Singularity Hub

The Short:

The Harvard Crimson and the LA Times offer some of the better articles reporting that researchers have genetically reprogrammed mice pancreas cells directly into a completely different type of cell called a B cell. B cells are responsible for creating the blood sugar regulating hormone insulin in humans, and it is the absence of these B cells that causes humans to suffer from type 1 diabetes, a currently un-curable disease that requires burdensome lifelong treatment.

With this breakthrough, the Harvard researchers have apparently offered “the first conclusive evidence” that it is possible to genetically convert one type of adult cell or tissue into another type of cell or tissue. Although still years into the future, this research could pave the way for major advances in the field of regenerative medicine where people’s bodies have lost certain types of cells or tissues to injury or disease.

The Long:

Mice suffering from type 1 diabetes were treated with a virus that
specifically infected their pancreas cells and converted them into B
cells. Ten days later, up to 20% of the pancreas cells had ceased
their normal function and instead begun producing insulin at levels comparable to
B cells from healthy, non-diabetic mice.

Although this is apparently the first demonstration of direct conversion of one adult cell type to another cell type, it should be noted that this is not the only route to creating a desired cell or tissue type. Therapies derived from stem cells and pluripotent cells have been used to create all sorts of cell types in numerous studies and in fact this breakthrough from the Harvard researchers complements rather than competes with these therapies. What is notable here is the proof of concept that mature cells such as pancreas cells can be genetically reprogrammed to do almost anything through the technique of intentional viral infection, changing their behavior or even changing their entire identity.

Human applications for this type of genetic reprogramming are still many years into the future. Not only will effort be required to apply this breakthrough to humans instead of to mice, but also the proteins required to induce the reprogramming, called transcription factors, require years of effort to pinpoint and are specific to the type of reprogramming desired.

Image from Royan Institute

The Singularity Institute for Artificial Intelligence (SIAI) has just released details and opened up registration for its Singularity Summit 2008 (SS08).  This will be the third year of their annual summit, and it looks to be bigger and better than ever.  The summit will be held October 25, 2008 at the Montgomery Theater in San Jose, CA.

The Singularity Summit is hands down the premier event of the year for those that are interested in the singularity.  Many of the biggest players in the singularity space will be attending the summit to share ideas, network, and listen to an impressive array of speakers.  The Hub’s Keith Kleiner will be attending the summit and there will be extensive coverage of the event here at the Hub.

From the SS08 website:

“The Singularity Summit gathers the smartest people around to explore the biggest ideas of our time. Learn where humanity is headed, meet the people leading the way, and leave inspired to create a better world.”

The Short:

In January 2008 University of Minnesota Researchers reported that they were able to grow an entire rat heart from scratch. The story is available here at npr, and there is also an audio clip of a segment that was run on npr radio.

The associated press reports that “An estimated 5 million people live with heart failure and about 550,000 new cases are diagnosed each year in the United States. Approximately 50,000 die annually waiting for a heart donor.” If we can learn to grow hearts we could save the lives of millions of people and also extend the lives of healthy people, giving them new hearts as their old hearts wear out.

There is still much work to be done before we can grow a human heart, but the University of Minnesota breakthrough shows that researchers are making significant progress towards this lofty goal. Below is a cool video documenting the development of the rat heart:

The Long:

Growing heart tissue and many other tissues of rats and other organisms is commonplace in laboratories across the globe, but growing tissue with the complex configurations and interconnectedness of organs is still a rare achievement. We recently reported on the progress being made at a company called Tengion and also in the lab of Anthony Atala at Wake Forest.

The University of Minnesota researchers offer a unique breakthrough in organ creation by creating a scaffold on which the heart can be grown. The researchers took a dead rat heart and removed the cells, leaving behind a matrix, or scaffold, of proteins and other materials. This scaffold was then injected with new cells and these cells self directed their own growth over the scaffold into a fully functioning heart.

The researches next plan to repeat their success with a pig heart. Successfully growing a pig heart would be a major breakthrough because a pig heart is very similar to a human heart in anatomy, size, and function. The hope is that the scaffold from a pig heart could be injected with cells from a human needing a new heart. The human cells would grow over the pig derived scaffold into a fully functional human/pig hybrid heart. This hybrid heart would not be rejected by the human immune system because its cells would have originated from the human that was receiving it.

Many will claim that success in growing a heart is still a dream that is many decades or more away. Perhaps they are right, but here at the Hub we argue that people too often underestimate the accelerating nature of human innovation and technology. Maybe custom grown hearts are not as far into the future as people think.

