Category: Technology

Fungal Structures

As mankind develops and expands, the need for buildings and other structures grew with it. Most of those building involved concrete, sometimes on a huge scale, which is damaging to the environment on so many levels. Other materials like wood and plastic are also not sustainable or suitable either. However, a group of scientists believe that we could theoretically create buildings from fungus – and not just the structure, but the internal plumbing and electrics too, making a sustainable, self growing and repairing building.

“We propose to develop a structural substrate by using live fungal mycelium,” explained the European academics in their paper. “Fungal buildings will self-grow, build, and repair themselves.”

In a world which has already begun to see the physic changes caused by climate changes, the need for biological building materials would be a huge step forward in reducing fossil fuels and environmentally-destructive mining processes.

“Fungal materials can have a wide variety of mechanical properties ranging from foam-like to wood-like to polymer-like to elastomer-like,” explained co author microbiologist Han Wösten from The Netherlands’ Utrecht University. “The fact that we can make wood-like materials implies that we can use it for the building industry. The selling point of our materials is that it is biodegradable, thereby helping to create a circular economy. At the same time, it should not degrade when actually used as a building material. We can work around this apparent paradox by coating the material. In fact, we also coat wood with paint of oils to protect it against degradation.”

You might be surprised to know that NASA is also testing whether or not fungus could potentially grow in Martian soil, with an aim to using it to build low cost, sustainable structures on Mars. So far, all experiments have involved killing off the fungus once a structure has been built so that it solidifies and hardens sufficiently to carry the loads needed in structural walls. The aim is to find a way to keep the fungus alive so that it remains a living structure, allowing for further growth, repairs and alterations.

And it doesn’t stop with the main structure. Computer scientist, Andrew Adamatzky, another author of the paper, explained that they are looking to build fungal neuromorphic circuits to replace the electronics inside the building. “The living circuits will be self-growing, self-assembling and self-repairing, which no traditional circuitry can do.”

Overall, a circular economy for construction is the goal, minimizing the use of the Earth’s limited resources and reducing energy consumption.

Innerspace

It seems that science fiction movies have yet again been able to accurately predict the future. Back in 1987 Dennis Quaid starred in a film called Innerspace, where a man and his machine were shrunk down so much that they could then be injected into the blood stream of Martin Short. From there he could interact with the cells, nerves etc.

Whilst the movie may be just been a work of fiction at the time, just 35 years later a team of scientists in Israel have created a micro robot that is so small it can inspect individual cells to assess their health, as well as move cells to a different location by electro magnetic means. The scope for these micro robots is huge and this progress could be a game changer in the diagnosis and treatment of diseases.

“Developing the micro-robot’s ability to move autonomously was inspired by biological micro-swimmers like bacteria and sperm cells,” said Gilad Yossifon, biomedical engineering professor at Tel Aviv University. “This is an innovative area of research that is developing rapidly, with a wide variety of uses in fields such as medicine and the environment and as a research tool.”

“Our new development significantly advances the technology in two main aspects — hybrid propulsion and navigation by electric and magnetic mechanisms that are very different. In addition, the micro-robot has an improved ability to identify and capture a single cell for local testing or retrieval and transport to an external instrument.”

As well as being able to identify healthy and dying cells, the team is now looking to develop the micro robot so that it can also be used as an effective drug carrier that can precisely target specific areas of the body.

The merging of robot and animals has been experimented with in many ways over the years. Early in 2023 scientists managed to make a robot move using muscle cells taken from a mouse, laying the path for potential complex cyborg technology in the future.

Like a scene from Frankenstein, the experimental cyborg was created from a 3D printed skeleton, wireless LED control chip and lab grown mouse muscle cells, and maneuvered through a maze. The power to move the cells came from the use of light and heat on the LED controllers. “You can basically beam energy into the chip,” explained Mattia Gazzola, mechanical engineer at the University of Illinois, “so that means that you don’t need power onboard.”

