viruses are choosier.

Thats where his lab comes in. The teams hope is to build up a library of B. cecpacia-killing phages that can be used in cocktails whenever a case like Smiths pops up. To do that, the scientists have collected all sorts of substances most people would rather not deal with. They take the used saliva, urine, and fecal samples from hospitals. Instead of discarding them, we take them and search for phages, Hazan explained. Were looking in water bodies, small lakes. After the rain, in puddles. Whenever a student goes on vacation we ask him, Bring some samples of soil or water or whatever!

They also regularly take wastewater from West Jerusalems sewage treatment plant, which is where the phage active against Smiths bacteria came from. Everybody complains about the smell, but we are finding gold in that sewage, Hazan added.

Three Hebrew University students Chani Rakov, Ortal Yerushalmy, and Leron Khalifa first isolated the phage in question this past December. When they put it into a Petri dish covered in the kind of bacteria that had been collected from Smiths lungs, it began to create clear spots where the superbug was dying off. The decision was unanimous that it should be named BCMallory1, for the initials of the bacteria its active against, and the name of the person who helped inspire the search.

When she heard the news, Smiths mother began to cry. To her, it meant that other families might not have to live through what she did. Its a very bittersweet feeling, said Diane Shader Smith. You know the suffering, and you dont want anyone to suffer, but also you think, Mallory could have lived.

Because bacteria often develop resistance to phages as well, many researchers think its best to deliver a cocktail of phages alongside antibiotics, and Hazan plans to keep searching. Hes also thinking about the possibility of genetically engineering some of the phages his team finds, to make them safer or more efficient bacteria-killers.

We dont want to have another Mallory Smith, said Steffanie Strathdee, co-director of the Center for Innovative Phage Applications and Therapeutics, at University of California, San Diego, and co-author of The Perfect Predator, a book about how she saved her husbands life through a similar phage hunt in 2016. Smiths case still haunts her, she said: I think about her every day. We came so close to saving her life.

See more here:
Superbug treatment named for patient who inspired its discovery - STAT

With Trumps trial in the Senate going on, it feels like a good time to talk about random news items. I want to distract mystelf from President Trumps pending acquittal.

I spelled mystelf correctly. Mystelf is a legitimate word I made up yesterday to mean my stupid self.

The first news item that caught my eye was about scientists discovery that tardigrades arent as indestructible as weve been told. Tardigrades are those little microscopic animals also called water-bears who look kind of cute with pudgy feet and can survive all kinds of cold. They can survive a drought. Theyve even been subjected to the vacuum of space and lived and shown no ill effects.

But nobody until now, apparently, thought of cooking them. Well, they dont look yummy, Ill admit.

Still, youd think in all this time, someone would have wondered how well theyd do in the noonday sun on a Moroccan summer day. It turns out they cant take it.

Good news for me. The research shows that my stupid body temperature is just the right amount of heat to kill off any tardigrades that find their way deep inside me. It would only take a week or two. Excellent. I had wondered if a tardigrade infestation was possible. I can now relax, safe knowing they could only live skin-deep in me.

My favorite government agency is DARPA, the Defense Advanced Research Projects Agency. The agency solicits and supports research of all sorts, but usually theyre looking for a defense angle. The reason we can use the internet is because of a project of theirs back when the agency was called ARPA. What was then called the ARPA-net was thought a great system for communication that could function even during a nuclear attack. That was before Russian hackers, malware, denial of service attacks, etc.

Whenever youre bored and fed up with looking at cute cat videos, go to the DARPA website, click the Our Research link and browse all the projects they have going. It gets wild.

You may know some of them. Boston Dynamic Robots came out of one of their projects: robots that walk and run on all fours and can get back up when theyre down. DARPA has pushed a lot of Star Wars-ish projects like that.

Lately theres been a rash of projects involving genetic modification of plants and animals for defense purposes. One of them is called the APT project. APT stands for Advanced Plant Technologies. The goal of the project is to genetically engineer a variety of plants that can be used as sensors to detect chemical, biological, radiological, nuclear, and explosive (CBRNE) threats to protect deployed troops and the homeland. See why I like reading these things? Troops and the homeland. Sheer poetry.