Yesterday Intel CTO Justin Rattner delivered his keynote presentation about the future of technology and the coming of the singularity at Intel’s annual Intel Developer Forum (IDF). Although Rattner could use some tips on giving a more entertaining presentation, some of the ideas and technologies presented during the keynote were truly fantastic and we give the keynote a mild thumbs up.  Below is the Hub’s take on this exciting event:

The first thing that must be acknowledged about Rattner’s keynote is that it represents a symbolic endorsement of the singularity from a major player in the technology industry. Believers in the singularity are sometimes seen as crazy or over optimistic, but with Rattner’s keynote it is clear that the idea of a singularity occurring in this century is gaining serious momentum.

Rattner’s keynote began with a roughly 5 minute introductory video from singularity proponent Ray Kurzweil. During the rest of the keynote Rattner brought out a series of individuals to demonstrate futuristic technologies that are on the horizon. Some of these demonstrations were really cool…others not so much. Here is the breakdown:

1. Intel Scientist Dr. Mike Garner Presents the Future of Moore’s Law
Our Take: Nothing new here

In this segment Rattner discusses with Dr. Garner how the industry will be able to continue the doubling of computing capacity every year as it has done for the last 40 years. With current technology at the 32 nanometer scale, we are fast approaching limits on how small we can get with current semiconductor technology. Dr. Garner suggests a number of technologies and ideas for overcoming this hurdle (trigate transistors, quantum computing, carbon nanotubes, etc.), but in our opinion none of these ideas are new and no new light is shed on how and when any of these technologies will become a reality.

2. UCSB phD Brian Koch Presents Silicon Photonics
Our Take: pretty cool

Brian discusses a collaboration between Intel and UCSB to combine the speed and bandwidth offered by light (photonics) with the versatility and mass production capabilities of silicon. This marriage between silicon and photonics could offer a host of new capabilities and advantages in the future including huge bandwidth, decreased cost, and decreased energy consumption. Intel has a pretty good website dedicated to this entire technology here.

3. UCSB Professor Jan Rabaey Presents Massively Wireless Communication
Our Take: Interesting, but not revolutionary

Dr. Rabaey predicts that we will have 1000 radios per person in 10 years! This was the most interesting idea offered during Dr. Rabaey’s presentation and is definitely an exciting vision of what the future may hold. Dr. Rabaey stated that the three major problems with a massively wireless world are limited radio spectrum, limited energy for radio devices, and too many standards. Dr. Rabaey offers intresting ideas for overcoming these problems, but from our view this is simply a focus on improving the efficiency and the intelligence of how radios communicate. What we fail to see in this presentation is any revolutionary technology or capability for the future.

4. Alanson Sample from the University of Washington Presents Wireless Power Transmission
Our Take: Awesome!

Wireless power transmission technology debuted about a year or so ago, but nonetheless it is a stunning concept and the demo was great to see. Alanson was able to send 60W of energy wirelessly across a distance of two feet to power up a light bulb. Approximately 25% of the energy is lost during transmission, which is pretty good (Alanson claims this is more efficient than many wall warts)! From the standpoint of the singularity one of the more interesting applications of this technology would be the ability to recharge or power up devices that have been implanted into the human body. Jordan Robertson from the Associated Press in a recent article gives us more in depth information about the technology, and reveals that 90% efficiency of power transmission has actually been achieved at a distance of 3 feet.

5. Dave Ferguson and Siddhartha Srinivasa Present Autonomous Robots
Our Take: Not bad, but nothing revolutionary

David and Sidd demonstrate a robot named Herb that can enter an environment and autonomously find, navigate to, and then pickup any coffee cups in the vicinity. Many people underestimate the difficulty in such a task, but in truth it is actually quite difficult for robots to replicate the human ability to navigate a new and unknown environment that is also changing as people and other objects within it move. Herb did a commendable job of performing his task, but overall this demonstration is similar to many other projects occurring all over the world, most notably the DARPA Urban Challenge which is referenced during the presentation.

