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Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 18, 2022 at 12:57pm

Scientists Just Measured a Mechanical Quantum System Without Destroying It

There's a key aspect of quantum computing you may not have thought about before. Called 'quantum non-​demolition measurements', they refer to observing certain quantum states without destroying them in the process.

If we want to put together a functioning quantum computer, not having it break down every second while calculations are made would obviously be helpful. Now, scientists have described a new technique for recording quantum non-demolition measurements that shows a lot of promise.

In this case, the research involved mechanical quantum systems – objects that are relatively large in quantum computing terms, but exceedingly tiny for us. They use mechanical motion (such as vibration) to handle the necessary quantum magic, and they can be combined with other quantum systems too.

For the purposes of this study, the team put together a thin strip of high-​quality sapphire, just under half a millimeter thick. A thin piezoelectrical transducer was used to excite acoustic waves, moving energy units such as phonons which can, in theory, be put through quantum computing processes. Technically, this device is known as an acoustic resonator.

That was the first part of the setup. To do the measuring, the acoustic resonator was coupled with a superconducting qubit – those basic quantum computer building blocks that can simultaneously hold both a 1 and a 0 value, and upon which companies such as Google and IBM have already built rudimentary quantum computers.

By making the status of the superconducting qubit dependent on the number of phonons in the acoustic resonator, the scientists could read that number of phonons without actually interacting with them or transferring any energy.

They describe it as similar to playing a theremin, the strange musical instrument that doesn't need to be touched to produce sound.

By interfacing mechanical resonators with superconducting circuits, circuit quantum acoustodynamics can make a variety of important tools available for manipulating and measuring motional quantum states.

https://www.nature.com/articles/s41567-022-01591-2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 18, 2022 at 12:00pm

Rocket engine exhaust pollution extends high into Earth's atmosphere

Reusable space technology has led to a rise in space transportation at a lower cost, as popularized by commercial spaceflights of companies like SpaceX and Virgin Galactic. What is poorly understood, however, is rockets' propulsion emissions creating significant heating and compositional changes in the atmosphere.

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'Night-time solar' technology can now deliver power in the dark UNSW researchers have made a major breakthrough in renewable energy technology by producing electricity from so-called "night-time" solar power.

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 18, 2022 at 11:58am

For large bone injuries, it's Sonic hedgehog to the rescue

A  Stem Cell study in npj Regenerative Medicine presents intriguing evidence that large bone injuries might trigger a repair strategy in adults that recapitulates elements of skeletal formation in utero. Key to this repair strategy is a gene with a fittingly heroic name: Sonic hedgehog.

In the study, researchers took a close look at how mice are able to regrow large sections of missing rib—an ability they share with humans, and one of the most impressive examples of bone regeneration in mammals.

To their surprise, the scientists observed an increase in the activity of Sonic hedgehog (Shh), which plays an important role in skeletal formation in embryos, but hasn't previously been linked to injury repair in adults.

In these experiments, Shh appeared to play a necessary role in healing the central region of large sections of missing ribs, but not in closing small-scale fractures.

This evidence suggests that large-scale bone regeneration requires the redeployment of an embryonic developmental program involving Shh, whereas small injuries heal through a distinct repair program that does not mirror development.

A murine model of large-scale bone regeneration reveals a selective requirement for Sonic Hedgehog, npj Regenerative Medicine (2022). DOI: 10.1038/s41536-022-00225-8.

https://medicalxpress.com/news/2022-05-large-bone-injuries-sonic-he...

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 18, 2022 at 11:51am

Ehsan Nowroozi et al, Real or virtual: a video conferencing background manipulation-detection system. arXiv:2204.11853v1 [cs.CV]. arxiv.org/abs/2204.11853

Machine learning techniques for image forensics in adversarial setting. Ph.D. Thesis (2020). theses.eurasip.org/theses/859/ … for-image-forensics/

Ehsan Nowroozi et al, A survey of machine learning techniques in adversarial image forensics. arXiv:2010.09680v1 [cs.CR], arxiv.org/abs/2010.09680

Shijing He, Yaxiong Lei, The privacy protection effectiveness of the video conference platforms' virtual background and the privacy concerns from the end-users. arXiv:2110.12493v1 [cs.HC], arxiv.org/abs/2110.12493

Jan Malte Hilgefort et al, Spying through Virtual Backgrounds of Video Calls, Proceedings of the 14th ACM Workshop on Artificial Intelligence and Security (2021). DOI: 10.1145/3474369.3486870

Information Leakage in Encrypted IP Video Traffic. Proceedings of the IEEE Global Communications (GLOBECOM)(2015).

Mauro Barni et al, CNN Detection of GAN-Generated Face Images based on Cross-Band Co-occurrences Analysis, 2020 IEEE International Workshop on Information Forensics and Security (WIFS) (2021). DOI: 10.1109/WIFS49906.2020.9360905

https://techxplore.com/news/2022-05-strategy-discern-real-virtual-v...