Another one of these is the ELM project (yes, they all get acronyms like that its so precious): Engineered Living Materials. This week there was news about the engineering of a kind of living brick. Its a brick you can use like any brick: You can throw it at someones head or use it as a paperweight, but its ingredients include a kind of genetically modified bacteria. The bricks are alive.When you need more bricks, you can break them up and the pieces will grow new bricks. You do have to feed and water them. They eat sand and a certain kind of gelatin, and guzzle CO2. I want one for a pet. I will call her Cyan.

The final news item that caught my eye skirted dangerously close to the Senate trial. I almost looked away in horror when I saw it concerned John Roberts, the chief justice of the U.S. Supreme Court, who is now presiding over the trial. But it wasnt about that. It was about John Roberts dropping the phrase OK, Boomer in arguments in an age discrimination case before the court.

He was wondering whether saying OK, Boomer to a job applicant in an interview could be evidence for age discrimination later if the applicant gets turned down.

Im glad its getting unpopular to be a Baby Boomer. One of the things Ive hated all my life is there have always been too many of us. Every other generation gets assigned about 10 years. Boomers got 1945 to 1964 20 years. Thats not right. All you people born 1955 to 1964 (that includes John Roberts), I now proclaim you the After-Shock Generation.

Dr. Wes Browning is a one time math professor who has experienced homelessness several times. He supplied the art for the first cover of Real Change in November of 1994 and has been involved with the organization ever since. This is his weekly column,Adventures in Irony, a dry verbal romp of the absurd. He can be reached at drwes (at) realchangenews (dot) org

Read the fullJan. 22-28 issue.

2020Real Change. All rights reserved.Real Change is a non-profit organization advocating for economic, social and racial justice since 1994.Learn moreabout Real Change anddonate nowto support independent, award-winning journalism.

Originally posted here:
You can send your tardigrades to space and back, but don't eat one. Got that, boomer? - Real Change News

(Inside Science) -- Castles made of sand could, with the help of bacteria, grow copies of themselves and become as strong as the cement that commonly holds bricks together, a new study suggests.

Such living materials could one day help people colonize Mars, scientists added.

After water, concrete is the most used material on Earth, at a rate of about 3 metric tons used per year for every person in the world. Cement, the primary component of concrete, is the oldest artificial construction material, dating back to the Roman Empire.

Cement and concrete have changed little as technology for more than a century. Now scientists are seeking inspiration from natural processes, such as the way colonies of coral polyps build reefs.

"We want to blur the boundaries between the natural world and the built environment, between what is nonliving and what is living, and create a material that displays both structural and biological functions," said materials scientist Wil Srubar, who heads the Living Materials Laboratory at the University of Colorado Boulder.

The researchers started with sand, gelatin and a kind of photosynthetic bacteria known asSynechococcusthat is widespread in ocean surface waters. The gelatin retained moisture and nutrients for the bacteria to proliferate and mineralize calcium carbonate in a way that is similar to how seashells form.

In experiments, the resulting material was roughly as strong as typical cement-based mortars.

"I have a small cube of the material on my desk that is 2 inches across that I can stand on," Srubar said.

The material not only is alive, but can reproduce. When researchers halve one of the bricks, the bacteria can help grow those halves into two complete bricks when supplied with extra sand and gelatin. Instead of manufacturing bricks one by one, the researchers showed they could grow up to eight bricks from one.

"Conventional manufacturing approaches make one widget at a time," Srubar said. "By using one brick to grow two bricks, and then four, and then so on, we can explore the idea of exponential manufacturing of building materials. Given that time is money, I think anyone involved in manufacturing would find speeding up manufacturing time very interesting."

Previous research used bacteria to repair cracks in concrete and oil and gas wells by mineralizing calcium carbonate. However, such work typically used microbes that fare very poorly in typical materials used like cement, which are highly acidic -- only 0.1 percent to 0.4 percent of such bacteria survived after 30 days. In contrast, in this new work, 9% to 14 percent of the bacteria remained viable after 30 days assuming at least 50 percent humidity was maintained.

One challenge the scientists face is that the material needs to get completely dried out to reach its maximum strength, but such drying stresses out the bacteria. To help keep the microbes alive, the researchers currently have to control the humidity surrounding the material.

"We're looking to create a desiccation-tolerant strain of bacteria so that we can get full structural capacity while also enhancing microbial viability in super-dry conditions," Srubar said.

All in all, "we're particularly excited about the possibilities of this material technology in austere environments with limited resources," Srubar said. "If you have microorganisms that can grow structural materials in remote places, that could help build everything from a military installation to human settlements on other planets."