6. Joshua Smith from Intel Presents a Sixth Sense Called Pretouch
Our Take: Now This is Revolutionary!

Josh presents to us something completely novel, a sixth sense called pretouch in which a robot uses electric fields to sense its environment. The inspiration for this technology comes from certain species of fish that have this same capability. In the demonstration a robotic hand was able to use pretouch to create a 3 dimensional spatial model of an apple that it was presented with. The robotic hand was then able to grab the apple based upon this dynamically generated model. The entire task was performed without the aid of cameras (for vision) or any other conventional senses. MIT Technology Review wrote an article about pretouch nearly a year ago and it is a good place to start if you want to learn more. Pretouch gives us a glimpse of a future in which humans and robots will have capabilities that are completely different and novel from those that we have today.

7. Tan Le From Emotiv Presents Noninvasive Neural Interfaces
Our Take: Cool, but invasive neural interfaces are the real future

Emotiv demonstrates one of the most practical and well developed noninvasive neural interface applications we have seen. In the demonstration a human plays a game in which he is able to scare creatures away, change colors of the game, and even move objects (though with noticeable difficulty) simply by thinking alone. The gamer is wearing a helmet that detects electric field fluctuations emanating from his skull and these fluctuations are translated into actions within the game. Emotiv shows us a really cool possibility for enhancing gaming interfaces and a compelling pathway to many other novel applications. Despite this, we are only marginally excited about this technology because noninvasive neural interfacing is a poor substitute for the capabilities offered by truly invasive, direct neural interfacing. Noninvasive neural interfacing is error prone and limited in its ability to extract human intention. Lets go straight to the source and focus on direct neural interfaces into the brain…that is where the true link to human intention will be revealed.

8. Jason Campbell from Intel Presents Shape Shifting Materials
Our Take: This Rocks!

Jason Campbell presents an Intel initiative to build shape shifting materials composed of building blocks called catoms. Intel’s latest catom prototypes are currently 1/10 of millimeter in diameter nanobots with their own microprocessors and actuators that are capable of changing their color and other properties. Jason presents us with the vision of a matchbox sized cell phone composed of thousands or even millions of catoms that can morph on demand into a nearly full sized keyboard. Catom based shape shifting technology is still in the very early research phase and there does not seem to be any real world example of this technology to date. Nonetheless, it was fascinating to see real progress being made in a technology that has captured the imagination of science fiction writers for decades.

The Short:
News outlets are reporting that researchers from Advanced Cell Technology, Inc have been able to differentiate human embryonic stem cells into red blood cells. This could be a major breakthrough in mankind’s quest to find a safe, unlimited source of blood that can be used for blood transfusions and other medical needs.

Currently the world’s blood supply is obtained from human donors in a system that is short on supply and fraught with complications related to sterilization, contamination, disease, storage life (typically less than 42 days), and collection logistics.

The Long:
First off, one can’t help but be a little skeptical here because of the financial condition of Advanced Cell Technology, which reportedly is on the brink of bankruptcy. Their website appears not to have been updated in several months, perhaps symbolizing the malaise that is happening over there.

Let us hope that this research truly is legit, however, because it would be a fantastic breakthrough for mankind. Other researchers have been able to derive red blood cells in the past from sources such as cord blood and bone marrow, but these sources are still donor limited. They are also rarely of type O(-) which is the universal blood type that virtually every person can accept. Embryonic stem cells can be multiplied infinitely, allowing for the generation of unlimited blood supply and theoretically can be developed into type O(-).

This breakthrough is still nowhere near to producing a clinical trial and has many technical hurdles to overcome, so don’t expect anything to come of it for many years. Still, it is exciting to see a breakthrough that might be taking us that much closer to an improved blood supply. Now, if someone could just make us a respirocyte then we would really be in business!

The research paper was published in the journal Blood at http://bloodjournal.hematologylibrary.org/papbyrecent.dtl

Earlier we reported here at the hub that growing tissue and organs is not a science fiction story about the future, but instead is a technology that exists today. A company called Tengion is at the forefront of this emerging field of growing custom organs. Tengion is essentially a corporate vehicle for the commercial development of the major breakthroughs that have been made at the leading institutions in the field of organ and tissue regeneration. Most notably Tengion has rights to develop the research of Dr. Anthony Atala from Wake Forest where the most stunning results in the field of regenerative medicine have been achieved to date. Anthony Atala’s lab has grown a whole host of human organs including bladders, blood vessels, and heart valves.

