Toxoplasma gondii

Totodu74/Wikimedia Commons CC By SA 2.0

According to the CDC, more than 60 million people in the United States may be infected with the Toxoplasma parasite, which is spread through cat feces (as well as soil and uncooked meat). Most peoples' immune systems are able to fend off illness. But in people with compromised immune systems, such as pregnant women, toxoplasmosis can damage the brain, eyes, and other organs. Symptoms include blurred vision, muscle aches, and flu-like symptoms. Prevention: Change your cat's litter box daily. Use gloves, and wash your hands afterwards. Keep your cat indoors, and don't touch stray cats.

If someone offered you a drug that would save your life, what would you be willing to pay for it? Could you even put a number on it?

Let’s start at $750 per pill. It’s a large number, but when you consider its benefit — your health — it certainly seems manageable. And think about what else that number buys. Along with curing you, that money pays for scientists who will design even better drugs, which might work faster and have fewer side effects. What’s more, your insurance provider or Medicare might cover much of the bill.

Now imagine, after being quoted that price, you heard a neighbor with the same illness only paid $13.50 per dose last week. What do you think of that $750 figure now? Does it seem wildly unfair? Who decides these numbers, anyway?

This is the situation that set up a major firestorm this week over drug prices, with a company called Turing Pharmaceuticals at the center. Turing Pharmaceuticals is a startup operated by a former hedge fund manager, Martin Shkreli (who is no stranger to controversy).

Last month Turing purchased the intellectual property right to a drug developed in 1953 called Daraprim (also known by its scientific name, pyrimethamine), which treats a parasitic disease called toxoplasmosis. You might recognize that as “crazy cat-lady syndrome,” because it can be transmitted through cat litter, among other ways.

It can cause blindness, neurological problems and even death, but is easily treated with a six-week course of Daraprim taken twice a day. That treatment used to cost about $1,130. After Turing bought the drug in August, treatment shot to $63,000, according to a joint statement from the Infectious Diseases Society of America and the HIV Medicine Association. The statement pointed out that for some vulnerable people like AIDS patients (who often take the drug as a preventative measure), annual treatment would now be $634,000.

When the news hit major media outlets, outrage spread across the web, with many members of the public and journalists calling for Shkreli to lower his company's price. After a couple days of raging debate, Shkreli told news stations Tuesday night that the company would indeed bring the cost down, but he hasn’t said to how much yet.

“There were mistakes made with respect to helping people understand why we took this action; I think that it makes sense to lower the price in response to the anger that was felt by people,” Shkreli told NBC News.

But this debate is about much more than Daraprim. Some drugs are just astronomically expensive, including lifesaving treatments for cancer, hepatitis C, and other ailments. It's such a common problem that medical societies offer tips to help doctors get drugs for their patients. There's an entire cottage industry of Patient Assistance Programs that offset the cost of certain drugs, operated by private foundations and some drug companies. Doctors, patients, and pharmaceutical companies have been arguing about this for years, but in recent months it’s been getting more contentious as prices have been on the rise. Pharmaceutical prices were up 13.6 percent last year, compared to about 8 percent over the previous five years, according to Topher Spiro, vice president for health policy at the progressive-leaning Center for American Progress.

"There was a big spike last year, and I think that's what’s fueling a lot of the current debate. It’s increasing health insurance premiums and Medicare premiums," Spiro told Popular Science. "A big portion of the premium rate [insurers] are seeking is a direct result of pharmaceutical costs, so it is starting to explode."

In August, for example, 117 doctors from around the country signed a commentary in the journal Mayo Clinic Proceedings calling for a complete overhaul of cancer drug prices. In 2014, all new FDA-approved cancer drugs were priced above $120,000 per year, the doctors pointed out. It’s a situation that literally leaves people choosing between paying their mortgage and paying for their lifesaving cancer drugs.

The Mayo Clinic Proceedings letter recommends allowing importation of cancer drugs across the border; laws that prevent companies from delaying access to generic versions of their drugs; letting Medicare negotiate drug prices; and even forming price oversight committees that would review new drugs and propose prices based on their potential benefit.

