Category Archives: Transhuman News

The 3D-printed portraits, titled Probably Chelsea, will hang on fishing line from a dropped ceiling in the center of the gallery. The gallerys director, Iliya Fridman, said, The Probably Chelseas will be in a lot of different places on the gender and race spectrum. It really demonstrates that there are so many elements of DNA that are common to humans.

The show isnt supposed to be about WikiLeaks, Mr. Fridman said, but sometimes the political parallel is too powerful to resist. A super-powerful dynamic happening here is that the freedom one could gain by defining ones own DNA in a variety of ways is really metaphorical to the freedom the entire country could gain from releasing secret data, Mr. Fridman said.

Mr. Fridman said the show would also feature images from a graphic short story illustrated by Shoili Kanungo, Suppressed Images, that recounts the collaboration between Ms. Manning and Ms. Dewey-Hagborg. The story ends with an image of Ms. Manning going to a gallery after her release.

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From Chelsea Manning's DNA Springs an Art Show - New York Times

If youre reworking a genome, you might want to heed the old saying, Measure twice, cut once. Otherwise, your attempts to right the genome or modify it for special purposes could end in genomic wrongsoff-target effects. For example, the popular gene-editing tool known as CRISPR could go astray, altering genes other than the ones it was meant to alter. If only CRISPRs potential slips could be foreseen! Then, perhaps, they could be avoided, and CRISPR would realize its potential not only in research, but also in medicine.

Scientists from The University of Texas at Austin took an important step toward safer gene-editing cures for life-threatening disorders, from cancer to HIV to Huntington's disease, by developing CHAMP, which stands for chip-hybridized association-mapping platform. It repurposes next-generation sequencing chips to enable the massively parallel profiling of proteinnucleic acid interactions.

The scientists used CHAMP to provide the first comprehensive survey of DNA recognition by a type I-E CRISPR-Cas (Cascade) complex and Cas3 nuclease. CHAMP, the scientists showed, was able to simultaneously measure the interactions between proteins and 107 unique DNA sequences.

Additional details appeared June 29 in the journal Cell, in an article entitled, Massively Parallel Biophysical Analysis of CRISPR-Cas Complexes on Next Generation Sequencing Chips. These details suggest that CHAMP provides a framework for high-throughput, quantitative analysis of proteinDNA interactions on synthetic and genomic DNA.

Analysis of mutated target sequences and human genomic DNA reveal that Cascade recognizes an extended protospacer adjacent motif (PAM), the articles authors wrote. Cascade recognizes DNA with a surprising 3-nt [nucleotide] periodicity. The identity of the PAM and the PAM-proximal nucleotides control Cas3 recruitment by releasing the Cse1 subunit.

Essentially, these findings led to a model for the biophysical constraints governing off-target DNA binding. This model, for example, suggests that Cascade pays less attention to every third letter in a DNA sequence than to the others.

"So, if it were looking for the word 'shirt' and instead found the word 'short,' it might be fine with that," explained Stephen Jones, Ph.D., a postdoctoral researcher at UT Austin and one of three co-lead authors of the Cell paper.

Knowing such rules could lead to better computer models for predicting which DNA segments a specific CRISPR molecule is likely to interact with. And that can save time and money in developing personalized gene therapies.

"You and I differ in about 1 million spots in our genetic code," said Ilya Finkelstein, Ph.D., an assistant professor in the department of molecular biosciences at UT Austin and the project's principal investigator. "Because of this genetic diversity, human gene editing will always be a custom-tailored therapy."

The researchers took a DIY approach to developing the equipment and software for their technique, using existing laboratory technology. The heart of the test is a standard next-generation genome sequencing chip already widely used in research and medicine. Two other key elementsdesigns for a 3D printed mount that holds the chip under a microscope and software the team developed for analyzing the resultsare open source. As a result, other researchers can easily replicate the technique in experiments involving CRISPR.

"Next-generation genome sequencing was invented to read genomes, but here we've turned the technology on its head to allow us to characterize how CRISPR interacts with genomes," noted Andy Ellington, Ph.D., a professor in the department of molecular biosciences, vp for research of the Applied Research Laboratories at UT Austin, and a co-author of the paper.

"If we're going to use CRISPR to improve peoples' health, we need to make sure we minimize collateral damage, commented Dr. Jones. And this work shows a way to do that."