Combine this with the recent explosion in AI development and biohybrid robots with their own intelligent neural network and internal self healing micro robots could possibly overtake the human race as the dominant species on planet Earth.

“Life Finds A Way”

Science fiction often has a way of accurately predicting the possibilities of the future. When Michael Crichton wrote Jurassic Park in 1990 he obviously did a lot of research into genetic engineering, but little could he have known that his novel was going to have a direct link to the resurrection of the Dodo thirty years later.

The Dodo has been extinct since around 1662 due to habitat loss and hunting, but a biotech startup called Colossal Sciences, is planning to resurrect the flightless bird in a similar way the dinosaurs were in Jurassic Park. Colossal Sciences is a “de-extinction” company who have previously floated plans to revive other long lost animals including the Wooly mammoth and Tasmanian tiger. And they’re not alone in their vision – since 2021 they have acquired $225 million in investment to make their proposals a reality.

Interestingly one of Colossal’s biggest backers is Thomas Tull (through States Innovative Technology Fund) who is also the producer of the Jurassic World films. Like the films foretold, reintroducing an extinct animal into a new ecosystem can have disastrous consequences, many of which might not be predictable.

If we’ve learned anything from Jurassic Park, we know that the first thing you need in order to recreate an animal is its DNA. Colossal Sciences lead paleogeneticist Beth Shapiro claims they are now in the possession of a complete Dodo genome after taking extracts from preserved remains in Denmark. But this isn’t to create a theme park, there’s a serious reason for trying to bring the Dodo back – to find a way to combat the current extinction crisis affecting the planet.

“We’re clearly in the middle of an extinction crisis,” Shapiro said. “And it’s our responsibility to bring stories and to bring excitement to people in a way that motivates them to think about the extinction crisis that’s going on right now.”

But can a true Dodo be recreated, or would it just a hybrid who’s DNA has been altered slightly?

The theory that resurrecting extinct animals from their DNA in the future could be a viable science is also confirmed by Chester Zoo, UK, whose animal researchers have teamed up with Nature’s SAFE to cryogenically freeze genetic material from animals at the zoo that have died, preserving their DNA for the future in the event of extinction.

Sadly, some scientists think that these efforts might be too late as human population and activity means we’re already in the process of a mass-extinction event, with some unique animal DNA lost forever.

Turning Waste into Fuel

Two problems seem to be plaguing the planet and our survival as a species – the ever growing mass of plastic waste we produce, and our dwindling supplies of fossil fuels. But surprisingly there could be one solution that solves both problems at the same time. And even better – it’s solar powered!

Researchers at the University of Cambridge claim that they have created a machine that takes CO2 as well as plastic waste and turns it into fuel using solar power. Their “Photoelectrochemical” system uses two compartments inside a reactor, one for greenhouse gases, and one for plastic waste. A light absorber called Perovskite and a chemical catalyst are then used to absorb enough light from the sun to convert the waste into carbon, a basic fuel.

“What’s so special about this system is the versatility and tunability — we’re making fairly simple carbon-based molecules right now, but in the future, we could be able to tune the system to make far more complex products, just by changing the catalyst,” explained Cambridge chemist Subhajit Bhattacharjee.

“Generally, CO2 conversion requires a lot of energy, but with our system, basically you just shine a light at it, and it starts converting harmful products into something useful and sustainable,” added coauthor Motiar Rahaman.

As well as carbon based fuels, the Photoelectrochemical system was also able to convert plastic bottles and CO2 into synthetic gas, and glycolic acid. Synthetic gas is an important part of liquid fuels.

On a side note, the Perovskite and catalyst combination could also help transform the solar power industry by making solar panels more productive and efficient in converting sun light into power.

But they’re not stopping there. While the system would be valuable in removing waste products from the planet and at the same time creating a fuel, the team at Cambridge believe that within the next five years they will be able to adapt the Photoelectrochemical system to transform other, more complex, materials and possibly create a solar recycling plant.

