This blog consists of daily news items of interest to followers of QUIDDITY as a qualitatitive method of describing the world. This approach was described by Clive Barker in "The Great and Secret Show" and analyzed in the 149 posts of the QUIDDITY blog of this writer (see link to companion blog).
AAA: Partially automated driving systems don’t always work
By TOM KRISHER
“DETROIT (AP) — August 6, 2020 -- Two
tests by AAA during the past two years show that partially automated driving
systems don’t always function properly, so the auto club is recommending that
car companies limit their use.”
More at: https://apnews.com/addf53726301c6bbd5a48b4f361b64cd
Biopharmaceutical Commitment Against COVID-19
In these unprecedented times, America’s
biopharmaceutical companies are coming together to achieve one shared goal: the
eradication of COVID-19. The decades-long investments we have made in new
technology, research and treatments have prepared us to act swiftly:
• We are rapidly screening our vast
global libraries of medicines to identify potential treatments and have
numerous clinical trials underway to test new and existing therapies
• We are dedicating our top scientists
and using our investments in new technologies to speed the development of safe
and effective vaccines
• We are sharing the learnings from
clinical trials in real time with governments and other companies to advance
the development of additional therapies
• We are expanding our unique
manufacturing capabilities and sharing available capacity to ramp up production
once a successful medicine or vaccine is developed
• We are collaborating with government
agencies, hospitals, doctors and others to donate supplies and medicines to
help those affected around the world
• We are working with governments and
insurers to ensure that when new treatments and vaccines are approved they will
be available and affordable for patients
• We are coordinating with the
governments and diagnostic partners to increase COVID-19 testing capability and
capacity
• We are protecting the integrity of the
pharmaceutical supply chain and keeping our plants open to maintain a steady
supply of medicines for patients
• We are providing financial support and
in-kind donations to organizations and patients around the globe
• We are working hard to protect our
workforce and the communities where we live and work, having employees working
from home whenever possible and keeping our salesforces out of hospitals and
physicians’ offices
• We are remaining steadfast in our
commitment to research and development of new medicines to prevent, treat and
cure disease in all its forms, not just COVID-19 OUR COMMITMENT TO BEAT
CORONAVIRUS
Learn more at PhRMA.org/coronavirus and
bio.org/coronavirus We all have unique roles to play and are confident that
together we can be successful. And we won’t rest until we are.
Why a Year of No Dating Was the Best Thing I Ever Did for Myself.
By Jessica Kaufman in The Elephant
Journal
December 5, 2016 -- Several years ago,
when I was living in NYC, I met a bunch of women who were doing this “year
of no dating” thing.
No sex, no crushes, no seduction—just
showing up in the world as a platonic sister to all. No hopeful texting, no
“will he kiss me or won’t he,” no fantasizing about anyone sparkly and new.
At first, I was horrified to hear that
people were doing this on purpose. Why deny yourself the life-changing power
and magic of falling in love? The prospect of intentionally abstaining from
romance was as inconceivable to me as sobriety is to an active alcoholic. Love
is what got me through! It seemed like agreeing to live life without anything
nice—like back rubs or vacation.
Several years ago, when I was living in
NYC, I met a bunch of women who were doing this “year of no dating” thing.
No sex, no crushes, no seduction—just
showing up in the world as a platonic sister to all. No hopeful texting, no
“will he kiss me or won’t he,” no fantasizing about anyone sparkly and new.
At first, I was horrified to hear that
people were doing this on purpose. Why deny yourself the life-changing power
and magic of falling in love? The prospect of intentionally abstaining from
romance was as inconceivable to me as sobriety is to an active alcoholic. Love
is what got me through! It seemed like agreeing to live life without anything
nice—like back rubs or vacation.
I talked to these gorgeous, capable,
satisfied single women, and listened to their stories. Before I knew
what I had decided to, I’d set a date to stop dating.
That meant calling it off with the
brooding blonde man from Boston who I started seeing in order to numb the
pain of my recent divorce. It meant not filling my self-worth meter with the
affections of someone new. It meant showing up to social gatherings committed
to going home alone.
Every night. For a year.
Something inside me screamed and cried
and seriously doubted that I could make it and that’s when it hit me—I had been
using love as a substitute for self-worth.
Why be alone if it meant doubting I was
worthy of someone’s love, anyone’s love? Why should
I have to face that?
I hadn’t been sans-crush since middle
school. I’d been bookending relationships since high school. My heart was like
a grocery list: I need to get Sean. Nope, Tommy. Nope, Elisha. Nope, Jimmy.
Nope, Dave. Nope, Allison.
Relationships fueled me to the point
that I didn’t know what else I could run on. And I didn’t know any of this
until I put them all down.
When I quit dating, I experienced
serious withdrawal. First, from Boston guy, then from my ex-husband, then from
the affair I’d had at the end of my marriage. Like layers of an onion, back and
back and back, until one day I felt cleaner than I’d ever felt before. I felt
fresh, light, open, new, and me. Those ghosts just weren’t with me anymore.
