Secretagentpeptidebond - Mostly Harmless.

‘BLOOD LAMP’ Mike Thompson, an artist based in Amsterdam, wanted to design a piece that forced people to think about the cost of the power they use. So he made a lamp lit with the user’s blood. His “Blood Lamp” glows thanks to a reaction with luminol, a molecule used in police forensics that gives off electric blue light when exposed to an iron-rich protein in blood called hemoglobin. Iron atoms catalyze the oxidation of luminol, creating a high-energy, unstable peroxide molecule that releases energy as blue light as it relaxes to its low-energy ground state. After the user adds blood and the reaction consumes all of the luminol, the light fades, and the lamp can never be used again.

Credit: Mike Thompson

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CRISPR/Cas Just Got About One Hundred Million Dollars Hotter

CRISPR Therapeutics and Vertex Pharmaceuticals Incorporated announced  that they will be entering into a 105 million USD strategic research collaboration focused on developing therapeutics for genetic disease.

In more detail, what does that mean? A number of genetic mutations are responsible for inherited diseases, and two examples of this are cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anaemia.

Cystic fibrosis (CF) is caused by mutations within the CFTR gene which lead to a broken or non-folding protein, this in turn prevents the proper dilution of mucosal secretions and thus leads to numerous pathologies. Sickle cell anaemia/disease, by contrast, is due to mutations within the gene coding for haemoglobin leading to protein aggregation and disruption of red blood cell structures. It is predominantly found in descendants from malaria-prone areas, as the mutation – at least in heterozygotes – provides innate resistance against malarial infection.

The collaboration between Vertex and CRISPR will initially focus on developing therapeutics for cystic fibrosis and sickle cell anaemia, with other unspecified genes also on the target list

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doctor: looks like we'll have to perform a CAT scan. is this something you're familiar with?

me: I've spent my whole life scanning my environment for cats

SEED MONEY

After the price of gold dropped in the 1980s, Fred Libby left the mines of Arizona, where he worked with precious metals, and started Treehouse Silver Inc. with his wife, Connie. The Libbys now grow small crystals of copper, gold, silver, and other minerals and sell them to more than 250 gift shops around the country. They grew this crystal by dissolving copper wire in a hot mixture of water and nitric acid. Then they dipped two copper plates into the solution, one of which had pennies attached to it. The plates are hooked up to opposite ends of a low-voltage power source with the pennies plate connected to the power source’s negative end. After about a day, copper in the solution gets reduced to copper metal and crystallizes in long, thin structures on the pennies.

Credit: Treehouse Silver Inc. 

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The Beauty of Discovery

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Space Lettuce in the White House Kitchen Garden

While most people plant gardens on Earth, we’re working to cultivate one in space!

On April 5, the First Lady welcomed students from across the country as well as NASA Deputy Administrator Dava Newman and NASA astronaut Cady Coleman to the White House Kitchen Garden.

While there, they planted various produce, including the same variety of lettuce that will be sent to the International Space Station on the April 8 SpaceX cargo launch.

These seeds were prepared and packaged for both the First Lady’s garden, as well as the batch headed up to space station. “Outredgeous” Red Romaine Lettuce and “Tokyo bekana” Chinese Cabbage will soon be growing in both gardens!

Why do we grow plants in space?

Our Veggie plant growth system on the space station provides lighting and nutrient supply for a space garden. It supports a variety of plant species that can be cultivated for educational outreach, fresh food and even recreation for crew members on long-duration missions.

When crews travel farther into space, they will need a self-sustaining life support system, and that means growing their own food.

How do we grow plants in space? Here’s a resource for “Space Gardening 101”.

Want to see the space station seeds launch? You can watch Friday’s SpaceX cargo launch live online starting at 3:30 p.m. EDT, with launch scheduled for 4:43 p.m.

Make sure to follow us on Tumblr for your regular dose of space: http://nasa.tumblr.com

Lifelike Illustrations and descriptions of edible Mushrooms. 

By Krombholz, JV,cs . 1831

Contributing Library: Missouri Botanical Garden, Peter H. Raven Library

BioDivLibrary

Formation of a polyaromatic imidazole based compound. 

I used quite harsh conditions to prepare this compound (polyphosphoric acid and 180 °C), but instead of obtaining a black mess as usual, I obtained a deep blue reaction mixture with a white mass floating on it’s surface and some white crystals sublimed out from it to the wall of the flask. The only question is, that where is the compound what I am looking for….

My window is smarter than yours…