Read the rest here:
CRISPR Platform Scans DNA to Predict Off-Target Effects - Genetic Engineering & Biotechnology News (press release)

LAS VEGAS, Nev. -- Cisco has entered the nascent market for intent-based networking systems with a grand vision of leading customers to a new era of network management. But realizing that vision will depend on whether Cisco can successfully integrate complex products and build effective support operations.

Cisco launched its intent-based networking system (IBNS) June 20 with the unveiling of the Digital Network Architecture (DNA) Center, the software console for creating and deploying configuration policies for a new line of campus switches called the Catalyst 9000s. This week, at its Cisco Live user conference, the company dedicated a considerable amount of time educating its customers on the use and capabilities of the modernized campus network infrastructure.

In general, an IBNS replaces manual configuration of switches, firewalls and other infrastructure components. On switches, it means a network operator no longer has to make configuration changes through the command-line interface (CLI) of each piece of equipment. Today, roughly 75% of organizations manage network infrastructure manually, according to Gartner.

Having a network management center that executes policy-based configurations makes a company's network more agile because changes can be made quickly based on the demands of business operations. Also, an intent-based networking system solves the leading cause of network outages -- misconfigurations and errors on the part of network operators.

Cisco has told customers that DNA Center will eventually become the central console for an intent-based networking system that touches the entire enterprise WAN, including data center, campus and cloud. For that to happen, however, a lot of other Cisco products will have to be integrated into DNA Center.

Those products include the Tetration network analytics engine, CloudCenter, which lets companies manage applications running on multiple clouds, and the Application Policy Infrastructure Controller (APIC) that is the heart of Cisco's software-defined networking (SDN) system for the data center.

"Until [DNA Center] is integrated with those solutions, it's not a single pane of glass," said Brandon Carroll, the CEO of IT training company Global Config Technology Solutions Inc.

One area analysts will watch closely is how well Cisco can incorporate analytics to help customers do network monitoring, troubleshooting and identify threats through DNA network management center. Good analytics can also help customers create the most effective policies.

"Analytics is one of the most daunting pieces and one of the most challenging pieces and also one of the most important ones," said Brad Casemore, an analyst at IDC.

Beyond technology, Cisco also has business challenges. For example, the company will have to provide a way for customers to transition from old switches to the new gear that supports DNA Center. Today, the software communicates to the Catalyst 9000s through significant changes in IOS, the network operating system in the switches. Older Catalysts either wont work or will only support a limited number of the DNA Centers capabilities.

[For now] you still have that underlying infrastructure that you have to manage thats not part of the overall solution, Carroll said. Thats going to be the hardest part getting older equipment out [of customers environments] and the newer equipment in.

Also, each business unit responsible for selling a product that will go into DNAs network management center has to learn to work together in preparing the technology for testing through Ciscos online simulation platform, called the Virtual Internet Routing Lab.

We see little bits of them not getting along when you look at the VIRL product, Carroll said. There are a lot of other Cisco products that could be in VIRL if the business units work together to get their products into that solution.

Cisco has time to work out the kinks. Customers got technical details on the DNA network management center and related products for the first time at Cisco Live. Also, intent-based networking, in general, is just beginning to emerge, so no vendor has all the technology needed for a WAN deployment. Other vendors providing some form of intent-based networking include Apstra, Forward Networks, Veriflow and Waltz Networks. Industry experts expect Juniper Networks Ciscos largest competitor in the space to launch an IBNS soon.

The concepts behind intent-based networking have been around for more than a dozen years. Analysts are optimistic that current products are mature enough to start gaining traction in the market. Gartner estimates the number of companies with the technology in production will grow from fewer than 15 today to more than 1,000 by 2020.

Gartner lists four capabilities for a system to qualify as intent-based.

First, the user has to be able to create a high-level business policy that the product converts into network configurations. The system also has to be able to tell the user the potential impact of the changes before they are deployed;

An IBNS carries some risks, according to Gartner. These include the reliability of the algorithms that power the software. No one can say for sure how well they will work across all enterprise networks.

Other risks include the immaturity of many of the vendors in the market and whether typically conservative network operators will embrace the technology, particularly if early implementations result in high-profile failures.

Key features of a unified network management tool

Network functions virtualization requires a new network management model

The ABCs of unified network management

Originally posted here:
Cisco faces challenges in building DNA network management center - TechTarget