“The good news is that effective new cancer therapies are being developed by pharmaceutical and biotechnology companies at a faster rate than ever before,” the letter reads. “Drug companies should be rewarded with reasonable profits for these efforts. The unfortunate news, also acknowledged by some of the pharmaceutical leadership, is that the current pricing system is unsustainable and not affordable for many patients.”

As the Turing price-test showed, this is hardly limited to cancer. Members of Congress (including Sen. Bernie Sanders, the Vermont independent vying for the Democratic presidential nomination) earlier this summer sent a letter requesting data from a company called Valeant Pharmaceuticals after it raised the prices of two heart medications. Isuprel and Nitropress went up by about 525 percent and 212 percent, respectively, immediately after Valeant bought the drugs from Marathon Pharmaceuticals. Before the sale, Marathon itself had already jacked up the prices by nearly 400 percent over their 2013 cost, according to Sanders’ office.

“It is unacceptable that Americans pay, by far, the highest prices in the world for prescription drugs,” he said in a statement.

Doctors who have cried foul have pointed out that the Turing price hike would actually mean fewer patients can access Daraprim. Dr. Wendy Armstrong, professor of infectious diseases at Emory University in Atlanta, told The New York Times her hospital has not had access to the drug in several months and that toxoplasmosis was not a disease where physicians have been crying out for better therapies. Spiro said many drugs like Daraprim are simply being marketed differently with little or no change to the way they work.

Pharmaceutical companies are quick to point out that the promise of profits is part of what sparks innovation in the first place. And some of their revenues are re-invested in research and development, they add. It takes about 10 years for a new medicine to reach the marketplace, including about seven years for clinical trials, according to PhRMA, the main trade group for drug industry. PhRMA says a new drug costs about $2.6 billion to develop.

"Conversations on the cost of medicines often fail to acknowledge the competitive biopharmaceutical market that exists in the U.S., which helps to control costs while encouraging the development of innovative new therapies," Holly Campbell, a spokesperson for PhRMA, told Popular Science.

In some cases, new and very expensive drugs are indeed better therapies for which people have been clamoring for some time. One notable example is Sovaldi, which cures the liver-wasting disease hepatitis C. In 2014, the pharmaceutical company Gilead Life Sciences came under fire for charging about $84,000 for Sovaldi (a Best of What’s New winner). It cures hepatitis C in three months with practically no side effects.

When I talked to John McHutchison, Gilead’s vice president of clinical research, he said Sovaldi took years and considerable effort to develop because it’s a very precise, targeted virus attacker called a nucleotide polymerase inhibitor. Instead of working with the immune system, like many other drugs, Sovaldi works against the hepatitis virus, attaching itself to the mechanism the virus uses to replicate. Its developers had to find just the right enzymes to make it work without harming other cells in the body, McHutchison explained to me last year. Gilead also notes that most people who need Sovaldi can get it at deep discounts through insurance companies.

Gilead Sciences Sovaldi

Courtesy Gilead Sciences

This first-of-its-kind drug cures Hepatitis C in weeks. Wow.

Sovaldi was one of the first high-priced drugs to hit the market, and other companies have followed suit, Spiro said.

"It happens to be a coincidence that a lot of these drugs are coming onto the market now. Some of the newer ones cost $10,000 a month. We’re seeing a lot of new drugs that cost thousands of dollars," he said.

This is not to say that it ought to be this way, and that insurance companies (and taxpayers) should be on the hook for pricey treatments. The Mayo commentators argue that high prices don’t help anyone, noting that money diverted as profit doesn't necessarily contribute to better health outcomes or novel therapies. Given this climate, the Mayo co-signers said there is "no relief in sight" because drug companies keep challenging the market by raising prices higher and higher. "This raises the question of whether current pricing of cancer drugs is based on reasonable expectation of return on investment or whether it is based on what prices the market can bear,” they wrote.