Tengion does not have a commercially available product yet, but they have a serious arsenal of technology and patents and they are focused on bringing a long list of custom grown organs to the market. Tengion’s lead product candidate is a custom grown bladder called the Neo-Bladder which is currently in phase II clinical trials. Since Tengion’s organs are grown from the patient’s own cells these organs are not rejected by the body’s immune system, a common and serious problem for the typical organ transplant from a foreign donor. Below is a video of Anthony Atala giving an inside look at his lab which is simply amazing (although the reporter clearly doesn’t know a thing about science):

Eye To Eye: Tissue Engineering (CBS News)

As humans age the systems in our cells for cleaning up unwanted proteins and other debris become less efficient. It is theorized that junk in our cells thus accumulates, leading to further deterioration in the health and function of our cells, ultimately leading to disease and aging.

Medical News Today reports that researchers have added support to this theory with the dramatic reduction of the aging of an entire organ in a mouse - the liver - by genetically enhancing the ability of cells in the liver to clean up the toxic accumulation of their cellular junk. From the article:

“When the mice were examined at 22 to 26 months of age (equivalent to
approximately 80 years old in humans), the liver cells of transgenic
mice digested and recycled protein far more efficiently than in their
normal counterparts of the same age - and, in fact, just as efficiently
as in normal six-month old mice.”

In May the New York Times and many other outlets reported on the “most striking demonstration to date of brain-machine interface technology”. From the article:

“The findings suggest that brain-controlled prosthetics, while not practical, are at least technically within reach.

In previous studies, researchers showed that humans who had been paralyzed for years could learn to control a cursor on a computer screen with their brain waves and that nonhuman primates could use their thoughts to move a mechanical arm, a robotic hand or a robot on a treadmill.

The new experiment goes a step further. In it, the monkeys’ brains seem to have adopted the mechanical appendage as their own, refining its movement as it interacted with real objects in real time. The monkeys had their own arms gently restrained while they learned to use the added one.”

Check out this awesome video of a monkey operating a robotic arm:

Robo-monkey uses brain power to feed itself

New Scientist released an awesome article describing how researchers are using rat brains to control a robot. Approximately 300,000 neurons from a rat fetus are deposited onto a sheet of nutrients and electrodes (and MEA, or multi-electrode array) and the neurons immediately begin to build connections to each other and to the electrodes.

The robot can send signals to the neurons via these electrodes and the neurons will over time fire off in predictable patterns. These patterns can be connected to output electrodes that can send signals back to the robot and cause it to react to its environment, such as avoiding a wall. The video is simply awesome so check it out:

The Short:

Lifecell is a company that offers a suite of tissue regeneration technologies that have been used for more than 1 million successful implants and grafts in the last decade. Their flagship product, Alloderm, is an acellular dermal matrix that contains a framework of biochemical and structural components that allow for the regeneration and replacement of human skin.

Severe burns, skin grafts for your gums, and abdominal wall reconstruction are just a few of the countless applications for this amazing product. Interestingly, an investing site called wikinvest has one of the most readable descriptions of Lifecell’s technology for those of us who are not tissue experts. A new product from Lifecell, called Strattice, derived from pig skin will open the doors to new applications and cheaper implementation of tissue regeneration.

The Long:

If you are still confused as to how it all works, here is a more in depth explanation: The human body is very good at recovering from damage such as small scrapes or small burns. However, when the damage is more severe the body cannot fully repair itself back to normal, resulting in loss of functionality, deformation, scarring, and other complications. In the case of these severe injuries or in the case of an abnormal need for skin (as
in the case of gum disease) the body needs a helping hand to “show” it
where and how it needs to grow. The matrix called Alloderm serves as
this helping hand. It is inserted into the place where new skin is
desired and your body will grow onto the matrix good as new!

Lifecell’s Alloderm product is a matrix of chemicals, proteins, and other vital components of the human skin that has been extracted from human donated skin, usually cadavers. This matrix is sterilized by Lifecell’s proprietary process and then preserved through a freeze-drying process until it is ready for use. Once
implanted into a patient, AlloDerm is revascularized (blood flow restored) and
repopulated (grafted) with the patient’s own cells.

Lifecell was recently acquired by KCI.

Growing new organs to replace old or damaged organs is no longer science fiction or something we will do in the future. It is happening now and real patients are having real organs that have been grown with their own tissue transplanted into their bodies. It is shocking that such an amazing revolution continues to remain virtually unnoticed by society!

Organs grown from a person’s own cells are the holy grail of medicine and human longevity. These organs are not rejected by the body’s immune system as foreign invaders because they actually originate from the patient. Here at singularity hub we will be following this field intensely as it may be one of the most revolutionary and game changing developments ever to beset mankind. Is your heart getting too old sir? No problem…lets just grow you a new one! The implications are stunning!