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 18, 2022 at 11:51am

A strategy to discern between real and virtual video conferencing backgrounds

Video-conferencing platforms such as Skype, Microsoft Teams, Zoom and Google Meet allow people to communicate remotely with others in different parts of the world. The COVID-19 pandemic and the social distancing measures that followed led to a further rise in the use of these platforms, as it increased remote working and virtual collaborations.

Most video-conferencing platforms now also allow users to use virtual backgrounds, so that they don't need to show their home environments to their co-workers and to reduce the risk of distractions. These virtual background can be i) real (current), ii) virtual (e.g., a seaside landscape or outer space), and iii) fake, which is a real but not current background. While being able to change the background increases users' privacy, fake backgrounds can also be used with malicious intent, to give the impression of a false location, for instance suggesting that a user is at the office when he is actually at home.

Researchers  have recently developed a tool that could be used to distinguish between real and virtual backgrounds in video-conferencing platforms. Their method, introduced in a paper pre-published on arXiv, was found to successfully discern between real and "artificial backgrounds" in two distinct and common attack scenarios.

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 17, 2022 at 10:39am

CRISPR now possible in cockroaches

Researchers have developed a CRISPR-Cas9 approach to enable gene editing in cockroaches, according to a study published by Cell Press on May 16th in the journal Cell Reports Methods. The simple and efficient technique, named "direct parental" CRISPR (DIPA-CRISPR), involves the injection of materials into female adults where eggs are developing rather than into the embryos themselves.

Insect researchers have been freed from the annoyance of egg injections. They  can now edit insect genomes more freely and at will. In principle, this method should work for more than 90% of insect species.

Current approaches for insect gene editing typically require microinjection of materials into early embryos, severely limiting its application to many species.

Takaaki Daimon, DIPA-CRISPR is a simple and accessible method for insect gene editing, Cell Reports Methods (2022). DOI: 10.1016/j.crmeth.2022.100215. www.cell.com/cell-reports-meth … 2667-2375(22)00078-9

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 16, 2022 at 9:24am

While initial experiments revived the photoreceptors, the cells appeared to have lost their ability to communicate with other cells in the retina. The team identified oxygen deprivation as the critical factor leading to this loss of communication.

To overcome the challenge, researchers procured organ donor eyes in under 20 minutes from the time of death. They designed a special transportation unit too to restore oxygenation and other nutrients to the organ donor eyes.

 They also built a device to stimulate the retina and measure the electrical activity of its cells. With this approach, the team was able to restore a specific electrical signal seen in living eyes, the "b wave." It is the first b wave recording made from the central retina of postmortem human eyes.

They were able to make the retinal cells talk to each other, the way they do in the living eye to mediate human vision. Past studies have restored very limited electrical activity in organ donor eyes, but this has never been achieved in the macula, and never to the extent they have now demonstrated.

The process demonstrated by the team could be used to study other neuronal tissues in the central nervous system. It is a transformative technical advance that can help researchers develop a better understanding of neurodegenerative diseases, including blinding retinal diseases such as age-related macular degeneration.

Fatima Abbas, Silke Becker, Bryan W. Jones, Ludovic S. Mure, Satchidananda Panda, Anne Hanneken, Frans Vinberg. Revival of light signalling in the postmortem mouse and human retina. Nature, 2022; DOI: 10.1038/s41586-022-04709-x

Part 2

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 16, 2022 at 9:20am

Life after death for the human eye: Vision scientists revive light-sensing cells in organ donor eyes

Scientists have revived light-sensing neuron cells in organ donor eyes and restored communication between them as part of a series of discoveries that stand to transform brain and vision research.

Billions of neurons in the central nervous system transmit sensory information as electrical signals; in the eye, specialized neurons known as photoreceptors sense light.

Publishing in Nature, a team of researchers  describe how they used the retina as a model of the central nervous system to investigate how neurons die—and new methods to revive them.

They  were able to wake up photoreceptor cells in the human macula, which is the part of the retina responsible for our central vision and our ability to see fine detail and color. In eyes obtained up to five hours after an organ donor's death, these cells responded to bright light, colored lights, and even very dim flashes of light.

Part 1

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 16, 2022 at 7:46am

Comment by Dr. Krishna Kumari Challa on May 14, 2022 at 6:59am

Paper or plastic? Rigid waterproof coating for paper aims to reduce...

There is a considerable amount of research into the reduction of plastic for many and various applications. For the first time, researchers have found a way to imbue relatively sustainable paper materials with some of the useful properties of plastic. This can be done easily, cost effectively, and efficiently. A coating called Choetsu not only waterproofs paper, but also maintains its flexibility and degrades safely as well.

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