Category Archives: Singularity

It is no secret that 3D printing has been making great waves in recent years in the medical sector. One arena in which the technologies have been especially useful is for making prostheses as it allows for lighter, more customized solutions for users. One notable example is the TrueLimb prosthetic from our startup of the month, Unlimited Tomorrow. The company uses 3D printing to create high-quality, low-cost bionic prosthetic arms with the goal of being accessible to all who need them. As such, they have also partnered with The Singularity Group in order to raise money to help amputee victims of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We spoke with Jennifer Barbic, the Vice President of Marketing, to learn more about their TrueLimb prostheses, why they turned to 3D printing and their current projects.

My name is Jennifer Barbic. I am Vice President of Marketing for Unlimited Tomorrow. We produce a 3D printing bionic prosthetic arm called TrueLimb. As for Unlimited Tomorrow, to understand our company you must first understand our founder. Growing up in a small town in Colorado, Unlimited Tomorrows Founder and CEO, Easton LaChappelle, was a child who loved to tinker. He loved taking things apart to understand how they worked, building with legos, and experimenting with motors and gadgets. As a teenager he started experimenting with building robotic arms, first creating one that was wirelessly controlled, and eventually creating one using 3D printing, a new technology that fascinated Easton. That 3D printed arm wound up winning 2nd place in engineering at the International Science Fair. As a result, Easton had the opportunity to meet former President Barack Obama, speak to international audiences including delivering a TedTalk, and pursue an internship at NASA. Even during this exciting time in Eastons life, his mind kept coming back to a little girl he had met at the Colorado State Science Fair a few years prior.

The Unlimited Tomorrow team including Jennifer Barbic (photo credits: Unlimited Tomorrow)

While Easton was showcasing his invention, he noticed one little girl closely examining the robotic arm, even more so than any other visitor. As he stepped over to talk to her, he noticed that the girl had an upper limb difference and was wearing a prosthesis. As he started talking to her and her parents, he was astounded by what they shared. The device that the girl was wearing was very heavy and uncomfortable, it did not match the size of her sound limb, and it had very minimal functionality. When they shared that the device had cost more than their annual salary, Easton was truly floored. The wheels started turning in Eastons head after that conversation, and they never stopped. The girl had made such an impression on Easton that while he was interning at NASA, he continued to stay up late at night working on his robotic arm technology, thinking that there had to be a better solution for the challenges the girl and her family had faced.

That one chance meeting had altered his view of what technology could do, and made him realize what he was truly passionate about. Upon returning home from his internship, the phone rang one day and shockingly it was author, coach, speaker, and philanthropist, Tony Robbins, asking to speak with Easton. Tony had seen Eastons TedTalk and wanted to help him pursue his passion. He offered to help him found a company so that he could continue to build robotic arms. Easton agreed and together they founded Unlimited Tomorrow when Easton was just 18 years old. That drive is the core of our company.

At Unlimited Tomorrow our first responsibility is to the individuals with limb differences we serve. We believe in pushing boundaries in order to improve prosthetic accessibility. We challenge ourselves to use all available technology and resources to make the highest quality, lowest cost prosthetic arms in the world.

The TrueLimb has been designed to overcome many of the limitations of traditional prosthetics (photo credits: Unlimited Tomorrow)

The TrueLimb prosthetic arm was developed over eight years to solve common challenges that individuals with upper limb loss and limb differences face. Those challenges include devices that are too heavy, sizing that does not match the user, and affordability. Many individuals prefer a bionic arm with a natural skin tone look, but options with that look have historically been limited. Batteries that power bionic arms often do not last throughout the day, and chargers can be proprietary and expensive. Sensors used to activate devices are often unreliable and sometimes impacted by moisture and sweat. People struggle with repairs taking a long time and costing a lot. Many individuals report issues with the learning curve of using a new device.

By contrast, TrueLimb weighs just 1-1.5lbs from socket to fingertip (with most others weight around 3-5+ lbs). In addition, it is incredibly durable for everyday use and is personalized to be the same size as the users opposing limb. It is easy to put on and take off and its socket is adjustable, and breathable. TrueLimb comes in hundreds of skin tones and colors for users to choose from, can be charged with a standard USB-C charger, and offers multi-day battery life. TrueLimb has six easy-to-remember, functional grips designed to help with everyday tasks. TrueLimbs sensor technology, TrueSense, is not impacted by sweat or moisture and does not require direct skin contact to activate. 30+ sensors line the socket of each TrueLimb, vs. two in most traditional devices, which increases device activation and control.

Photo Credits: Unlimited Tomorrow

Currently, we use 3D printing, 3D scanning, 3D modeling, smart algorithms, and a fully digital workflow in the creation of our prostheses. 3D printing helped to solve the biggest challenge of all when it comes to prosthetic arms weight. Through 3D printing, we have been able to produce a device that is a fraction of the weight of other devices, but also incredibly durable. The combination of 3D scanning and 3D printing allows us to create a prosthetic arm that is fully personalized for each user, with next to no waste. Additionally, the fact that our process is fully digital enables us to expand accessibility to advanced prosthetic technology.

The process is also simple and convenient. It starts by asking the user to answer a few questions and schedule a one-on-one consultation with our clinical team. Next, we ship a 3D scanner so they can scan their residual limbs, with these we create a set of check sockets. The check sockets are shipped and once again users need an evaluation with our clinical team to assess the comfort and fit, this can be repeated until the perfect comfortable fit is achieved. The final step is to 3D print, assemble and test the personalized TrueLimb.