Srubar said the current research acts as a proof of concept for the stronger compounds that could be made with the technique.

Ultimately the scientists envision using microbes that not only help build materials but impart structures with extra biological functions.

"You can imagine bacteria that provide materials with self-healing capabilities, or can sense and respond to toxins in the air, or can interact with the environment in other ways," Srubar said. "The sky's the limit with creativity."

"I find it exciting that this new work develops materials that are truly living, in that the microorganisms incorporated into their materials survived at very high rates over time periods of weeks," said Anne Meyer, a synthetic biologist at the University of Rochester in New York, who did not take part in this research. "Creating a truly living material allows the possibility of using genetic engineering techniques to add additional behaviors to the microbes living within the material. Could you incorporate a microbe that could respond to environmental cues to change the toughness or stiffness of the bacteria?"

She added that it might be possible to combine the new research with work from her lab that uses 3D printers to build shapes from bacteria.

The scientists detailedtheir findingsonline Jan. 15 in the journalMatter.

[This article originally appeared on Inside Science. Read the original here.]

Continue reading here:
This Regenerative Building Material is Made From Sand and Bacteria - Discover Magazine

A Trillion ToxicGallons

Oil and gas wells pump out nearly a trillion gallons of wastewater a year, Rolling Stone reported. That's literally a river of waste enough to replace all the water flowing from the Mississippi River into the Gulf of Mexico for more than two and a half days.

Much of that wastewater, often referred to by the industry as "brine," carries high levels, not of familiar table salt, but of corrosive salts found deep below the Earth's surface, as well as toxic compounds and carcinogens.

That water can also carry serious amounts of radioactive materials. The Rolling Stone report, labeled "sobering" by the Poynter Institute, described levels of radium as high as 28,500 picocuries per liter in brine from the Marcellus Shale, underlying Pennsylvania, Ohio, New York, and West Virginia, levels hundreds of times as much as the Nuclear Regulatory Commission would allow in industrial discharges from other industries.

The oil and gas industry's waste, however, isn't regulated like most other industry's wastes, slipping instead through loopholes carved out in the nation's cornerstone environmental laws, including exemptions for the industry in federal laws covering hazardous waste.

"If I had a beaker of that on my desk and accidentally dropped it on the floor, they would shut the place down," Yuri Gorby, a microbiologist who'd studied radioactive materials at the U.S. Geological Survey and Department of Energy, told the magazine. "And if I dumped it down the sink, I could go to jail."

Excerpt from a 1982 report prepared for the American Petroleum Institute and titled "An Analysis of the Impact of the Regulation of 'Radionuclides' as a Hazardous Air Pollutant on the Petroleum Industry."

API's report focused on the possibility that the federal government might step in and regulate those radioactive materials under the Clean Air Act or under federal Superfund laws.

"Depending on the mode of definition," the report adds, "very small quantities of petroleum products could easily contain reportable quantities of [radioactive materials]." A chart lists amounts as small as a half a barrel of crude oil or 17 cubic feet of natural gas as containing "one reportable quantity of uranium or radon" under the most restrictive definition.

The report labels uranium "a somewhat different dilemma" than radon gas. "We estimated earlier in this paper that significant quantities of uranium potentially enter our refineries via crude oil," the report continues. "Little is known of its fate, however."

"Since the law of conservation of matter must apply, it can only end up in the product, the process waste, remain in the process equipment, or escape into the environment," the report notes, calling for more study, particularly of the industry's refining equipment and waste.

1982 API Analysis of Radionuclides in Oil and Gas Industry (PDF)
1982 API Analysis of Radionuclides in Oil and Gas Industry (Text)

Some of the report's most stark language warned about the possibility of federal regulation of the industry's radioactive wastes.

"It is concluded that the regulation of radionuclides could impose a severe burden on API member companies," the report says, "and it would be prudent to monitor closely both regulatory actions."

API spokesperson Reid Porter provided to DeSmog the group's response to the Rolling Stone investigation.

"We take each report of safety or health issues related to energy development very seriously," Porter said. "Nothing is more important than the health and safety of our workers, the local environment, and the communities where we live, operate, and raise families. Natural gas and oil companies meet or exceed strict federal and state regulations and also undergo regular inspections to ensure that all materials are managed, stored, transported, and disposed of safely. Through regular monitoring, ongoing testing, and strict handling protocols, industry operations are guided by internationally recognized standards and best practices to provide for safe working environments and public safety."

