london – Tech Today w/ Ken May

Researchers grew a fully mature human egg in a lab

Researchers in the UK and the US have taken human eggs in their most early stage and developed them to maturity in a lab for the first time. It’s a big achievement that could open up new avenues for infertility treatment and give scientists a better understanding of how the egg development process works and how it can go wrong. While this has been done before in mice, experiments of which have resulted in live offspring, this is the first time it has been done with human eggs. The research team had previously developed a protocol wherein they could take eggs in later stages of development and bring them to maturity, and they expanded that protocol in an attempt to develop eggs from start to finish in the lab. They took samples of ovarian tissue from 10 women while they were undergoing caesarean section surgery and cultured sections of that tissue that have the ability to release an egg, structures known as follicles. The follicles were cultured in a multi-step procedure that allowed for eggs to develop. At the end of each step, follicles, and eventually eggs, that had successfully matured further were moved to the following step. The team initially isolated 87 follicles and by the end of the 21-day procedure, nine eggs reached a stage of maturity that would in theory allow them to be fertilized with sperm and develop into an embryo. While only 37 percent of the early-stage follicles resulted in a fully grown egg and only 10 percent achieved levels of maturity that could allow for reproduction, it’s still an important step in the study of egg development, or oogenesis. Ali Abbara, an endocrinology senior lecturer at the Imperial College of London who wasn’t involved with the study, told Reuters , “The technology remains at an early stage, and much more work is needed to make sure that the technique is safe and optimized before we ascertain whether these eggs remain normal during the process, and can be fertilized to form embryos that could lead to healthy babies.” Evelyn Telfer, a researcher at the University of Edinburgh and the leader of the study, told Reuters that the team is now working on optimizing this process and evaluating how healthy the resulting eggs are. One next step is to try to fertilize the eggs with sperm to see if they can result in a viable embryo — work that requires a licence that the team doesn’t yet have. This work could help improve IVF treatments in the future and could particularly help girls with cancer. They typically have pieces of their ovaries removed and preserved prior to receiving cancer treatments that might damage their follicles. However, if there’s a chance that the tissue has cancer cells, it can’t be reimplanted later on. If doctors could mature those eggs outside of her body, those eggs could still be used without introducing risk to the woman. Additionally, in cases where women have a condition that prevents the development of their eggs, this type of research could help scientists understand why that happens. “There are several conditions in which women lose their eggs much earlier in life, or they don’t grow, ” Telfer told New Scientist . “If we could understand the process…we could develop treatments for that.” The research was published in Molecular Human Reproduction . Via: Reuters Source: Molecular Human Reproduction

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Researchers grew a fully mature human egg in a lab

Scanning technique reads hidden writing in mummy boxes

Historians can use scanning to peek inside mummies without risking damage, but that hasn’t been true for the papyrus boxes those mummies were placed in before entering the tomb. If you’ve wanted to read the discarded everyday writing on that papyrus, you’ve typically had to destroy the boxes. That won’t be necessary from now on, though: researchers at University College London have developed a scanning technique that lets you read a mummy case’s writing while leaving it intact. If you scan the cases with light at different frequencies, you can make the ink glow and thus see under the paste and plaster that would normally obscure the text. A lot of the writing is unspectacular (the BBC describes them as shopping lists and tax returns), but that’s the point — it’s about discovering Egyptian history beyond royalty and other famous people. The technique has already found success with one mummy stored in Kent. It’s not certain that it’ll find widespread adoption, but it’s hard to see historians turning this down. Much as with techniques used to read closed books , this lets researchers have the best of both worlds: they can read ‘secret’ text without having to sacrifice priceless relics. Source: BBC