“Developing a circular economy, where we make useful things from waste instead of throwing it into landfills, is vital if we’re going to meaningfully address the climate crisis and protect the natural world,” explained Professor Erwin Reisner, a scientist at Cambridge’s Yusuf Hamied Department of Chemistry. “And powering these solutions using the sun means that we’re doing it cleanly and sustainably.”

Extinction Internet

If you look back only twenty or thirty years, the world seems a very different place to the one we’re familiar with now. Today, almost every aspect of our life depends on access to the internet and our ability to access social media every day, it’s the modern invention we physically cannot live without. So, it seems completely unbelievable that the end of life online could even be contemplated as a possibility. But that’s exactly what a Dutch professor thinks will eventually happen – we will start to “log off”.

Professor Geert Lovink, a media theorist from the University of Amsterdam, has produced a paper called “Extinction Internet” which considers the possibility that everyone will eventually become tired of being online, constantly being exposed to bad content, and decide to turn off.

Certain generations have already begun to discover that the internet is “both toxic and curative” resulting in disenchantment and a strong believe that the time to fix the internet has long passed. Swirling with fake news, misinformation and hatred, whilst intoxicating for the few, is destructive for most.

“There may come a point when that’s no longer acceptable, after which time the adverse consequences can no longer be controlled,” Lovink explained. “The internet is headed for a point of no return, and Big Tech is probably already aware of this, too.”

“Mark Zuckerberg has already moved away from his social media platforms and launched Meta,” he added, “as if nothing’s wrong and we can just start over again, but it’s clearly already broken.”

Lovink suggests that the psychological price associated with our addiction to the internet and social media will begin to cost too much of the average user, resulting in rejection of technology. And that point of no return is rapidly approaching – Lovink’s ‘peak internet moment’ will occur when our dependence hits a line most users will not want to cross.

“The observation that the internet is accelerating the world’s problems and is increasingly becoming problematic is reaching consensus status.”

But, could this really happen? Is the human race too addicted to a digital world to be able to unplug?

Whilst some will make a conscious decision to remove themselves from social media, the actual connection to the internet is also far more likely to be cut by a third party. The fragile thread of connection can simply be severed as a result of an electromagnetic pulse from a weapon of mass destruction – a threat that’s all too real.

Frozen Embryos

In 2022 a couple in Portland welcomed twins into the world. Whilst the chance of giving birth to twins is much smaller than a single child, what makes these twins even more extraordinary is that these children were born from embryos that had been frozen 30 years previously.

The babies were reported to be normal in every aspect, despite already being over 30 years old when they were born, after being perfectly preserved in liquid nitrogen at negative 200 degrees Fahrenheit.

The embryos were frozen in 1992 with the intention of being used for IVF (In-vitro fertilization) for a different couple. However, in 2007 that couple donated the embryos to the National Embryo Donation Center.

A viable embryo frozen in time which could then go one to become a child 30 years later, is a modern miracle, it’s not the first time embryos have successfully been transplanted in the future. Prior to 2022, the longest embryo to child gap had been 28 years. It just goes to show that the freezing process results in a stasis of the biological process which might theoretically mean that time doesn’t matter – could an embryo from 1992 be used successfully in 2092 to produce a child from the past?

Could this also help with the prospect of being cryogenically frozen to be reanimated at some time in the future?

The prospect of helping many childless couples in the future seems a lot brighter and promising, especially as mankind’s survival is becoming more and more precarious. Not only from climate change and global wars, but on the basic level of human reproduction.

Earlier in 2022 a team of scientists looked at over 250 studies from around the world to get a general idea of the global sperm count over the last 50 years. Incredibly, from 1973 to 2018 sperm count dropped by 1.2 percent per year until 2000, but then began dropping at a faster rate of 2.6 percent per year.

“We have a serious problem on our hands that, if not mitigated, could threaten mankind’s survival,” explained Professor Hagai Levine. “We urgently call for global action to promoted healthier environments for all species and reduce exposures and behaviors that threaten our reproductive health.”

With this alarming global decreases in sperm count, the use of frozen embryo’s in the future could be mankind’s best hope for survival.