Below is a video from recent CBS coverage on regenerative medicine that is a must see if you are out of the loop on this amazing development:

Regeneration of cells - CBS Cutting Edge

Intuitive Surgical introduced its Da Vinci robotic surgical system to the world in 1999, converting surgeons into “super surgeons” by giving them eyes with 3D HD vision and digital zoom and giving them hands with ultra precision, motion scaling, and tremor reduction.  Take a look at this beauty:

Early adopters have been promoting the virtues of the Da Vinci for nearly a decade now, but only in the last year or so has the Da Vinci gained the critical mass to leap from fledgling technology to revolutionary game changer. The Da Vinci robot is being massively adopted by hospitals across the nation as its virtues to the patient including faster recovery, less blood loss, less risk of infection, and less pain have become overwhelming. Below is a promotional video from Intuitive Surgical that explains this amazing game changing innovation in the field of human health and medicine:

da Vinci Surgical System

In the United States there are countless regulatory hurdles that must be overcome for new drugs and new medical treatments to make their way to the masses. Not so in China!

Check out Beike BioTech, a bio-technology company in China that has “…treated over 2,000 patients with stem cell injections for diseases like Alzheimers, Ataxia, Autism, ALS, Brain Trauma, Cerebral Infarction, Cerebral Hemorrhage, Cerebral Palsy, Guillain-Barre, Encephalatropy, and Spinal Cord Injury”.

In the engineering world there is a common and powerful custom of developing solutions to problems simply by trying lots of things and seeing what works. Because of intense regulation in the United States it is not possible to just try random procedures or drugs on people to see what happens. In many cases this is for good reason, but a huge price is paid for this as valuable treatments are delayed or not even attempted.

In China, on the other hand, we are witnessing the power of trial and error medicine when it is not denied by regulation. People from all over the world are flying to China to companies such as Beike to pay for experimental and unproven medical treatment for some of the world’s most terrifying diseases. Beike even admits on its own website that the benefits of their stem cell treatments may be questionable for many of their patients. But if you have the money and you have no other options to treat your severely debilitating illness then Beike is happy to give you that small glimmer of hope.

Using humans as laboratory mice certainly has its moral hazards, but it also holds great power as a tool for medical innovation. The United States might win the game of morals, but we can increasingly expect many of the greatest achievements in the game of medical breakthroughs to come from places like China where morals are seen differently.

On a related note I was recently speaking to my neighbor who is a specialist in developing drugs for cancer treatment. He will soon be moving back to China after living in the United States for 20 years. Why? Because he says he can’t get anything done here in the United States. By going to China he will have an ample supply of patients to try his drugs on and few regulations to limit his ability to experiment.

What if in just a short number of years we could double or triple the number of people in the world that were dedicated to the fields of technology, science, and research? Such a huge surge in the manpower being dedicated to these fields would have astounding implications for technological progress throughout the world. Just think what would happen if we suddenly doubled the number of people and dollars that were focused on curing cancer!

In an article published by the IOP (Institute of Physics) we learn that such a huge surge in the number of scientists worldwide is exactly what has occured in the last decade. In recent years China has seen an astonishing increase in the number of journal papers written by its scientists, symbolizing the rise of tens of millions of chinese scientists onto the world stage. According to the IOP published articles in nanoscience with at least one co-author based in China, have seen a 10-fold increase in the last 7 years! Quantity does not mean quality, but still it is hard to deny the incredible impact of all of these new scientists on technological progress now and in the future.

Singularity proponents often argue that technological progress in the next 50 years will far exceed that of the previous 50 years because the rate of technological progress is accelerating each year. Faster computers, more efficient algorithms, and better access to information are just a few examples of trends that are causing the rate at which technology progresses to accelerate. The rise of tens of millions of new scientists across the world is yet another of these powerful trends

In the coming decades mankind will unleash an amazing torrent of technological abilities as we march toward the singularity, but that won’t mean much for you or me if our bodies don’t live long enough and healthy enough to get there.

Lumosity offers a website dedicated to working out your brain in order to keep your brain in top shape. As a member of Lumosity you participate in games specially developed to train your brain. Members typically play one game per day and various tools are offered to chart your historical progress and to measure your BPI (Brain Performance Index) over time. I just signed up for an account and I am excited to try it out. Let us know here at the Hub what you think if you also give it a try. Below is a screenshot of my member login page so you can get a feel for what it is all about.