But the market didn't even have a chance to bear a $750-per-pill treatment for toxoplasmosis, as Turing Pharmaceuticals learned. The people would not go for it. Might that mean people are ready for some kind of price cap, or at least a new type of regulation? The Mayo cosigners call for a few incremental steps in that direction. In a new report for CAP, Spiro and his coauthors also call for new executive actions and congressional legislation to address costs. And the Democratic presidential contenders are beating this drum, too.

Former secretary of state Hillary Clinton's plan includes a per-patient spending cap, a requirement that drug makers spend a certain percentage of their profits on research and development, and a way to enable Americans to import drugs from other countries. Sanders' plan, announced earlier in September, also calls for importing drugs from Canada and for allowing Medicare to negotiate drug prices, something that was expressly barred under the law that created Medicare drug benefits. The Republican contenders have been much less specific (although Donald Trump did say the Turing price increase was "disgusting").

Unsurprisingly, the pharmaceutical industry is skeptical. “The policy proposals they recommend would, if adopted, send a chilling signal to the marketplace that risk-taking will no longer be rewarded, stopping innovation in its tracks and halting decades of progress in cancer care,” PhRMA said in response.

Regardless of who wins the White House next year, any sweeping changes would take Congressional action. That means it could be years before any meaningful change takes place, if it ever does — but, Spiro says, that doesn't mean things can't get better.

"You could bring public pressure to bear," he said, "and we’ve seen already how that can be effective. Public shaming is a very effective strategy, and again, there's no congressional action needed."

At least it seems to work some of the time.

Government Communications Headquarters (GCHQ) in Cheltenham, Gloucestershire

GCHQ, via Wikimedia Commons

It’s been two years since the first revelations from former NSA contractor Edward Snowden, and there are still new details in his trove of stolen secrets. Many of the revelations have concerned the bulk data collection of data done by the American agency, whose job it is to monitor electronic communications.

The NSA was hardly alone in this regard, and contained in the materials leaked by Snowden are details about other programs from other nations. One of them is the United Kingdom, and the latest leaked information shows not only that the UK was involved in bulk collection, but that the people behind the program were fans of the UK alt-rock band Radiohead. The program, which shares a name with the 1997 song by Radiohead, collected metadata records from over 200,000 people in at least 185 nations. The goal: find out information about people listening to internet radio.

The program, which was first conceived in 2007 and appears to be active since at least 2009. Created by Britain’s NSA counterpart, the Government Communications Headquarters, Karma Police “was designed to provide the agency with “either (a) a web browsing profile for every visible user on the Internet, or (b) a user profile for every visible website on the Internet.”

From The Intercept:

They zeroed in on any stations found broadcasting recitations from the Quran, such as a popular Iraqi radio station and a station playing sermons from a prominent Egyptian imam named Sheikh Muhammad Jebril. They then used KARMA POLICE to find out more about these stations’ listeners, identifying them as users on Skype, Yahoo, and Facebook.

The summary report says the spies selected one Egypt-based listener for “profiling” and investigated which other websites he had been visiting. Surveillance records revealed the listener had viewed the porn site Redtube, as well as Facebook, Yahoo, YouTube, Google’s blogging platform Blogspot, the photo-sharing site Flickr, a website about Islam, and an Arab advertising site.

That’s not just Karma police. That’s Karma secret police.

Read the full story at The Intercept.

Roach from BFU

Screenshot by author, from YouTube

The secret roach’s name was Death's Head, aka Blaberus Cranifer, and it came from Russia on a mission. It is a small, mechanical beast, styled after the death's head cockroach. According to Russian state-owned Sputnik news site, it was built in seven months by a group at the Immanuel Kant Baltic Federal University, for a vague Russian organization. That vague group’s requirements? “It should be externally similar to a cockroach, it must have the physical size of a [very large] cockroach and it should have the behavior pattern as close to a living cockroach as possible.” Here’s what that looks like:

Besides floundering on its back, the roach can run, and it sports a surprisingly well-designed ovoid body shield.

The roach has a 20-minute battery life, and according to Sputnik, “The robot can carry up to a 10-gram payload making it of interest to the military, as a miniature robot with a portable camera can penetrate into hard-to-reach places.”