I felt myself in a fullness of presence
that, for whatever reason, I hadn’t been able to feel while I was pushing
around a shopping cart full of romantic yearning and unprocessed relationships.
Taking serious time off allowed me to pick everything up out of that cart one
at a time, look at it for what it was, and put it back.
I didn’t just walk away from my cart for
a new one, or burn down the store. I did the work in a way that you can only
really do when you’re single for a long stretch of time.
An amazing thing happened during that
time—I came to realize that I could access the gifts of “a year of no dating”
any time I needed it. While I don’t think everyone needs to take a whole year
each and every time, I do recognize how valuable it is to take some time. A
significant amount of time, meaning: you have to look at what’s in your cart.
What have you been pushing around? Or
has it been pushing you? Are you tempted to abandon the cart, burn down the
store, or (what I believe my most recent ex is doing) just add another
beautiful, shining, heart-expanding item to the pile?
Don’t get me wrong; relationships are
great. They are powerful teachers and offer us so much deep joy and growth and
understanding. But until you’ve really known what it is to find that joy,
growth, and understanding without the catalyst of a new
relationship, I think that part of you will always remain unknown to yourself.
Like a forgotten drawer or corner, it piles up with the detritus of what you
haven’t unpacked, and you—not to mention
your future relationships—will have to navigate around it forever.
My last boyfriend and I broke up five
months ago, and I’m healing. My work now is to be single again. For a while. I
need time and space to make sure that I continue rebuilding my life without the
influence of my next “big relationship.” I need to get my new business off the
ground. I need to continue to work the steps in my recovery program. I need to
finish nursing the wounds my last relationship left in me, and I need time to
further understand why I said yes to that relationship when both of us knew it
was going to be a struggle. Most of all, I need time—real, seasons-passing
time—to get used to my life’s rhythms as an unpartnered person (though I might
not choose to be totally celibate this time around!).
When I meet my next serious partner, I
want to be as free and healed-up as possible, to have had time to process not
just the breakup with my most recent ex, but the overarching patterns in
my series of adult relationships. I owe that to myself, and my next partner
gets it as a side benefit of choosing someone as wise and mature as me, ha!
It’s been difficult to watch my last two
exes move right into their next big things, but no one can be the arbiter
of how other people are doing it. I’m sure it feels as right to them to move on
quickly as it does to me to slow that train to a halt.
I believe there’s power and strength in
solo time, and I’m amazed that it took me so long to figure that out.
So if you’re afraid, or curious, or
willing, take your time. Try it out. Say no for now, if even
part of you thinks that you could use a break.
Find your wholeness before you find your
next love. It will serve you for the rest of your life.
There is a phage that resists all forms of CRISPR. It has been studied for several years in San Francisco with a thoroughness that has uncovered surprising insights. Ed Yong, writing for the December 11, 2019, The Atlantic, explains this research here:
https://www.theatlantic.com/science/archive/2019/12/startling-secret-invincible-virus/603412/
Mark Anderson has written an article that was included in the IEEE Spectrum on August 2, 2020. It discussed massive computer power studying the genetic mature of the COVID-19 and its effects on patients.
“A supercomputer-powered genetic study
of COVID-19 patients has spawned a possible breakthrough into how the novel
coronavirus causes disease—and points toward new potential therapies to treat
its worst symptoms.
“The genetic data mining research
uncovered a common pattern of gene activity in the lungs of symptomatic
COVID-19 patients, which when compared to gene activity in healthy control
populations revealed a mechanism that appears to be a key weapon in the
coronavirus’s arsenal.
“The good news is there are already
drugs—a few of which are already FDA-approved—aimed at some of these very same
pathologies.”
Much more at: https://spectrum.ieee.org/the-human-os/computing/hardware/has-the-summit-supercomputer-cracked-the-covid-code
New Electronics Platform Provides Better Data for Personalized Care
By
Jeannie Kever
University
of Houston – July 30, 2020 -- A team of researchers led by Cunjiang Yu,
Bill D. Cook Associate Professor of Mechanical Engineering at the University of
Houston, has developed a new form of electronics known as “drawn-on-skin
electronics,” allowing multifunctional sensors and circuits to be drawn on the
skin with an ink pen.
The
advance, the researchers report in Nature Communications, allows for the
collection of more precise, motion artifact-free health data, solving the
long-standing problem of collecting precise biological data through a wearable
device when the subject is in motion.
The
imprecision may not be important when your FitBit registers 4,000 steps instead
of 4,200, but sensors designed to check heart function, temperature and other
physical signals must be accurate if they are to be used for diagnostics and
treatment.
The
drawn-on-skin electronics are able to seamlessly collect data, regardless of
the wearer’s movements.
They
also offer other advantages, including simple fabrication techniques that don’t
require dedicated equipment.