Sure!We havepartnered with Singularity Group to raise $1M tocreate and deliver functional prosthetic limbs to 100 amputee victims of the Russian invasion of Ukraine. We are actively working with Ukrainians who have been impacted during the war, and are about to deliver the first TrueLimb to a Ukrainian user.

As the war continues, more and more Ukrainian citizens are being injured. Including those who are losing limbs. And we know that Unlimited Tomorrows use of advanced technologies and a fully remote process allows the company to immediately help amputees in Ukraine or anyone in a conflict zone. You can learn more about the project and donate by visiting the gofundme link HERE or watching the video below.

At Unlimited Tomorrow we believe in technology withpurpose.Without newly available 3D printing, 3D scanning, 3D modeling, and smart algorithm technologies, TrueLimb would not exist. If you or someone you know has an upper limb difference, we would love to connect and share how we have harnessed technology to make an impact. You can learn more by visiting our website HERE and we invite you to follow us on our socials!

What do you think of Unlimited Tomorrow and its TrueLimb prostheses? Let us know in a comment below or on ourLinkedIn,Facebook, andTwitterpages! Dont forget to sign up for our free weeklyNewsletter here, the latest 3D printing news straight to your inbox! You can also find all our videos on ourYouTubechannel.

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#3DStartup: Unlimited Tomorrow and its 3D Printed Bionic Prosthetic Arm - 3Dnatives

Premier news source specializing in pataphysics, The Onion, has taken time from its busy schedule of predicting nefarious events to come and debunking the commonly held myth that girls just want to have fun to defend one of the many rights held within the Ninth Amendment the right to laughter. Theres probably also some free speech sprinkled in for good measure. And Criminal Law. You really should just look at it yourself.

The Onions journalists have garnered a sterling reputation for accurately forecasting future events. One such coup was The Onions scoop revealing that a former president kept nuclear secrets strewn around his beach homes basement three years before it even happened.

The Onion files this brief to protect its continued ability to create fiction that may ultimately merge into reality. As the globes premier parodists, The Onions writers also have a self-serving interest in preventing political authorities from imprisoning humorists. This brief is submitted in the interest of at least mitigating their future punishment.

Whom else but The Onion could finesse a robust defense of free speech and parody, all while making what might be a sly comparison of the judicial system to Rokos Basilisk? Please dont click that. Dear God, unless you plan on ushering in the technological singularity, please dont click that. You have been warned.

It doesnt take long into the brief to realize that The Onions amicus is no laughing matter. They open with the case of the 6th Circuit giving the okay for police to arrest and jail a man because he threw big meanie words at them on Facebook. In doing so, The Onion plainly states that the court threatened their entire business model. For everyone who had a fictional newspaper teaching 1Ls standing doctrine on their bingo card, please mark it.

This, much like Chidi processing the nuances of Jeremy Bearimy, broke me. The Onion, with a flair of pedagogy that shall never again be seen in Florida now that theyve gone and banned dictionaries for being too woke, gives a succinct and nuanced legal defense of the old adage that you cant explain jokes without ruining them.

[T]he Sixth Circuits ruling imperils an ancient form of discourse. The courts decision suggests that parodists are in the clear only if they pop the balloon in advance by warning their audience that their parody is not true. But some forms of comedy dont work unless the comedian is able to tell the joke with a straight face. Parody is the quintessential example. Parodists intentionally inhabit the rhetorical form of their target in order to exaggerate or implode itand by doing so demonstrate the targets illogic or absurdity.

Put simply, for parody to work, it has to plausibly mimic the original. The Sixth Circuits decision in this case would condition the First Amendments protection for parody upon a requirement that parodists explicitly say, up-front, that their work is nothing more than an elaborate fiction. But that would strip parody of the very thing that makes it function.

The Onion cannot stand idly by in the face of a ruling that threatens to disembowel a form of rhetoric that has existed for millennia, that is particularly potent in the realm of political debate, and that, purely incidentally, forms the basis of The Onions writers paychecks.

First, appreciate the simplicity of the prose. Second, thank The Onion for this picture in your head. Imagine this brief making it to the Supreme Court and, after being picked up and read by Clarence Thomas, the man finally has a textual basis for developing a sense of humor. Im just kidding! I hear the man is actually very funny you should hear his bit about coke cans.

The brief is nothing less than brilliant. The Associated Press catches a stray for literally no reason, theres an insightful bit of philology on the origins of parody and lets be real, you need something legal adjacent to waste time with on your screen as you bill three months worth of time to about 20 documents. You are welcome.

Read the brief here.

Chris Williams became a social media manager and assistant editor for Above the Law in June 2021. Prior to joining the staff, he moonlighted as a minor Memelord in the Facebook groupLaw School Memes for Edgy T14s. He endured Missouri long enough to graduate from Washington University in St. Louis School of Law. He is a former boatbuilder who cannot swim,a published author on critical race theory, philosophy, and humor, and has a love for cycling that occasionally annoys his peers. You can reach him by email atcwilliams@abovethelaw.comand by tweet at@WritesForRent.

