Show Notes 14 June 2024
Story 1: DeepMind’s AI program AlphaFold3 can predict the structure of every protein in the universe — and show how they function
Source: Live Science Story by Nicholas Fearn
See also: https://alphafold.com/
- Side note – DeepMind is an artificial intelligence technology that uses neural networks and machine learning to crack a broad range of problems, from protein folding to the game Go. The company DeepMind began as a London-based startup in 2010 and was acquired by Google in 2014. It’s now a subsidiary of Alphabet Inc., the parent company of Google.
- Now the news – DeepMind has unveiled the third version of its artificial intelligence-powered structural biology software, AlphaFold, which models how proteins fold.
- Side note: AlphaFold is an AI system that predicts a protein’s 3D structure from its amino acid sequence.
- GIANT SIDE NOTE – Understanding how proteins fold is crucial for several reasons:
- Protein Function: A protein’s function directly depends on its three-dimensional structure. When proteins fold correctly, their function proceeds without a hitch. However, folding errors, which can result from mutations or other random errors, may disrupt protein function1.
- Protein Structure Prediction: Predicting a protein’s structure from its amino acid sequence remains a key challenge. By studying protein folding, researchers can improve structure prediction methods and understand how different sequences lead to specific structures2.
- Protein Design: Designing proteins with novel structures and functions relies on applying the principles of folding. Understanding folding pathways helps in creating custom proteins for various applications2.
- Disease: Misfolded proteins are linked to many diseases, including Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s. Investigating protein folding can provide insights into disease mechanisms and potential therapeutic targets2.
- In summary, protein folding is essential for studying protein structure, function, and related diseases.
- The new AlphaFold3 helps scientists more accurately predict how proteins — the large molecules that play a critical role in all life forms, from plants and animals to human cells — interact with other biological molecules, including DNA and RNA. Doing so will enable scientists to “truly understand life’s processes,” DeepMind representatives wrote in a blog post.
- By comparison, its predecessors, AlphaFold and AlphaFold2, could only predict the shapes that proteins fold into. That was still a major scientific breakthrough at the time.
- AlphaFold3’s predictions could help scientists develop bio-renewable materials, crops with greater resistance, new drugs, and more, the research team wrote in a study published May 8 in the journal Nature.
- Given a list of molecules, the AlphaFold3 program can show how they fit together. It does this not only for large molecules like proteins, DNA, and RNA but also for small molecules known as ligands, which bind to receptors on large proteins like a key fitting into a lock.
- AlphaFold3 also models how some of these biomolecules (which are organic molecules produced by living things) are chemically modified. Disruptions in these chemical modifications can play a role in diseases.
- AlphaFold3 can perform these calculations because its underlying machine-learning architecture and training data encompasses every type of biomolecule.
- GIANT SIDE NOTE:
- Biomolecules are essential substances produced by cells and living organisms. There are four major types of biomolecules:
- Carbohydrates: These include sugars and starches, serving as energy sources and structural components in all life forms.
- Lipids: Fulfilling various roles, lipids store energy and act as chemical messengers.
- Nucleic acids: DNA and RNA store genetic information, determining protein sequences critical for life.
- Proteins: These are major structural elements, transporters, enzymes, antibodies, and hormones in cells.
- Each type plays a unique role, contributing to the complexity of life on Earth
- The researchers claim that AlphaFold3 is 50% more accurate than current software-based methods of predicting protein structures and their interactions with other molecules.
- However, unlike its predecessors, AlphaFold 3 is no longer open source. This means scientists cannot use custom versions of the AI model, or access its code or training data publicly, for their research work.
- However, scientists looking to use AlphaFold3 for non-commercial research can access it for free using the recently launched AlphaFold Server. They can input their desired molecular sequences and gain predictions within minutes. But they can only perform 20 jobs per day.
Story 2: A robotic third thumb controlled by your toe could just be what you need
Source: Metro Story by Katherine Fidler
See video here: https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/news/robotic-third-thumb-helps-perform-challenging-tasks-single-handedly/vi-BB1nm9dl?ocid=BingNewsSerp&t=24
Another video here after commercial: https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/peopleandplaces/this-robotic-thumb-is-designed-to-help-you-enhance-productivity-at-work/vi-BB1nosX4
- Who hasn’t wished they had a spare pair of hands now and again? You might be trying to unlock the front door with your arms full of shopping, or rushing to prep dinner but can only chop so much at a time.
- Well, humanity has just taken a step closer with an extra thumb – paving the way for future robotic limbs.
- The Third Thumb, created by University of Cambridge augmentation and prosthetics designer Dani Clode, is a 3D-printed robotic thumb controlled by a user’s toes.
- The “Third Thumb” straps to the palm, opposite the user’s natural thumb, and has two degrees of freedom.
- It’s powered by wrist-worn motors, and the wearer controls its movements, and the speed of them, using a pressure sensor placed under each big toe.
- Pressure exerted on one toe pulls the thumb across the hand, while pressure on the other toe moves the 3D-printed digit up toward the fingers.
- The controls are wireless and proportional, so faster movement from the toes will result in similarly quick movement with the thumb. Easing up on toe pressure will release the thumb back to its original position.
- One of the aims of the Third Thumb is to augment the human body, and one-handed tasks carried out while wearing the prosthetic in testing include peeling a banana, opening drink bottles, and playing cards.
- The team from Cambridge also said it’s incredibly easy to use, testing the device on almost 600 members of the public at the 2022 Royal Society Summer Science Exhibition.