“It
is applied like you would use a pen to write on a piece of paper,” said Yu. “We
prepare several electronic materials and then use pens to dispense them. Coming
out, it is liquid. But like ink on paper, it dries very quickly.”
Wearable
bioelectronics – in the form of soft, flexible patches attached to the skin –
have become an important way to monitor, prevent and treat illness and injury
by tracking physiological information from the wearer. But even the most
flexible wearables are limited by motion artifacts, or the difficulty that
arises in collecting data when the sensor doesn’t move precisely with the skin.
The
drawn-on-skin electronics can be customized to collect different types of
information, and Yu said it is expected to be especially useful in situations
where it’s not possible to access sophisticated equipment, including on a
battleground.
The
electronics are able to track muscle signals, heart rate, temperature and skin
hydration, among other physical data, he said. The researchers also reported
that the drawn-on-skin electronics have demonstrated the ability to accelerate
healing of wounds.
In
addition to Yu, researchers involved in the project include Faheem Ershad,
Anish Thukral, Phillip Comeaux, Yuntao Lu, Hyunseok Shim, Kyoseung Sim, Nam-In
Kim, Zhoulyu Rao, Ross Guevara, Luis Contreras, Fengjiao Pan, Yongcao Zhang,
Ying-Shi Guan, Pinyi Yang, Xu Wang and Peng Wang, all from the University of
Houston, and Jiping Yue and Xiaoyang Wu from the University of Chicago.
The
drawn-on-skin electronics are actually comprised of three inks, serving as a
conductor, semiconductor and dielectric.
“Electronic
inks, including conductors, semiconductors, and dielectrics, are drawn
on-demand in a freeform manner to develop devices, such as transistors, strain
sensors, temperature sensors, heaters, skin hydration sensors, and
electrophysiological sensors,” the researchers wrote.
This
research is supported by the Office of Naval Research and National Institutes
of Health.
https://uh.edu/news-events/stories/july-2020/07302020yu-liquid-electronics.php
12 Ways You Can Drastically Cut Your Dementia Risk
By Alice Klein, New Scientist
July 30, 2020 -- Almost half of
all dementia cases could potentially be prevented or delayed by adopting 12
health measures, a major review has found.
The review identified the biggest known
risk factors for dementia as
·
Smoking
·
Excess Alcohol Consumption
·
High Blood Pressure
·
Obesity
·
Diabetes
·
Head Injury
·
Depression
·
Hearing Loss
·
Exposure to Air Pollution
·
Lack of Exercise
·
Lack of Education
·
Lack of Social Contact
Minimizing these 12 risks could
potentially prevent or delay up to 40 per cent of dementia cases globally,
according to the review of the latest evidence by 28 leading dementia experts
from around the world.
“People who have family members with
dementia often ask me, ‘Is there anything I can do to prevent myself from
getting it?’,” says David Ames at the University of Melbourne in Australia, who
was one of the authors of the review. “There are certainly some things you can
do that might make a difference.”
For example, the review finds that
individuals can partially protect themselves by not smoking, drinking less than
21 units of alcohol per week, maintaining a systolic blood pressure of less
than 130 mmHg, avoiding activities that could lead to head injuries, using
hearing aids if needed, eating a healthy diet, and exercising and socialising
regularly.
Even older people can delay or possibly
even prevent dementia by taking steps to improve their lifestyles, says Ames.
“It’s never too early and it’s never too late to think about reducing your
risk,” he says.
In addition to making recommendations
for individuals, the review calls on governments to protect their populations
from dementia by providing primary and secondary education for all children,
improving air quality, promoting healthy behaviours, and discouraging smoking
and heavy drinking.
In some higher-income countries,
including the UK, US and France, dementia rates in older people have fallen in
recent decades, possibly due to improvements in education, nutrition and health
care. This suggests that preventative health measures can have an impact on
dementia, in the same way they have helped to reduce rates of lung cancer and
deaths from heart disease in many higher-income countries, says Ames.
Two-thirds of dementia cases currently
occur in lower-income and middle-income countries, where education is often
less accessible and rates of smoking, obesity and diabetes are relatively high.
“The higher prevalence of dementia risk factors means an even greater
proportion of dementia is potentially preventable than in higher-income
countries,” says review co-author Adesola Ogunniyi at the University of Ibadan
in Nigeria.
That means government interventions like
increasing education and introducing anti-smoking campaigns could have an even
bigger impact in lower and middle-income countries, says Ogunniyi. In Latin
America, for example, it’s estimated that 56 per cent of dementia cases could
be prevented or delayed by targeting the 12 risk factors.
However, there is a limit to how much
you can prevent dementia with lifestyle interventions, because the brain
inevitably starts to shut down in very old age, especially in people
who live past 100, says Ames. “We’ve become very good at keeping people from
dying of things like childhood diarrhea, and that means we now have a high life
expectancy,” he says. “If you hang around long enough, something eventually has
to catch you, and dementia is one of those diseases.”
