Science of the Future
How once food-poor India’s advanced seed genetics usurped China’s global dominance of rice production
India has become the world's largest rice producer, beating China, with a total output of 150.18 million tonnes, Union Agriculture ...
‘The dire wolf isn’t back’: A Colossal failure or the cutting-edge of conservation? Maybe both
When Colossal unveiled its interpretation of the dire wolf in April, the news made international headlines. Enthusiastic profiles in Time ...
Can AI’s enormous power demands resuscitate the low-carbon nuclear power industry?
Giants like Google, Amazon, and Microsoft have inked numerous deals in recent years with nuclear companies to power data centers; ...
Politicization of Health & Science: Year in Review
Ideology-driven misinformation is a grave and growing threat to science and society. False claims spread faster than facts; confusion has ...
Cassandras map the ‘inevitable’ AI doomsday
Right in the heart of Berkeley is the home of a group of modern-day Cassandras who rummage under the hood ...
AI doomerism is so passé. Or is it?
It’s a weird time to be an AI doomer. This small but influential community of researchers, scientists, and policy experts ...
CRISPR chicken: Could gene editing be the key to cheaper poultry?
Chicken is one of the world’s most affordable and widely consumed proteins, yet its price remains surprisingly sensitive to feed ...
Discovery of growth ‘switch’ in cold-hardy plants could unlock pathways to develop more cold-resilient crops
Scientists in South Korea have discovered a rapid molecular “switch” that reprograms plant growth in response to cold stress. The ...
AI hype takes a hit—For most businesses, the revolutionary tool falls short
Some disillusionment was inevitable. When OpenAI released a free web app called ChatGPT in late 2022, it changed the course of an ...
Corporate control, ecological challenges and food safety: Challenges await expansion of the gene-editing crop revolution
Ethical considerations surrounding genome editing are as complex as the science itself. As the debate rages on about the safety ...
AI morality? Don’t hold your breath
It’s not the AI overlords destroying humanity that we need to worry about so much as a hyperpolarized, hyperweaponized humanity destroying ...
The expanding role of robotics in agriculture … on Earth and in space
Despite challenges, agriculture remains an appealing sector for robotics applications. ... In recent decades, agri-tech companies have been investing in ...
What diseases lurk in your DNA? AI has many new answers
Scientists at the Icahn School of Medicine at Mount Sinai have developed a novel artificial intelligence tool that not only ...
Viewpoint: U.S. and Europe lagging behind China’s embrace of crop gene editing
Ships, chips, and missiles dominate discussions about defense. But don’t forget food. Secure supplies are key to supply-chain sovereignty — ...
Yummy goldenberries with their pineapple-mango taste could transform via gene editing into a mass grocery market star
Goldenberries taste like a cross between pineapple and mango, pack the nutritional punch of a superfood, and are increasingly popular ...
Trouble getting pregnant: AI is the energizer bunny way to supercharge sperm
Doctors at Columbia University's fertility centre ... have developed an imaging technology, Sperm Tracking and Recovery (STAR), which they believe ...
Outside the boundaries of modern science? Gene editing opens the door to treat rare diseases
Fyodor Urnov, the scientific director of UC Berkeley’s Innovative Genomics Institute (IGI), showed me a list of rare diseases and ...
Fungus ‘meat’? Yes, it could be a less expensive, environmentally sustainable —and tasty— chicken substitute
Chinese scientists have genetically tweaked a fungus to make protein-rich “meat”, which they say can be a low-cost, environmentally friendly alternative ...
Utopian fantasy or realistic tools? Deploying synthetic biology to jump crop yields sustainably
As the climate crisis accelerates, there’s a desperate need to rapidly reduce carbon dioxide levels in the atmosphere, both by ...
Yield, resilience and profits: Seed technology is put to the test
Dr Godfrey Kgatle, plant pathologist and research coordinator at Grain SA, offers insight into how traditional breeding, hybrids, genetically modified ...
Might CRISPR gene editing in medicine open up a can of ‘unintended consequences’ worms? RNA advances could address that threat
The United States Food and Drug Administration has approved the first-ever clinical trial that uses CRISPR-Cas13 RNA editing. Its aim ...
50 million tinnitus sufferers in the US take note: This device might relieve the often-devastating ring-like ‘noise’
Tinnitus, the rockstar of auditory annoyances, is a buzzing, ringing, or tone that only you can hear. It's a party ...
Will South Korea join the rest of the science world in deregulating genetically engineered crops?
[Korea's] National Assembly [just] passed the “GMO Full Disclosure Act (Food Sanitation Act Amendment).” This reflects progress in transparency, safeguarding ...
Most scientists reject social media while others consider it their obligation to counter junk claims. Here’s the best of the best
Once upon a time, science communication was a niche hobby, reserved for the rare few who could translate lab jargon ...
Can we ‘recharge’ our cells to rewind the aging clock? Scientists think so
Think of cells as the biological answer to battery-powered electronics. Mitochondria are the batteries that supply them with enough energy to keep going. ...
Viewpoint: India needs to refine its view of the benefits and limits of crop biotechnology
This year’s Nobel laureates in Economics affirm that the future of growth models will be driven by innovation. This is ...
AquaWomb offers a life support system for precarious, premature babies. Not everyone thinks that’s a great idea
In the US, more than 10,000 infants are born each year within ... precarious boundaries. Premature birth remains the nation’s second-leading cause of infant ...