It’s certainly an impressive machine, but it’s hard to imagine it was designed from scratch (well, with a head start from nature) and built entirely in 7 months. We’ve seen round backs on robotic roaches in research from the University of California at Berkeley. Other projects have put remote controls onto the backs of living roaches, and made kits for Kickstarter backers to do the same. Scientists have even launched robot birds from fast-sprinting robot roaches.

None of this is to diminish the work done by the team that built Blaberus, which you can see in action below:

Screenshot

Microsoft's upcoming VR headset, VR Kit, poses as a competitor to Google Cardboard.

Since Google released Google Cardboard in 2014, it has become the standard for low-cost virtual reality. Google literally gives them away for free, and even published directions detailing how to build your own, to the delight of VR DIYers everywhere.

Now Microsoft is trying to get in on that action, showcasing their own cardboard virtual reality headset as a reward for ideas in a Russian VR hackathon. Pictures of the headset were found on a website promoting the event, which will take place in Moscow on October 17. (The page has since been taken down.)

Microsoft’s headset, called VR Kit, appears to work by inserting a Lumia phone into the cardboard enclosure, which leaves an opening for the camera and flash. If this hardware is used, it could mean a low-cost echo of Oculus Rift integration with Leap Motion. Augmented and mixed reality are already in Microsoft’s sights, with their highly anticipated Hololens on track for enterprise testing in the next year. However, augmented reality usually requires the use of hands and fingers for input, which is hard to realize fully with a device that’s held to the face.

That said, Microsoft and Oculus (owned by Facebook) are working closely together on virtual reality. The new mass-market Oculus Rift VR headset due out in 2016 will work natively on Microsoft's Xbox One, and last week, Oculus announced that Minecraft (which is owned by Microsoft) will be coming to the Oculus Rift next year as well.

Screenshot

The original Russian and English translation of Microsoft's invite to the October hackathon in Russia.

The Microsoft event set for October 17, for its part, challenges virtual reality programmers to develop in three areas: games, education, and corporate applications, according to tech news site Thurrott. Winners will receive the headsets to continue development on their programs.

Microsoft’s ambition with the HoloLens is clear, and if VR Kit can dominate the market for low-cost artificial reality like Cardboard has with virtual reality, they could be major players when VR and AR truly hit the marketplace.

Mars isn’t the dry wasteland it looks like. There’s water in them thar rocks, according to NASA. Just this morning, the space agency announced that the mysterious, dark streaks that show up on Mars during the spring and summertime are in all likelihood caused by flowing water. The water is briny and it’s not there all year round, but it’s there. So, now what?

On Earth, where there’s water, there’s life. And when it comes to searching for otherworldly lifeforms, NASA’s motto has been to “follow the water.” So now that we know there’s water on Mars, the obvious next question is: "is there life there as well?"

In the paper about the discovery, researchers call for further exploration of these dark, streaky areas. And in a press conference, John Grunsfeld from NASA’s Science Mission Directorate said he hopes that NASA will someday send astrobiologists to these sites, to see if life could possibly be hiding out there.

But searching for life on Mars won’t be simple, as Scientific American’s Lee Billings notes. The Outer Space Treaty, which the U.S. is party to, outlaws the “harmful contamination” of other worlds with Earth biology.

Earth spacecraft have to go through rigorous cleaning to remove their microbes before they head into space. The microbes are subjected to drying, chemical cleaning, ultraviolet radiation, and starvation. But the bugs are stubborn, and a few of them can outlive NASA’s efforts to get rid of them. For example, the Curiosity rover launched with 65 bacteria species onboard—whoops!

Mars 2020 rover

NASA

This spacecraft has the capability help scientists determine whether life exists on Mars, but it's not allowed near the newly discovered watery regions on Mars.

Because of these tiny hitchhikers, the international organization COSPAR (Committee on Space Research) has designated “Special Regions” on Mars where conditions are potentially ripe for Martian biology to flourish. Spacecraft (and humans, not that it’s relevant at this point) are supposed to avoid these areas unless their equipment is super-sanitized. Otherwise they risk infecting Mars with Earth’s microbes, and confusing the life-detection equipment.