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First As Parody, Then As Free Speech: The Onion Goes To The Supreme Court. It's About As Awesome As You'd Suspect. - Above the Law

Security News Jay Fitzgerald October 04, 2022, 10:45 AM EDT

From Sophoss X-Ops To Blackcloaks Honeypot offering, firms are providing more proactive intelligence offerings to combat increasing cyberthreats.

For years, cybersecurity was seen as a mostly defensive operation to keep bad actors at bay, shoring up digital fortifications across a number of proven or potential attack vectors.

But cybersecurity companies, both big and small, are increasingly introducing new intelligence offerings as ways to combat cyberattacks, proactively trying to identify potential bad actors and their tactics before they unleash sometimes devastating attacks on organizations.

Some of the intelligence offering include the use of AI to sift through data and provide risk analytics to customers. Some include actual analysts diving into the dark web to find and assess risks.

Others offering provide a combination of AI and human intelligence capabilities.

Meanwhile, cybersecurity companies are also establishing new internal intelligence and general research units to enhance intelligence gathering and product development.

As part of CRNs Cybersecurity Week 2022, heres look at 10 intelligence hot tools and services offered by cybersecurity companies, from both large firms and startups.

* Trellixs Advanced Research Center

* Sophos X-Ops

* SentinelOnes Singularity Vulnerability Mapping

* Cyberints Argos Edge

* BlackCloaks Honeypot deception trap

* Cybersixgills Dynamic Vulnerability Exploit (DVE) Intelligence

* Securonix: Identity Analytics and Intelligence

* CrowdStrikes suite of threat intelligence products

* Nisos: Managed Intelligence

Jay Fitzgerald is a senior editor covering cybersecurity for CRN.Jay previously freelanced for the Boston Globe, Boston Business Journal, Boston magazine, Banker & Tradesman, MassterList.com, Harvard Business Schools Working Knowledge, the National Bureau of Economic Research and other entities. He can be reached at jfitzgerald@thechannelcompany.com.

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10 Hot Cyber Threat Intelligence Tools And Services In 2022 - CRN

(Photo courtesy of Game Rant) Nintendo has come out with its upcoming slate of offerings.

Tanner HumeConnector Editor

Nintendo Direct has once again graced the gaming landscape with announcements, news, and trailers for upcoming titles. A lot of things were revealed at Septembers most recent Direct, and they all need to be looked at. So without further ado, lets find out what was announced.

Farming Games: There were way too many farming games announced at direct. Seriously, there did not need to be that many. Sure, its nice to have one or two be announced. Five, however, may have been a bit much. The decision to announce so many releases from this genre, instead of a new Mario Kart or multiplayer Mario title is one of the more disappointing aspects of this Direct presentation. The highlights of the bunch are Harvestella and Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life. Harvestella may not seem like it necessarily needs to be a farming game, but regardless, the trailer was impressive, and the game has a lot of promise. Story of Seasons: A Wonderful Life also looks like it could be quite the interesting experience.

Kirbys Return to Dream Land Deluxe: This popular Nintendo Wii title is now being remastered, and for good reason it is one of the better Kirby games to have come out. For fans of the franchise, this is a major win and one that brings with it a chance to re-live the game with the possibility of brand-new features. A cool addition to the upcoming remastered version is a previously absent online mode, where gamers can play this epic journey together. This also adds in some cool mini-games that will be fun for everyone.

Pikmin 4: After years of rumblings and fan speculation, Pikmin 4 is finally being released. It has been nearly 10 years since the release of the last Pikmin title, with the third installment being released back in 2013. For Pikmin lovers, this news is paradise. The only real downside to the announcement is the lack of substantive information. They did not give any details about the game, nor what it would feature. Nevertheless, this game will surely be a pandoras box of surprises.

Bayonetta 3: Do you ever want to hop onto a game and complete various tasks to save the world? Well, Bayonetta 3 is for you. Coming out in October, this game seems to be very much action-packed and filled to the brim with adventure and discovery. Can you defeat Singularity, or will you fail under pressure at the daunting task? Buy the game next month, and find out for yourself.

N64 Games: Nintendo is bringing a batch of classic Nintendo 64 games to Nintendo Switch Online. The titles include Pokmon Stadium and Goldeneye 007, which were widely loved by many back in the 90s and early 2000s. For the new generation of gamers, this is the chance to explore what these games were and how they earned their status. Yes, they even feature online play, which is a major bonus.

Final Fantasy VII Reunion: Revisiting the classic PSP game, Final Fantasy VII Reunion brings with it a renewed sense to play and enjoy the games features and epic quests it bares with it. Out in December, get your hands on a copy of this epic part of the saga.

Legend of Zelda: Tears of the Kingdom: The main event of Nintendo Direct, Tears of the Kingdom will certainly breathe new life into the Zelda franchise, with a whole new adventure and more tasks for Link to conquer. He certainly wont be letting Ganon get in his way this time. The game will be released to the Switch in May of 2023.

No matter what kinds of games youre into, this Nintendo Direct surely brought some good news, with plenty of titles to look forward to across the board.

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Nintendo comes out strong with its offering of upcoming titles - The UML Connector

These days there is much talk about the metaverse, a world of virtual reality on the internet. Facebook even changed its corporate name to Meta to stake its claim to this concept. How well will this futuristic technology blend with basic human nature?

