Mashed potatoes and gravy for the hungry mind

Special Dispatch #3 Thanksgiving, 2008

We’re serving up a feast of good news this Thanksgiving. Here’s the third
course.

 

Item 3

Solar
Sailor Sun Sails To Be Fitted to Chinese Cargo Ships

Late last month, the Australian Solar Sailor company announced they’d
signed a deal with China’s biggest shipping line, COSCO, to fit some of their
jumbo jet sized solar-powered sails to a tanker and bulk carrier.

The 30 metre long sails, festooned in photovoltaic panels are expected to
catch enough wind to reduce fuel costs by between 20% and 40%, whilst those
PV cells will provide the ships with 5% of their electricity. A computer automatically
angles the sails for maximum wind and solar efficiency, and if all goes to
plan the sails will have recovered their initial cost within four years.

The Good News

Where technology is concerned, what goes around frequently comes around. Ideas
that have been replaced by two or three generations of subsequent technology
suddenly resurface as new and viable. A good example of this sort of thing is
the mechanical model of computing — something Charles
Babbage would have been perfectly comfortable with — re-emerging with molecular
nanotechnology.

100 years ago, sailing technology was all about obsolete for serious shipping
applications. But it could make acomeback today, making ships much more efficient
and environmentally friendly.

Not to mention cool-looking.

 

 

Live to see it!

More proof that if you’re not excited about the future, you’re not paying attention

Special Dispatch #2 Thanksgiving, 2008

Our special Thanksgiving series of good news series continues.

 

Item 2

Japanese researchers
make brain tissues from stem cells

Japanese researchers said Thursday they had created functioning human brain
tissues from stem cells, a world first that has raised new hopes for the treatment
of disease. Stem cells taken from human embryos have been used to form tissues
of the cerebral cortex, the supreme control tower of the brain, according
to researchers at the government-backed research institute Riken.

The tissues self-organised into four distinct zones very similar to the structure
seen in human foetuses, and conducted neuro-activity such as transmitting
electrical signals, the institute said.

The Good News

Well, let’s count the possible applications here:

1. Treatment for brain damage sustained via disease or trauma. The conventional
wisdom has always been that recovery from brain damage requires building new
connections and otherwise working around damage that has to be taken as a permanent
fact of life. If we can grow new brain tissue, this is no longer the case.

2. Treatment for degenerative disease. There are a number of very exciting
possible treatments being developed for diseases such as Parkinsons
and Alzheimers.
The ability to produce vital new brain tissue can only be a boon to fighting
these diseases.

3. Life Extension. If we’re going to live longer, it’s a cinch that
we’re going to need longer-lasting brains. This technology can help make that
possible.

4. Performance Enhancement. Growing new brain tissue might be more than
a way of keeping youthful mental stamina and performance well into our senior
years; perhaps it would enable us to augment and upgrade our brain performance
at any age.

 

Live to see it!