Unfortunately, the Mars 2020 rover, which is the next spacecraft that could potentially search for life in Mars’ soggier habitats, is not allowed to go near them. Such watery areas could be prime real estate for microbes, and the rover’s radio-thermal generator could provide enough heat for it to be loaded with earth germs.

Although future spacecraft could theoretically design around this flaw, it could cost millions of dollars and several years extra to adequately decontaminate spacecraft to enter one of these regions. With NASA’s tightening purse strings, it’s hard to see how the agency could come up with the cash.

So NASA’s in a bit of a “catch-22”, as Billings notes. “[K]nowing for certain whether any of these places are actually special probably requires visiting them—something that is very difficult to do under current protocols.”

Volkswagen Logo

Gerry Lauzon/FlickrCC by 2.0

The scale of the Volkswagen emissions fraud is expanding, a black, dirty sinkhole that is dragging a spirit of innovation, the CEO, billions of dollars, and millions of cars into an inescapable mire. And, over a week after the initial revelation, things are not looking up.

Volkswagen has set up a website for people that own the affected cars, and the EPA is promising to add more testing to the regulatory process, but it's still a long, hard road ahead for VW.

28 U.S. states have opened investigations, and other countries around the world have also begun to take action against VW, including South Korea, Switzerland, France, Italy, and especially Germany, where the former CEO is being investigated by prosecutors.

But the harsh spotlight on Volkswagen (which could have prevented all this by spending roughly $430 per car during manufacturing) is also casting light into other dark corners of the automotive industry.

"The Volkswagen scandal was just the tip of the iceberg," Greg Archer, clean vehicles manager at environmental group Transport & Environment told Reuters. Archer's group found that some Mercedes, BMW, and Peugeot cars used 50 percent more fuel on the road than in the lab, guzzling gas at a much higher rate than their owners might have anticipated given the companies claims.

While in our cynical world, all these revelations aren't necessarily surprising, the discrepancy between what is being advertised and the real-world experience of these cars is definitely depressing. Whether false advertising over fuel consumption or emissions, the fact is that people buying cars for their green credentials were being sold a bill of goods. And many are very unhappy about it.

For a prime example of this deceitful advertising gap, (and if you just really needed to slam your head into a desk a few times today) watch one of Volkswagen's commercials from earlier this year where they claim that 'diesel is dirty' is just another old wives' tale.

Looks like those old wives actually knew something after all.

'Salad machine' of the Mars500: preparing the salad cassette

ESA

A member of the Mars500 crew prepares to harvest vegetables grown in a simulated spacecraft environment.

Future Mars astronauts will have more to contend with than just the unforgiving, vacuumous expanse of space separating Earth from the Red Planet (140 million miles, on average). In an experiment meant to simulate a journey to Mars, 18 months of isolation caused participants to have high stress levels and low brain activity, according to a study recently published in Physiology and Behavior.

Starting in 2010, six men voluntarily went into a small habitat outside Moscow, Russia for that length of time (one-and-a-half Earth years). The intention of the study, called Mars500, was for researchers to better understand what can happen to people’s bodies and minds as a result of long periods of isolation. They were especially interested in the brain: “The influences of long-term confinement on the human brain are barely investigated,” the researchers write. Based on shorter earlier studies, the researchers suspected that exercise would counter the stress and boredom of the isolation.

As part of the study, every 60 days the participants took EEG measurements to record their brain activity and gave saliva samples to indicate their levels of cortisol, a stress hormone. The participants would exercise on special equipment for 30 minutes, taking EEGs before and after.

Though the experiment was conducted a few years ago, the data has just started to trickle out over the past two years. In this study the researchers found that, over the course of the study, the participants had much less brain activity in the form of alpha and beta waves, which indicate levels of relaxation and conscious, logical function respectively. The cortisol levels were high for almost the entire isolation period. But after exercise, brain waves increased, and cortisol levels decreased. The researchers conclude that, though the volunteers were stressed and bored in isolation, regular exercise could help.