Successful technological innovations have almost always been built on the strong foundation of fundamental human nature. For example, smartphones address one of our core human needs: the need to communicate with others. While e-commerce was a technological revolution, its success depended heavily on generating enough trust, the core human factor in any commercial transaction, in online platforms. All major e-com players had to introduce several innovative features to their product design for buyers to trust the deals on offer. There are also times when technological innovations unearth latent human needs and make a big business out of them. Evolutionarily, humans have mostly interacted only with people they are close to, both physically and emotionally. These are their strong ties. There was little interaction with ones weak ties, such as acquaintances and those with whom one only shares broad common backgrounds. In 1973, Professor Mark S. Granovetter, then at Johns Hopkins University, published his paper, Strength of Weak Ties, in the American Journal of Sociology. In it, Granovetter reminded the world of frequent instances where ones interactions with weak ties could be more beneficial than those strong ties. But the larger world really understood this latent power of ones weak ties only with the arrival of social media. Social media companies established the fact that interactions with weak ties can have huge business potential. It is in this context that one should evaluate the success potential of the metaverse.

The metaverse is an online 3D virtual space that connects users, who can adopt various incarnations or avatars, in all aspects of their digital lives. The metaverse will allow users to work, meet, play and socialize together in these 3D spaces. Clearly demarcated from the real world, this is a virtual world where the adopted avatars of people might differ from their real-world personalities.

The metaverse is all about altered reality. Are humans keen to get out of the context they live in and stay in an alternate world? Are humans comfortable being someone else? Answers to these questions will determine whether Big Tech firms that are working to develop the hardware and software necessary for people to spend significant time and money in the metaverse will succeed or not.

The Hindu religion has always accepted that an entity can have multiple avatars. In fact, multiple avatars of the same deity are an established phenomenon in Hinduism. But with the arrival of Abrahamic faiths, the concept of divinity became strictly singular. So it was not surprising that even in interpreting the personality of an individual, singularity became the norm. Traditional theories of human behaviour have typically considered the human personality to be singular. Any trace of multiplicity in ones behaviour, more so if contradictory, was portrayed as a sign of duplicity. So most individuals took care to show only one consistent avatar to the outside world.

In standard economic models too, an individuals identity and preferences were considered fixed. It was George Akerlof and Rachel Kranton in their article Economics and Identity published in the Quarterly Journal of Economics who gave credence to the concept of an individuals multiple identities. They contended that a person chooses various identities in varied contexts, this identity choice being one of the most significant economic decisions an individual makes. American developmental psychologist Howard Gardner too lent his voice to new conversations around the multiplicity of human nature. He put forward the theory that human intelligence is not a single variable, but a combination of multiple intelligences of varying proficiency.

Especially strong support for the existence of multiplicity in human nature comes from anthropologists David Graeber and David Wengrow in their recent book, The Dawn of Everything: A New History of Humanity. In this book, they write about the concept of seasonal duality. Various human tribes across the world jump back and forth, over the course of the year, between distinctly opposite behaviours. In some cases, people actually adopt different names in summer and winter, literally becoming someone else during the course of the year. Many of these societies have two social structures: one in summer and one in winter, with two distinct sets of law.

For example, consider the Inuit community. In summer, they disperse into bands of 20-30 people under the leadership of a single male leader. During this period, property is possessively marked out and patriarchs exercise tyrannical power over their kin. But in the long winter months of relative hardship, there is a dramatic reversal. Inuits gather together as a larger group, and the virtues of equality, altruism and collective life prevails. Wealth is shared, even husbands and wives, among partners.

So, the ability to consciously alternate between contrasting modes of life is an integral part of human nature, and has been so ever since the species hunter-gatherer days. This human nature of regular oscillations between distinctly different patterns of behaviour bodes well for modern-day investors in the metaverse. It is now for strategic thinkers and designers who are working on metaverse projects to take advantage of this aspect of our inherent human nature.

Biju Dominic is chief evangelist, Fractal Analytics, and chairman, FinalMile Consulting.

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The metaverses evolutionary roots could aid its success | Mint - Mint

Big tech is eager to get us excited about the coming of the metaverse, but todays virtual reality hardware is a long way from meeting their ambitious goals. One of the biggest challenges is building better displays with far more pixels per inch, but experts say new materials and designs are on the way.

Silicon Valley is betting billions of dollars that the internet is about to undergo its biggest shift since the advent of the smartphone. Soon, the thinking goes, most people will be accessing the web via wearable headsets that transport us into virtual worlds rather than by tapping on a touchscreen.

Today, though, virtual and augmented reality are still fairly rudimentary. While companies like Meta, Microsoft, Google, and Magic Leap are already selling virtual and augmented reality headsets, they have found limited use cases so far, and the experiences they offer still fall well short of the high-definition standards we have come to expect from digital entertainment.

One of the biggest limitations is current display technology. In a VR headset, screens sit just a few centimeters in front of our eyes, so they need to pack a huge number of pixels into a very small space to approach the definition you might expect from the latest 4K TV.

Thats impossible with todays displays, but in a perspective published last week in Science, researchers from Samsung and Stanford University say that emerging technologies could soon get us close to the theoretical limit of pixel density, ushering in powerful new VR headsets.

Efforts to boost the performance of displays is complicated by the fact that this directly competes with another crucial goal: making them smaller, cheaper, and more energy-efficient. Todays devices are bulky and unwieldy, limiting the amount of time they can be worn and the context in which they can be used.