- The team stressed the importance of testing new technology on a wide demographic, to ensure it works for everyone.
Story 3: Scientists develop ultra-thin battery for smart contact lenses that could be charged by tears
Source: CNBC Story by Nessa Anwar
See the video here: https://www.msn.com/en-us/video/money/the-super-thin-battery-that-could-power-smart-contact-lenses/vi-BB1nHZeh?t=62
- A new ultra-thin battery created by researchers at the Nanyang Technological University’s School of Electrical and Electronical Engineering in Singapore is about 0.2 millimeters thick, making it thin enough to fit inside a 0.5-millimeter contact lens.
- The battery is powered by a biocompatible saline solution and serves as an alternative to lithium-ion batteries.
- While the battery can be charged through a traditional wire or chemical method, it can also use the glucose in your tears to power up.
- Scientist Lee Seok Woo said a scene from a “Mission Impossible” movie inspired his latest invention: batteries for smart contact lenses. In the fourth film of the series, an agent wears contact lenses capable of facial recognition and eye tracking. Lee wanted to make that lens a reality.
- Lee’s expertise in battery components served as the jumping off point for his foray into wearable technology. He realized smart contact lenses would need safe and compact batteries, which would be crucial for advancing development of these devices.
- Contact lenses themselves are extremely thin, at 0.5 mm, thus the size and flexibility of these batteries are key to preventing user discomfort.
- “The thickness of our battery is about 0.2 mm, which is about twice the thickness of a human hair,” Lee said.
- The battery is coated with glucose and, when dipped into saline solution, the glucose will react with the sodium and chloride ions to charge it.
Story 4: Mouth-based touchpad enables people living with paralysis to interact with computers
Source: Medical Xpress Story by Zach Winn
- Augmental is a San Francisco-based MIT Media Lab spinoff startup deploying technology that lets people with movement impairments seamlessly interact with their personal computational devices.
- Augmental’s first product is the MouthPad, which allows users to control their computer, smartphone, or tablet through tongue and head movements. The MouthPad’s pressure-sensitive touch pad sits on the roof of the mouth, and, working with a pair of motion sensors, translates tongue and head gestures into cursor scrolling and clicks in real time via Bluetooth.
- Tomás Vega, co-founder of Augmental, noted, “We have a big chunk of the brain that is devoted to controlling the position of the tongue. The tongue comprises eight muscles, and most of the muscle fibers are slow-twitch, which means they don’t fatigue as quickly. So, I thought why don’t we leverage all of that?”
- People with spinal cord injuries are already using the MouthPad every day to interact with their favorite devices independently. One of Augmental’s users, who is living with quadriplegia and studying math and computer science in college, says the device has helped her write math formulas and study in the library—use cases where other assistive speech-based devices weren’t appropriate.
- “She can now take notes in class, she can play games with her friends, she can watch movies or read books,” Vega says. “She is more independent. Her mom told us that getting the MouthPad was the most significant moment since her injury.”
- Augmental generates each MouthPad design using a 3D model based on a scan of the user’s mouth. The team then 3D prints the retainer using dental-grade materials and adds the electronic components.
- With the MouthPad, users can scroll up, down, left, and right by sliding their tongue. They can also right click by doing a sipping gesture and left click by pressing on their palate.
- For people with less control of their tongue, bites, clenches, and other gestures can be used, and people with more neck control can use head-tracking to move the cursor on their screen.
Honorable Mentions:
Story: Tiny startup bets that you will spend $2000 on a work ‘laptop’ with no screen — Spacetop G1 uses AR glasses to deliver a virtual 100-inch display but it runs on Google ChromeOS
Source: TechRadar.com Story by Wayne Williams
- After nearly three years in development, Sightful has unveiled Spacetop G1, the world’s first Augmented Reality laptop which uses AR glasses to deliver a virtual 100-inch display and runs on Chrome OS.
- Currently priced at $1700 (it usually retails at $1900), the Spacetop G1 is available to reserve for a $100 refundable deposit and is expected to start shipping in October 2024. It’s US-only for now.
- Developed by a team of over 60 spatial computing experts, including veterans from Apple, Microsoft, and Magic Leap, Spacetop offers a private, virtual workspace. The laptop form factor houses customized hardware and a proprietary spatial environment, allowing users to design and customize their workspace wherever they are.
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Story: Forget Smartphones: IntelliPhones Will Soon Put AI Power in Your Pocket – Analysts predict ‘once in a decade’ transformation will be unleashed by powerful, AI-driven IntelliPhone successors to smartphones. They don’t know when they’re coming, though.
Source: Inc. Story by Bruce Crumley
- Businesses of all sizes will hold transformational computing power in their hands before very long, if analysts at Bank of America are correct. They’re calling the next piece of game-changing technology the IntelliPhone.’ The device, which hasn’t been released by any current smartphone manufacturer, will harness artificial intelligence (AI) for a range of applications by Apple and its competitors When it hits the market, IntelliPhone hardware and app software will make today’s iPhones and smartphones look downright antiquated by comparison.
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Story: Scientists create new color-changing ‘sunglasses for windows’ to block heat
Source: Interesting Engineering Story by Ameya Paleja
- Researchers at the Harbin Insitute of Technology (HIT) in China have developed transparent films that can change color on demand and block out sunlight and heat.
- The research is a major boost for technology that can help us cope with a warming planet without spending too much energy.