API also pointed to a one-page document titled "NORM [naturally occurring radioactive materials] in the Oil and Natural Gas Industry." As of publication time, API had not responded to questions from DeSmog regarding the 1982 report.

10 Years Later, Hazards 'Widespread'; 20 Years Later, Workers Sue OverCancers

Over a decade later, problems persisted, other documents indicate. "Contamination of oil and gas facilities with naturally occurring radioactive materials (NORM) is widespread," a 1993 paper published by the Society of Petroleum Engineers warned. "Some contamination may be sufficiently severe that maintenance and other personnel may be exposed to hazardous concentration."

Nonetheless, the paper focused on the potential for "over-regulation."

"Where possible, industry input should be directed to minimize an over-regulation of NORM contamination in the industry," author Peter Gray, an expert on radioactivity who formerly worked for Phillips Petroleum Co., wrote. He added that concentrations of radioactive contamination at the time were "relatively low and do not usually present a health hazard to the public or to most personnel in the industry," but added that some facilities "may be hazardous to maintenance personnel in particular."

Peter Gray NORM Contamination in the Petroleum Industry, 1993 Society of Petroleum Engineers (PDF)
Peter Gray NORM Contamination in the Petroleum Industry, 1993 Society of Petroleum Engineers (Text)

The 1993 paper notes that some oil-producing states had passed or were considering passing laws to protect against the industry's radioactive wastes, noting in particular that Louisiana and Mississippi had regulations in effect, and that Louisiana had required "radiation surveys of every petroleum facility in the state."

But state and federal regulators largely failed to act, Rolling Stone found. "Of 21 significant oil-and-gas-producing states, only five have provisions addressing workers, and just three include protections for the public, according to research by [Elizabeth Ann Glass] Geltman, the public-health expert," the magazine reported. "Much of the legislation that does exist seems hardly sufficient."

In documents dated nearly two decades later, from a 2011 lawsuit brought by more than 30 Louisiana oilfield workers who'd developed cancer, plaintiff's experts described as resulting from their exposure to radioactive materials at work.

The 2013 plaintiff's expert report describes in detail how jobs like roustabout, roughneck, and derrickman can expose workers to radioactive materials, including a sludge where radioactive elements concentrate that collects inside pipes and so-called "pipe scale," or crusty deposits that also attract radioactive materials. The case ended in October 2016, following a long string of settlements on unspecified terms by individual plaintiffs in the case, public court records show.

OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURES to RADIOACTIVE SCALE and SLUDGE Coleman Et Al v H C (PDF)
OCCUPATIONAL EXPOSURES to RADIOACTIVE SCALE and SLUDGE Coleman Et Al v H C (Text)

Tracking theTrucks

Nobel's Rolling Stone expos depicts radioactive drilling waste sloshing into a striking array of corners.

For example, to keep dust down, the "brine" can be spread on roads, like a stretch in Pennsylvania where Nobel describes a group of Amish girls strolling barefoot. Nobel adds that contractors pick up waste directly from the wellhead and that in 2016 alone, more than 10.5 million gallons were sprayed on roads in the northwestern corner of Pennsylvania.

The waste has also been sold at Lowe's, bottled as "AquaSalina" and marketed as a pet-safe way to fight ice and salt, though an Ohio state lab found it contains radium at more than 40 times the levels the Nuclear Regulatory Commission allows in discharge from industry. And the radium-laced waste is spilled from trucks transporting it, in potential what the article indicates may be a violation of federal law.

One brine truck driver, identified only as a man named Peter from Ohio, started taking his own samples after being told by another worker with a radiation detector that he'd been hauling "one of the 'hottest loads' he'd ever seen," Rolling Stone reports. "A lot of guys are coming up with cancer, or sores and skin lesions that take months to heal," Peter told the magazine. Tests by a university lab found radium levels as high as 8,500 picocuries per liter, the article adds.

One expert, scientist Marvin Reisnikoff, who'd served as one of the plaintiff's experts in the lawsuit brought by the Louisiana oilfield workers and co-authored the 2013 report, told Rolling Stone that a standard brine truck rolling through Pennsylvania might be carrying radioactive wastewater at levels a thousand times higher than those allowed under federal Department of Transportation (DOT) limits. But, a DOT spokesperson told Rolling Stone, federal regulators rely heavily on industry self-reporting, and the rules seem generally unenforced.