A major reason why headsets are so large today is the array of optical elements they feature and the need to keep sufficient space between them and the displays to focus light properly. While new compact lens designs and the use of metasurfacesnanostructured films with unique optical propertieshave allowed some miniaturization in this area, say the authors, this is likely reaching its limits.

Novel designs like holographic lenses and pancake lenses that involve bouncing light around between different bits of plastic or glass could help reduce the lens-to-display distance by a factor of two to three. But each of these interactions reduces the brightness of the images, which needs to be compensated for by more powerful and efficient displays.

Better displays are also needed to solve another important limitation of todays devices: resolution. Ultra-HD TV displays can achieve pixel densities of around 200 pixels per degree (PPD) at distances of around 10 feet, far in excess of the roughly 60 PPD that the human eye can distinguish. But as VR displays are at most an inch or two from the viewers eyes, they can only achieve around 15 PPD.

To match the resolution limits of the human eye, VR displays need to squeeze between 7,000 and 10,000 pixels into each inch of display, say the authors. For context, the latest smartphone screens manage only around 460 pixels per inch.

Despite the size of that gap, though, there are already clear paths towards closing it. At present, most VR headsets use separate red, green, and blue organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs), which are hard to make more compact due to their manufacturing process. But an alternative approach that adds colored filters to white OLEDs could make it possible to achieve 60 PPD.

Relying on filtering has its own challenges, as it reduces the efficiency of the light source, resulting in lower brightness or higher power consumption. But an experimental OLED design known as a meta-OLED could get around this trade-off by combing the light source with nanopatterned mirrors that exploit the phenomenon of resonance to emit light only from a particular frequency.

Meta-OLEDS could potentially achieve pixel densities of more than 10,000 PPD, approaching the physical limits set by the wavelength of light. They could also be more efficient and have improved color definition compared to previous generations. However, despite keen interest from display technology companies, the technology is still nascent and likely further away from commercialization.

The most likely near-term innovation in displays, say the authors, is one that exploits a quirk of human biology. The eye is only capable of distinguishing 60 PPD in the central region of the retina know as the fovea, with significantly lower sensitivity on the periphery.

If eye movements can be accurately tracked, then you only need to render the highest definition in the particular section of the display that the user is looking at. While the required improvements in eye and head tracking add extra complexity to designs, the authors say this is probably the innovation that will happen soonest.

Its important to remember that there are a host of issues other than just better displays that will need to be solved if VR is to become widely commercialized. In particular, powering these headsets raises complicated challenges around battery capacity and the ability to dissipate heat from onboard electronics.

Also, the display technologies discussed by the researchers are primarily relevant to VR and not AR, whose headsets are likely to rely on very different optical technology that doesnt obscure the wearers view of the real world. Either way, though, it seems that while more immersive virtual experiences are likely still some way off, the road map to get us there is well in place.

Image Credit:Harry Quan / Unsplash

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The Tech That Will Push VR to the Limits of the Human Eye - Singularity Hub

Astronomers now routinely discover planets orbiting stars outside of the solar system theyre called exoplanets. But in summer 2022, teams working on NASAs Transiting Exoplanet Survey Satellite found a few particularly interesting planets orbiting in the habitable zones of their parent stars.

One planet is 30 percent larger than Earth and orbits its star in less than three days. The other is 70 percent larger than Earth and might host a deep ocean. These two exoplanets are super-Earthsmore massive than Earth but smaller than ice giants like Uranus and Neptune.

Im a professor of astronomy who studies galactic cores, distant galaxies, astrobiology, and exoplanets. I closely follow the search for planets that might host life.

Earth is still the only place in the universe scientists know to be home to life. It would seem logical to focus the search for life on Earth clonesplanets with properties close to Earths. But research has shown that the best chance astronomers have of finding life on another planet is likely to be on a super-Earth similar to the ones found recently.

A super-Earth is any rocky planet that is bigger than Earth and smaller than Neptune. Image Credit: Aldaron, CC BY-SA

Most super-Earths orbit cool dwarf stars, which are lower in mass and live much longer than the sun. There are hundreds of cool dwarf stars for every star like the sun, and scientists have found super-Earths orbiting 40 percent of cool dwarfs they have looked at. Using that number, astronomers estimate that there are tens of billions of super-Earths in habitable zones where liquid water can exist in the Milky Way alone. Since all life on Earth uses water, water is thought to be critical for habitability.

Based on current projections, about a third of all exoplanets are super-Earths, making them the most common type of exoplanet in the Milky Way. The nearest is only six light-years away from Earth. You might even say that our solar system is unusual since it does not have a planet with a mass between that of Earth and Neptune.

Another reason super-Earths are ideal targets in the search for life is that theyre much easier to detect and study than Earth-sized planets. There are two methods astronomers use to detect exoplanets. One looks for the gravitational effect of a planet on its parent star and the other looks for brief dimming of a stars light as the planet passes in front of it. Both of these detection methods are easier with a bigger planet.

Over 300 years ago, German philosopher Gottfried Wilhelm Leibniz argued that Earth was the best of all possible worlds. Leibnizs argument was meant to address the question of why evil exists, but modern astrobiologists have explored a similar question by asking what makes a planet hospitable to life. It turns out that Earth is not the best of all possible worlds.