Bloodhound preps for land speed record with 200MPH test run

It’s finally happened. Nine years after the Bloodhound project was announced at London’s Science Museum , the supersonic car has completed its first test runs. At a closed-off airstrip near Newquay airport, Cornwall, the monstrous vehicle roared across the tarmac at roughly 200 MPH. That figure is a long way off the team’s ultimate goal of 763 MPH, however, and a new world land speed record. Eventually, the team hopes to crack 1, 000 MPH at the dusty Kalahari desert in South Africa. Before then, however, the team had to prove that the car was more than vapourware and broken promises. Today, the car relied on a Eurojet EJ200 jet engine for thrust. That on its own could take the car to 650 MPH. The final configuration will also have a rocket system provided by Nordic aerospace company Nammo. For the initial record attempt, the Bloodhound will use a single monopropellant rocket which can produce around 40kN of thrust. It will then be swapped out for a hybrid rocket system that, combined with the jet engine, can carry the car to 1, 000 MPH. In total, the vehicle will produce 212kN of thrust, which is eight times the power output of a Formula 1 starting grid. To install the rocket system, however, Bloodhound needs cash. Funding has always been a problem for the team in Bristol, which relies on sponsorship and fan donations to operate. The trial runs in Cornwall, then, serve two purposes; they’re a vital form of testing, giving the team valuable data and insight into the practicalities of running the vehicle. They are, though, also a marketing tool which the team hopes will attract the interest and, ultimately, the cash of a deep-pocketed investor. Without extra funding, the team will have to delay its record attempt in late 2018. Bloodhound is driven by Andy Green, an RAF pilot who set the previous world land speed record with the Thrust SSC in 1997. He’ll be piloting the vehicle both for the initial land speed record (the team hopes to hit about 800 MPH) and the 1, 000 MPH attempt. Bloodhound is a complicated and intimidating car to operate, measuring 13.4 meters and weighing roughly seven and a half tonnes. In Cornwall, however, Green seemed unfazed —excited even — as he clambered into the cockpit. We’re not surprised; he’s waited as long as the public to finally push the accelerator pedal. Here’s hoping it won’t be quite as long before we see Bloodhound run again.

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Bloodhound preps for land speed record with 200MPH test run

Feds in California are aggressively going after Silk Road, AlphaBay vendors

Enlarge / A stack of bitcoins sits among twisted copper wiring inside a communications room at an office in this arranged photograph in London on Tuesday, September 5, 2017. (credit: Bloomberg / Getty Images News ) Next month, a California drug dealer who recently pleaded guilty to selling on Silk Road, AlphaBay, and other sites is scheduled to be sentenced. According to federal authorities, David Ryan Burchard was one of the largest online merchants of marijuana and cocaine—he sold over $1.4 million worth of narcotics. Burchard was prosecuted in federal court in the Eastern District of California, which has quietly become a hub of cases against dealers from those notorious and now-shuttered Dark Web marketplaces. According to Lauren Horwood, a spokeswoman for the US Attorney’s Office in Sacramento, one of the primary hubs of this federal judicial district, there are currently 11 Silk Road and AlphaBay-related prosecutions underway. Four of the defendants have pleaded guilty, and, of those, two have already been sentenced, while the others’ cases are still ongoing. Read 21 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Feds in California are aggressively going after Silk Road, AlphaBay vendors

The unflushable debate resurfaces: A 130-ton mass clogs London’s sewer

The “monster fatberg.” (credit: Thames Water ) A 250-meter-long mass weighing 130 metric tons has blocked a Victorian-era sewer tunnel in the east side of London, the BBC reports . To put the size and heft of the clog in perspective: it’s longer than two American football fields and as heavy as 11 double-decker buses. The mass is a concrete-hard amalgamation of flushed items, including condoms, diapers, and—most notably—wet wipes that have all been cemented together with oils and fats that were also washed down drains. For that reason, these types of clogs are sometimes called “fatbergs.” Authorities expect it will take three weeks to remove. Read 9 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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The unflushable debate resurfaces: A 130-ton mass clogs London’s sewer

14,700 years ago, cannibals conducted rituals in this English cave

PLoS Nestled in the dramatic Cheddar Gorge in Somerset, UK, there’s a roomy limestone cave called Gough’s Cave where a few generations of people lived about 14,700 years ago. They littered the floor with the remnants of their meals, leaving hundreds of bones behind for archaeologists to find. Now, scientists have analyzed these bones and discovered that some of them are from six separate human beings. And they bear the distinct marks of ritual cannibalism. Natural History Museum of London scientist Silvia Bello and her colleagues write in PLoS One about the find. The bones came from a child, two adolescents, two adults, and one elderly adult. All showed evidence of butchery, which leaves characteristic marks behind when sharp tools are used for defleshing. The bones were also covered in human tooth marks from biting and gnawing, and some had been broken open for their marrow. Read 10 remaining paragraphs | Comments