Environmental groups immediately called for congressional hearings into the drilling industry's radioactive wastes.

"This alarming report brings into stark relief what we already knew to be true," Food & Water Watch Policy Director Mitch Jones said in a statement calling for a congressional investigation, "that highly toxic and radioactive waste generated by fossil fuel drilling and fracking cannot be stored or disposed of safely, and in fact is often being intentionally dispersed in our communities."

"It is imperative that Congress hold hearings soon to examine and expose the full extent of the threat oil and gas waste poses to families and workers throughout America," he added, "and take urgent action to halt fracking and the legal and illegal dispersal of the waste currently taking place."

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Scientists Combine AI With Biology to Create Xenobots, the World's First 'Living Robots' - EcoWatch

A nearly invisible bite delivered by a tiny mosquito has the capacity to trigger the fear of dengue in a human being who is millions of times larger than the insect. Such is the deadliness of the disease. However, one may not have to be harrowed by the fear of contracting the disease anymore.

In an effort to combat the spread of dengue, and counter the virus causing it, scientists at CSIRO, and the University of California San Diego have created a breed of genetically modified mosquito that is resistant to spreading all the four serotypes of the disease.

Talking about the research that is the first engineered approach towards targeting all the four serotypes, Dr Prasad Paradkar, senior research scientist, said in a statement, "In this study we used recent advances in genetic engineering technologies to successfully genetically modify a mosquito, the Aedes aegypti, with reduced ability to acquire and transmit the dengue virus."

Why genetically engineer a mosquito?

Over 390 million people are infected with dengue every year. It is caused by the Dengue virusDENV. Mosquitoes are the only known vectors carrying the disease, only other exception being transmission from mother to foetus. The virus has four serotypes: DENV1, DENV2, DENV3 and DENV4. Therefore, an individual can contract the disease four times due to the prevalence of four distinct strains.

Over half of the world population is at the risk of infection, and the rate of infection has seen an alarming rise over the years. Globally, nearly be $40 billion are lost as a result of dengue every year. This the primary motivation behind the development of the new mosquito, as a resistant vector will be unable to carry the virus.

"Mosquito-transmitted viruses are expected to climb over the coming years, which is why CSIRO is focussed on developing new ways to help solve this global challenge," said Paradkar.

Unlike previous attempts at synthetically engineering mosquitoes that were limited by the ability to target only one or two of the major serotypes, this breed of mosquito has shown the ability to resist all the four. As the scientists point out, this presents the future potential to fight all forms of mosquito-borne illnesses.

"This breakthrough work also has the potential to have broader impacts on controlling other mosquito-transmitted viruses," said Omar Akbari, co-author of the study.

Akbari also added that the research is in the preliminary stages of testing procedures to simultaneously negate mosquitoes against dengue and an array of mosquito-borne viruses such as chikungunya, Zika, and yellow fever.

The disease is typically characterised by symptoms such as severe fever, muscle aches, and headaches. More severe forms of the disease can cause shock, vomiting, haemorrhage, and sometimes, death.

There is no known treatment for specific neutralisation of the disease. Also, there are no vaccinations available against the disease. Treatment includes prescription of drugs such as acetaminophen, also known as paracetamol, to soothe the pain. Hydration through intake of fluids and occasionally intravenously is another remedy.

Stressing on this immediate need for a cure, Paradkar concluded, "There is a pressing global demand for effective strategies to control the mosquitoes that spread the dengue virus, as there are currently no known treatments and the vaccine that is available is only partially effective."

Originally posted here:
Dengue breakthrough: Scientists develop genetically engineered mosquito to combat the disease - International Business Times, Singapore Edition

There are many pressing areas in need of fresh theological thinking in light of a rapidly changing world. The redefinition of family, the nature of sexual identity, artificial intelligence, genetic engineering

and the digital church.

One of the more pressing concerns will be how much tech can and should be used and how in light of an orthodox and robust ecclesiology. Is someone considered attending if its through an internet connection and a virtual reality (VR) headset? Is it appropriate to perform a digital baptism where avatars are immersed in water? What of a completely computer-generated church using VR and augmented reality (AR)? Which, I might add, already exists.

On the most basic of levels, what is to be thought when people participate through an online service but consider themselves a part of a churchthe so-called bedside Baptists and pillow Presbyterians? Or using apps to attend digital events and enter into corporate prayer through emojis and avatars?