Due to Earths tectonic activity and changes in the brightness of the sun, the climate has veered over time from ocean-boiling hot to planet-wide, deep-freeze cold. Earth has been uninhabitable for humans and other larger creatures for most of its 4.5-billion-year history. Simulations suggest the long-term habitability of Earth was not inevitable, but was a matter of chance. Humans are literally lucky to be alive.

Researchers have come up with a list of the attributes that make a planet very conducive to life. Larger planets are more likely to be geologically active, a feature that scientists think would promote biological evolution. So the most habitable planet would have roughly twice the mass of Earth and be between 20 to 30 percent larger by volume. It would also have oceans that are shallow enough for light to stimulate life all the way to the seafloor and an average temperature of 77 degrees Fahrenheit (25 degrees Celsius). It would have an atmosphere thicker than Earths that would act as an insulating blanket. Finally, such a planet would orbit a star older than the sun to give life longer to develop, and it would have a strong magnetic field that protects against cosmic radiation. Scientists think that these attributes combined will make a planet super habitable.

By definition, super-Earths have many of the attributes of a super habitable planet. To date, astronomers have discovered two dozen super-Earth exoplanets that are, if not the best of all possible worlds, theoretically more habitable than Earth.

Recently, theres been an exciting addition to the inventory of habitable planets. Astronomers have started discovering exoplanets that have been ejected from their star systems, and there could be billions of them roaming the Milky Way. If a super-Earth is ejected from its star system and has a dense atmosphere and watery surface, it could sustain life for tens of billions of years, far longer than life on Earth could persist before the sun dies.

To detect life on distant exoplanets, astronomers will look for biosignatures, byproducts of biology that are detectable in a planets atmosphere.

NASAs James Webb Space Telescope was designed before astronomers had discovered exoplanets, so the telescope is not optimized for exoplanet research. But it is able to do some of this science and is scheduled to target two potentially habitable super-Earths in its first year of operations. Another set of super-Earths with massive oceans discovered in the past few years, as well as the planets discovered this summer, are also compelling targets for James Webb.

But the best chances for finding signs of life in exoplanet atmospheres will come with the next generation of giant, ground-based telescopes: the 39-meter Extremely Large Telescope, the Thirty Meter Telescope, and the 24.5-meter Giant Magellan Telescope. These telescopes are all under construction and set to start collecting data by the end of the decade.

Astronomers know that the ingredients for life are out there, but habitable does not mean inhabited. Until researchers find evidence of life elsewhere, its possible that life on Earth was a unique accident. While there are many reasons why a habitable world would not have signs of life, if, over the coming years, astronomers look at these super habitable super-Earths and find nothing, humanity may be forced to conclude that the universe is a lonely place.

This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.

Image Credit: NASA Ames/JPL-CalTech

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Super-Earths Are Bigger and More Habitable Than Earth, and Astronomers Are Discovering More of the Billions They Think Are Out There - Singularity Hub

Memories are finicky. Ive been touring Atlantic Canada for the past three weeks, and already my recollection of the tripdates, places, foods, adventuresdoesnt match up with pins on Google Maps or journal entries. My brain was learning new experiences and encoding memoriesjust not strongly enough to last even a week.

Memory retention gets worse with age. For people with brain injuries, such as from a stroke or physical trauma to the brain, the impairment can be utterly debilitating. What if there was a way to artificially boost the brains ability to retain memories?

The idea sounds like a Black Mirror episode. But this month, a new study in Frontiers in Human Neuroscience provided some of the first evidence that a memory prosthetic is possible in humans. The prosthetic isnt a device; rather, its a series of electrodes implanted inside the hippocampusa structure buried deep within the brain thats critical for episodic memoriesthat encodes the when, where, and what of our daily experiences.

The setup relies on an utterly unromantic view of memory. Rather than the waves of rich, detailed, emotional memories that flood our brains, it holds that memories are simply electrical signals generated by a well-regulated neural highway inside the hippocampus. If we can capture these signals while a person is learning, then in theory we could play the recordings back to the brainin the form of electrical zapsand potentially boost that particular memory.

The team built on their previous work of engineering memory prosthetics. In people with epilepsy, they showed that by re-introducing neural signals encoding one type of memory in a specific task, the zaps boosted recall by over 50 percent.

The study involved a small cohort. But incredibly, those who suffered from previous memory loss showed the best improvements.

To be clear, the team did not develop a video camera for memory. The system partially mimics the hippocampus normal process for memory encoding and recall, which can be notoriously subjective and somewhat unreliable. A similar memory prosthetic might not work well in the real world, where were constantly bombarded with new experiences and memories.

That said, the study shows a way to help people with dementia, Alzheimers, or other causes of memory loss retain snippets of their lives that could otherwise be lost.

Its a glimpse into the future of what we might be able to do to restore memory, said Dr. Kim Shapiro at the University of Birmingham, who was not involved in the study, to MIT Technology Review.

It all comes down to the electrical pulses surrounding the hippocampus and within it.

Lets zoom in. The hippocampus, a seahorse-shaped structure, is often described as a monolithic hub for memories. Butinsert food analogyrather than a uniform block of cheese, its more like a multi-layered cheese dip, with electrical pulses flowing through different layers as it encodes, retains, and recalls memories.

For the memory prosthetic, the team focused on two specific regions: CA1 and CA3, which form a highly interconnected neural circuit. Decades of work in rodents, primates, and humans have pointed to this neural highway as the crux for encoding memories.

