tag > Science
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The Great Smokey Dragon
John Archibald Wheeler’s "great smoky dragon" is a metaphor for quantum mechanics' fundamental indefiniteness, describing a particle that is well-defined only at its source (tail) and detection point (mouth). The middle (the body) is a nebulous, unobservable superposition. This metaphor is frequently used to discuss quantum weirdness, entanglement, and the observer-dependent nature of reality.
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Machine Learning for the Genetic Engineering of Fungal Secondary Metabolite Clusters: A Novel Framework for Alien Communication
The Search for Extraterrestrial Intelligence (SETI) has long scanned the skies for radio signals. But what if an advanced civilization's signature isn't a broadcast, but a biological program?
Hypothesis
Mastery over a planet's biology is the ultimate technology. Instead of fleeting electromagnetic waves, a persistent, self-replicating message could be encoded into the very blueprint of life - an engineered gene cluster in a hardy organism like a fungus, designed to survive deep space and seed itself on new worlds.
Fungal Gene Clusters: Nature's Data Cassette
Fungal secondary metabolite (SM) clusters are modular genetic programs. Enzymes like Polyketide Synthases (PKSs) are built from domains (A-T-C-KR-ER-ACP...) in a precise order. This sequence is a code. In theory, it could be repurposed. A non-functional, hyper-complex cluster discovered in a space-borne spore might not be for making a toxin - it could be a biochemical QR code, a message etched in DNA that can last for eons and travel between stars.
Machine Learning is the Decoder
Decoding such a message, however, would be impossible by eye. It would require advanced machine learning—trained on every known natural and engineered biological pattern—to first recognize the cluster as artificially designed, then reverse-engineer its domain sequence into a payload: an image, a mathematical constant, a map.
This isn't just speculation - it's a new lens for our own research. As we use AI to genetically engineer fungal SM clusters for new drugs and materials, we are learning to write and read this deep language of biology. We are developing the very tools needed to one day ask: Is this fungus from Earth, or is it a message in a bottle, waiting for a reader smart enough to understand it?
We're not just engineering fungi. We're building the translator for a conversation that may have already begun.
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Einstein's most valuable letter
In 1922, at Tokyo during his lecture tour Albert Einstein tipped a courier with handwritten note instead of cash, saying they might one day be worth more. One read: “A quiet and modest life brings more joy than a pursuit of success bound with constant unrest.” In October 2017, that note sold for $1.56 million at Winner's auction house in Jerusalem.
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Hologram News: Holograms Influence Brain & Universe as hologram
Researchers use Ultrasound Holograms to Influence Brain Networks
For the first time, a new ultrasound technique allows researchers to stimulate multiple locations in the brain simultaneously. This opens up new possibilities for treating devastating brain diseases such as Alzheimer’s, Parkinson’s and depression in the future.
Information and Quantum Physics: The Universe as a hologram
The exploration of quantum information challenges objective reality, positing the universe as a hologram. This piece examines how informational algorithms drive everything from the emergence of physical laws and time to the ultimate nature of consciousness as an emergent property
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VortexNet Anniversary. What's next?
The first "VortexNet: Neural Computing through Fluid Dynamics" anniversary is coming up. It's impact over the past year has been odd and noticeable. How should we continue this thread? Feedback welcome.
There is no shortage of ideas what to explore next in this context..
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Toward a Grand Unified Theory of Snowflakes
Ever since the Japanese physicist Ukichiro Nakaya produced his seminal catalog of snowflake shapes 77 years ago, researchers have sought to understand the interplay of factors that lead to different shapes.