There will be a knee-jerk reaction against such innovations, but there can be little doubt that a new way of doing and being church is being forged through technological innovation and an increasingly digital world. In other words, instead of a knee-jerk negative reaction out of distaste or stylistic preference, it demands vigorous theological reflection that takes the digital revolution seriously.

A single blog is grossly insufficient to tackle this task, but perhaps I could suggest one way of thinking about one of the many questions being raised: If someone is involved in an online campus, should they be encouraged to participate in the Lords Supper as they watch?

Again, this is not about a full-blown theology of the online church, much less the only kind of question that can be raised. So lets just treat it as a sample question in need of theological reflection in light of the digital revolution.

My own conclusion? A qualified yes.

When I was in seminary and pastor of a county-seat First Baptist Church, one of the more meaningful ministries of the deacons was taking communion to shut-ins (I dont know whether shut-ins is still the correct term, but that is what we called them.). We offered communion, or the Lords Supper, once a month. We had members of the church who were physically unable to attendthey were in the hospital, in a nursing home, or in their own homes, but not able to physically leave.

So on Sunday afternoons, following the Sunday morning services that we had communion, the deacons of the church fanned out across our little town and brought a communion kit with bread and grape juice to those people so they could also partake.

The deacons spent a few minutes talking with them, read scripture and prayed, reminded them of the churchs love and concern for them, and then shared the bread and the juice with them. It was beautiful and so much the epitome of the church and the sacrament.

And theologically, what could possibly be the problem? They were members/attenders of the church, unable to physically attend and we, as the church, went to them on the days we celebrated communion to include them in the spirit of community and joint celebration of the sacrament.

Fast forward.

Youre celebrating communion as a church in the 2020s, and you have people unable to attend in person who are joining you online. They may be in a hospital, in a nursing home, a shut-in, traveling on business in a hotel room, on vacation and watching as a family, or living in a place where they have no church home and the online service has been their lifelinebecoming the only church home they are able to have.

What do you do?

Could you use the same theological and ecclesiastical reasoning that was applied by my former church?

What if an online campus pastor were to say, For those of you joining us online who cannot be with us physically, go get a bit of bread and some juice or wine, and when we partake as a church, join us as part of that community.

Why is that different from deacons taking it to them?

Today its just the internet taking it to them and they self-serve the elements. Its still done in full honor of the sacrament, under the leadership of pastors, under the authority of the church and in the spirit of community.

So are there limits to online participation in such things as the sacraments? I would argue that there are. Take, for example, baptism. Do we say, For those of you watching online, feel free to fill your bathtub and baptize yourself as we perform the sacrament of baptism as part of this service?

Heavens, no. Why? Because the goal is to think about each and every question being raised by the digital revolution and the online church both biblically and theologically. And the nature of the sacrament of baptism is that it is meant to be a public profession of faith. That means in front of other people. Its for this same reason that you cannot marry yourself. When a couple marries they make public vows, and it is the public nature of the vows that matters.

Such conclusions may not satisfy everyone, nor do they reflect the way to think theologically about all aspects of the online church. Each will bring its own set of unique theological challenges. But perhaps this shows how we are going to have to reflect, and reflect deeply, about the digital world and the churchs operation in that digital world.

These three things I know: We cannot bury our head in the sand as if there are no new questions being posed to the doctrine of the church (there are); we cannot march blindly forward into the digital world as if theology doesnt matter (it does); and we cannot restrain all ecclesiastical innovation as if there hasnt been a digital revolution

(because there has).

James Emery White

Sources

Dalvin Brown, Online Church: Ministries Use VR, Apps to Deliver Digital Services and Virtual Baptisms, USA Today, December 27, 2019, read online.

About the Author

James Emery White is the founding and senior pastor of Mecklenburg Community Church in Charlotte, NC, and the ranked adjunct professor of theology and culture at Gordon-Conwell Theological Seminary, where he also served as their fourth president.His newest book,Christianity for People Who Arent Christians: Uncommon Answers to Common Questions, is nowavailable on Amazonor at your favorite bookseller. To enjoy a free subscription to the Church & Culture blog, visit ChurchAndCulture.org, where you can view past blogs in our archive and read the latest church and culture news from around the world.Follow Dr. White onTwitter,FacebookandInstagram.

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Online Communion? Theology and the Digital Church - Dr. James Emery White Christian Blog - Crosswalk.com