The team members, led by Drs. Dong Song from the University of Southern California and Robert Hampson at Wake Forest School of Medicine, are no strangers to memory prosthetics. With memory bioengineer Dr. Theodore Bergerwhos worked on hijacking the CA3-CA1 circuit for memory improvement for over three decadesthe dream team had their first success in humans in 2015.

The central idea is simple: replicate the hippocampus signals with a digital replacement. Its no easy task. Unlike computer circuits, neural circuits are non-linear. This means that signals are often extremely noisy and overlap in time, which bolstersor inhibitsneural signals. As Berger said at the time: Its a chaotic black box.

To crack the memory code, the team worked out two algorithms. The first, called memory decoding model (MDM), takes an average of the electrical patterns across multiple people as they form memories. The other, called multi-input, multi-output (MIMO), is a tad more sophisticated, as it incorporates both input and output electrical patternsthat is, the CA3-CA1 circuitand mimics those signals in both space and timing. In theory, pulsing both electrical signals based on MDM and MIMO back into the hippocampus should give it a boost.

In a series of experiments, first in rats and monkeys, then in healthy humans, the team found that their memory prosthetics could improve memory when neural circuits were temporarily disrupted, such as with drugs. But bypassing injured circuits isnt enoughwhat they wanted was a true memory prosthetic that could replace the hippocampus if damaged.

The new study benefited from a valuable neuroscience resource: people with epilepsy who have electrodes implanted into memory-related regions of their brains. The implants, deep inside the brain, help neurosurgeons track down the source of peoples seizures. Among the 25 participants selected, some did not exhibit symptoms other than epilepsy, whereas others had mild to moderate brain injuries.

Heres the test. The participants were shown an image on a screen, then after a delay, they were shown the same image with up to seven different alternatives. Their goal was to pick out the familiar image. Each participant rapidly cycled through 100-150 trials, during which their hippocampal activity was recorded to capture their short-term memory.

After at least 15 minutes, the participants were shown 3 images and asked to rank the familiarity of each. Its a tricky task: one was a sample image from the trial, another an alternative that seemed familiar, and one never previously seen. This was intended to capture their long-term memory.

Flash forward. One day between removing the electrodes, the participants underwent another round of memory tests similar to the ones before. Some people received electrical stimulation based on their own neural signals, processed by either the MDM or MIMO algorithm. Others were zapped with random pulses. The last group received no stimulation at all.

Overall, stimulating the brains of people with epilepsy boosted memory performance by roughly 15 percent. Those pulsed with MDMwhich uses the averaged electrical signalshad a measly 13.8 percent boost. In contrast, the MIMO model, which mimics neural signals of each hippocampi, made their performance improve by 36 percent.

Irrespective of baseline memory function (impaired vs. normal), the MIMO model produces at least double the facilitation compared to the MDM model, the team said.

While promising, the study is just the next small step towards a hippocampal prosthetic. Because the participants had their electrodes removed following the second test, we dont know whethernor for how longthe effects lasted, or if continuous stimulation is necessary.

While a memory prosthetic could benefit people with Alzheimers, lots more details need to be ironed out. The electrode setup here is relatively crudewould a microarray or a non-invasive device be possible? If so, should the device be turned on 24/7? After all, we dont remember all of our memoriestheres a sort of synaptic purging thats thought to occur during sleep.

For now, the technology is far from being ready for clinical use. But its a glimpse of what could be. At the very least the study shows that, similar to a brain-controlled prosthetic limb, a memory chip isnt impossible for people who need it the most.

Image Credit: from Pixabay

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Scientists Have Long Dreamed of a Memory Prosthesis. The First Human Trials Look Promising - Singularity Hub

Today, September 26, a spacecraft moving eight times faster than a speeding bullet will impact an asteroid almost 7 million miles (11 million kilometers) from Earth. To be clear, the asteroid poses no threat to us, either before or after impact. But no one knows exactly how the collision will affect the system otherwise. What scientists learn may just save the world.

The theory is that if astronomers discover an asteroid bound for Earth, we can send a spacecraft, or kinetic impactor, to nudge it off its path. With enough advance warning, the nudge wouldnt have to be much for a would-be impactor to miss Earth entirely.

The Double Redirection Asteroid Test (DART) spacecraft was designed by NASA and launched on a SpaceX rocket last November. After nearly a year traversing the void, DART will finally arrive at a pair of asteroids, Didymos and Dimorphos. The latter of the two asteroids, a moonlet orbiting the larger Didymos, is DARTs primary target.

The spacecraft itself is basically a bus-sized, guided projectile with a GoPro. Its payload consists of just one instrument: A high-resolution camera called DRACO.

The camera will livestream images back to Earth at a rate of one image per second. Four hours before impact, when the larger asteroid Didymos will still be but a pixel of light in those images, DART will go on autopilot. The communications delay will be too much for scientists back home to take the controls. About two minutes from impact, DARTs primary target, Dimorphos, will fill the cameras field of view. It will grow and grow untilthe screen goes black. That blank screen will signify the first time humanity has altered the trajectory of a celestial body. (Theres also a chance DART will miss, in which case mission scientists will try to figure out what happened and possibly look for another target.)

