New Scientist: Proteins Protect against Heart Break

Pills that protect from heart break. And no, not the romantic kind. A rich dormant stem cell called thymosin beta-4 present in the innermost layer of the sac which surrounds the heart could be useful in both preventing a heart attack and repairing the cardiac muscle after such an attack occurs. As always the stem cell was tested on mice since they have similar organ systems to us. If daily injections of beta-4 were made the mice would survive even the most deadliest heart attack as well as regrowing their heart muscle much faster afterwards. If the testing also works on human subjects this could provide an opportunity to fight heart disorder effectively. A tablet taken orally could save hundreds of lives as well as precious resources of hospitals that try to effectively treat the mycocardial infarction.

http://www.newscientist.com/

New Scientist: Quantum leap?

Supercomputers. The stuff of science fiction of the late 1970's. They could communicate (artificial intelligence) and calculate impossible mathematical problems in a few seconds. They were at the peak of their intelligence. At times even smarter than we are. Although some of this is exageration some supercomputers are already in development and promise to be just what mathematicians and physicists need to solve their problems. They are called quantum computers because they use the process called "quantum annealing" . This optimizes any task that the computer has to carry out by replacing normal binary bits with quantum bits or aptly named qubits. Due to superposition of these bits, a quantum computer can check all the possible solutions from a group simultaneously rather than analyzing them bit by bit.

"D-wave has not presented evidence that its machine can solve problems faster than a classical computer"

The computer is called D-wave. There are some scientist however that disagree that the computer could actually replace any normal binary computer at all. Before going commercial these issues must be addressed and thoroughly analyzed so that consumers are happy with their new product. Testers say that the D-wave exhibits some quantum properties but not enough to actually speed up calculations.


http://www.newscientist.com/