AlphaBay taken down by law enforcement across 3 countries, WSJ says

Enlarge / A bitcoin token stands in this arranged photograph in London, U.K., on Wednesday, Jan. 4, 2017. (credit: Chris Ratcliffe/Bloomberg via Getty Images ) AlphaBay, one of the largest Tor-hidden drug websites that sprung up in the wake of Silk Road, has been shuttered for good after a series of law enforcement raids and arrests. The site mysteriously went dark earlier this month. Some users on Reddit suspected an “exit scam,” in which AlphaBay’s founders had shuttered the site and absconded with piles of bitcoins. According to the Wall Street Journal , which reported the news on Thursday, police in the United States, Canada, and Thailand collaborated to arrest Alexandre Cazes, who allegedly was the head of the online operation. The Canadian citizen was arrested on July 5 in Thailand, the same day that two raids on residences in Quebec, Canada, were executed. On Wednesday, Cazes was found dead, hanged in his Thai jail cell. Read 4 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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AlphaBay taken down by law enforcement across 3 countries, WSJ says

Struggling for survival, SoundCloud closes San Francisco, London offices

Enlarge / Alexander Ljung, CEO and co-founder of SoundCloud, seen here in 2013. (credit: David Paul Morris/Bloomberg via Getty Images) SoundCloud announced Thursday that it would be closing its San Francisco and London offices—firing 173 employees, or around 40 percent of its staff. The Berlin-based company has been struggling for years: it reported losses of over €51 million ($58.1 million) in 2015 —losses that have steadily grown since 2010. In January 2017 financial statements, the company said the losses “give rise to a material uncertainty about the Group’s ability to continue as a going concern.” Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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Struggling for survival, SoundCloud closes San Francisco, London offices

London Metropolitan Police’s 18,000 Windows XP PCs Is a Disaster Waiting To Happen

According to MSPoweruser, the London Metropolitan Police are still using around 18, 000 PCs powered by Windows XP, an operating system Microsoft stopped supporting in 2014. What’s more is that the police force is upgrading its PCs from Windows XP to Windows 8.1, instead of Windows 10. Only 8 PCs at the police force are reportedly powered by the “most secure version of Windows right now.” From the report: From the looks of things, the London Metropolitan Police will continue to upgrade their systems to Windows 8.1 at the moment. Windows 8.1 is still being supported by Microsoft, although the mainstream support for the OS is set to end on the 9 January 2018. Microsoft will offer extended support for the OS until 2023, which means Windows 8.1 is still a much more secure alternative for the Metropolitan Police than Windows XP. Windows 10 still would have been the best option in terms of security, however. Microsoft is releasing security updates for the OS every month, and the new advanced security features like Windows Defender Advanced Threat Protection makes PCs running Windows a whole lot more secure. The spokesman of the 0Conservative London Assembly said in a statement: “The Met is working towards upgrading its software, but in its current state it’s like a fish swimming in a pool of sharks. It is vital the Met is given the resources to step up its upgrade timeline before we see another cyber-attack with nationwide security implications.” Read more of this story at Slashdot.

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London Metropolitan Police’s 18,000 Windows XP PCs Is a Disaster Waiting To Happen

London police arrest four in Windows support scam bust

Enlarge / Customers of the telecommunications and Internet provider TalkTalk are among those who have been targeted in a Windows support scam operation in the UK. London Police announced the arrest of four suspected of involvement with the ring today. (credit: Carl Court/Getty Images) City of London Police, collaborating with Microsoft, have made four arrests as the result of a two-year investigation into rings of “Windows support” fraudsters. The arrests, London Police Commander Dave Clark told the press, “are just the beginning of our work, making the best use of specialist skills and expertise from Microsoft, local police forces, and international partners to tackle a crime that often targets the most vulnerable in our society.” The four suspects—a man and woman working together in Surrey, and another couple working from South Shields, Tyneside, are accused of being involved with a scheme operating out of a call center in India. Their role in the scams is not clear. The scam, similar to the one Ars intercepted in January , seeks to convince would-be victims to install remote-access software on their computers and then to set up recurring credit card billing for technical support or anti-virus software. In these cases, the scammers often posed as employees of the UK Internet service providers BT and TalkTalk, saying that they had been authorized by Microsoft to provide technical support. Read 2 remaining paragraphs | Comments

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London police arrest four in Windows support scam bust