NASA will broadcast the event live with two streams, the main broadcast and a livestream from DARTs perspective via DRACO (see below). The DRACO livestream begins at 5:30pm EDT / 2:30pm PST, and the main broadcast begins at 6:00pm EDT / 3:00pm PST. (DART is expected to impact Dimorphos at 7:14pm EDT / 4:14pm PST.)

[UPDATE: The DART mission went off without a hitch. You can still watch the whole broadcast or just DARTs final seconds below.]

The details of the impact will give us invaluable data for future planning.

Scientists expect DART to change Dimorphos 12-hour orbit by a few minutes. What will happen to Dimorphos itself is an open question. Last year, University of Maryland simulations suggested that, depending on its shape and where DART strikes, theres a decent chance Dimorphos will eventually begin to tumble chaotically in its orbit.

Scientists will be watching to find out.

DART recently deployed a second, smaller spacecraft about the size of a shoebox. The craft, called LICIACube, will record images of the impact from an orbit of about 55 kilometers above Dimorphos. Ground-based telescopes on Earth and the Hubble and James Webb Space Telescopes will also observe the aftermath. And a future European Space Agency mission, Hera, will go in for a more detailed investigation.

The first and most crucial observation will be a measurement of how Dimorphos orbit around Didymos changes after impact. Scientists are hoping to see the length of its orbit change by at least 73 seconds to prove DART was sufficiently powerful. Heras observations will add more data about the asteroids composition. Taken together, scientists can be more confident in their calculations should we discover an asteroid headed our way.

If you just take a hair off the orbital velocity, youve changed the orbit of the asteroid so that what would have been impact three or four years down the road is now a complete miss, Lindley Johnson, planetary defense officer at NASA, told IEEE Spectrum.

Time, then, is our greatest ally in planetary defense. That makes completing a survey of all asteroids in our neighborhood just as important as studying ways to deflect them.

To date, astronomers have discovered over 90 percent of all near-Earth asteroids greater than 0.6 miles (1 kilometer) across. These are impactors in the range of the one that wiped out the dinosaurs. Weve discovered only about 40 percent of asteroids bigger than 460 feet (140 meters). This class wouldnt wipe us out, but would do extreme damage if one hit a populated area. In any given year the likelihood of a surprise impact is small, but the devastation could be significant should an asteroid strike without warning.

Todays experiment and subsequent observations will begin to give scientists the data they need to make realistic defense plans in the future. Instead of missions manned by Bruce Willis, Ben Affleck, and a few nuclear warheads, maybe all well need is a small spacecraft packing just enough punch to give dangerous space rocks a nudge.

Image Credit: NASA/Johns Hopkins APL

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NASA's DART Spacecraft Will Smack an Asteroid at 14,000 MPH Todayand You Can Watch - Singularity Hub

Its astonishing to revisit Kim Stanley Robinsons The Gold Coast in 2022. Published in 1988, the novel, which is the second volume in the authors Three Californias trilogy, is set in a future that then seemed suitably distant, taking place in Orange County in 2027. Nearly three and a half decades later, the potential future Robinson imagined is coming up fast in front of us, less a harbinger or a warning than a slice of life. This is the challenge of all science fiction that unfolds in the near futureI think of Blade Runner (1982), which crossed its point of singularity three years ago, or Harry Harrisons Make Room! Make Room!, written during the 1960s and set in an overpopulated New York City in 1999.

The Gold Coast fares better, temporally speaking, than either of those precursors; the future it posits remains recognizable through the lens of the present we occupy. Thats because, even early in his career (The Gold Coast was his fourth book), Robinson was a visionary writer, if not prescient exactlyprescience, it turns out, only appears to emerge in hindsightthen highly attuned to the world both as it was and as it could become. The story of a disaffected young man named Jim McPherson, the novel unfolds in a landscape that has been overdeveloped, traversed by freeways and blanketed with condos and malls. Cars rely on computerized navigation systems, while defense contractors bid to supply the Pentagon with drones. Jims father, Dennis, works for one such company, which adds a layer of generational conflict to the narrative. Its not hard to imagine, from where I live in Los Angeles, everything Robinson describes in the book occurring at this moment, just a few miles down the road.

Such a tension, of course, is necessary, the back-and-forth on which science fiction relies. The best of the genre is not about the future but, rather, is a response to, or an extrapolation of, the world in which we find ourselves. This can lead to hope or to despair; in Three Californias, Robinson engages in both. The trilogys first book, The Wild Shore, imagines an agrarian culture that has emerged after a nuclear holocaust. The third, Pacific Edge, presents a full-on ecotopia, in the vein of Ursula K. Le Guin or Ernest Callenbach.

The Gold Coast represents a counterpoint. It is a novel about what goes wrong when (in some odd way) nothing goes wrong. Without some sort of external disruption, it observes, we will continue to amuse ourselves, even if it leads us to the grave. A map, Robinson writes here, is the representation of a landscape, after all, and many landscapes, like Orange Countys, are principally psychic. A map, and a work of fiction, too. What Robinson is doing in this novel, then, as he does throughout Three Californias, is framing his own map of the future through the conundrums of the presentnot to resolve them, necessarily, but to confront them and, in so doing, to raise necessary questions about who we are and how we want to live.

St. Martins Press-3PL

THE GOLD COAST: THREE CALIFORNIAS, BY KIM STANLEY ROBINSON

$26.03

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Why You Should Read This: 'The Gold Coast' - Alta Magazine