Over that long a period, though, exercise can’t replace an active and non-monotonous lifestyle. But, interestingly, the participants didn’t have any long-term effects and returned to normal brain function and cortisol levels as soon as their confinement ended; though stress can have many long-lasting effects on the body and mind, it appears that 18 months isn’t long enough to do any permanent damage.

That’s good news for the dozens of aspiring astronauts looking to colonize Mars. But it also means that they’re going to have a very boring ride over, and that they will have to offset the effects of isolation with exercise, even if they don’t feel like it (earlier studies had reported a loss of motivation to exercise even in shorter timeframes). For the people planning the missions, it also means that some of the vessel’s limited space will have to be taken up by exercise equipment in order to keep the crew from going completely crazy. While obviously hard on the participants, the results of the study will help any future astronauts on the order of the fictional Mark Watney stay as mentally healthy as they can on the voyage of a lifetime.

LauncherOne looks like its on target to deliver Virgin Galactic’s promised small satellite revolution.

Virgin’s NewtonThree main stage engine successfully passed testing when the liquid rocket propulsion system ran for more than 20 seconds, according to an announcement made today by Virgin Galactic.

As an affordable small satellite launch vehicle, LauncherOne is intended for commercial use. The company suggests that small satellite missions will be used in the future for a myriad of earthly causes such as providing internet access, taking pictures, and collecting data. This class of satellites can also be used to hunt asteroids and launch other satellites, and maybe even explore space.

Smokestacks

Señor Codo/FlickrCC by SA 2.0

It's a modern philosophical problem: Once a dog catches a car, what does it do with it?

Or, rephrased, once a power plant successfully recaptures its carbon emissions, where does the carbon go?

Reducing carbon dioxide emissions from power plants is one of the central goals of new climate change regulations announced by President Obama this year. Carbon dioxide is a potent greenhouse gas, and power plants that burn fossil fuels like coal and gas for energy are the largest source of CO₂ emissions in the country.

Many scientists are working on ways to capture the carbon produced by these plants using all kinds of methods, including freezing it or pulling it out of thin air with graphene nanofibers.

And capturing carbon is great, but XPrize chairman Peter Diamandis thinks we can take that one step further, and put the captured carbon to work. Today, Diamandis announced a new XPrize, focused on the carbon-power plant conundrum.

Paul Bunje, the XPrize Program Director for Energy and the Environment tells Popular Science that instead of being a carbon capture contest, the $20 million XPrize is a "carbon utilization contest." Bunje says that the prize challenges inventors to answer the question "Once you capture it, what do you do with it?"

Instead of making excess carbon an albatross weighing down the energy industry, this XPrize aims to turn carbon into a valuable commodity, while still keeping carbon pollution out of the atmosphere. They want to incentivize inventors to build devices capable of incorporating carbon into anything from building materials to manufacturing chemicals, to alternative fuels, or something entirely new. For the next nine months, teams from all over the country can register to compete on either the coal track or the natural gas track, they will be invited to submit detailed technical papers outlining their solution. 15 semifinalists in each track will be selected to build tabletop models of their demonstration. Then, 5 finalists from each the coal and gas track will be selected to build full-scale iterations of their invention, helped along by $500,000, awarded for making it to the finals.

The final products will be built and tested at brand-new testing facilities located next to a coal and gas plant respectively. Bunje says that details of the test centers, funded by XPrize partners, will be announced soon. "There are very few places in the world where you can test this carbon capture and innovation technology," Bunje says. "[The test centers] are going to be a legacy moving forward."

The two winning teams (one from the coal track and one from the gas track) will each receive $10 million. The contest is expected to take a total of 4 and a half years to announce a winner.

This XPrize is the latest in a long series of innovation prizes from the XPrize organization. Since the first XPrize for sending a privately funded manned spacecraft to the edge of space was awarded in 2004, several more XPrizes have been announcedand awarded. The Google Lunar XPrize will go to the group that can land a private lander on the moon. The Qualcomm Tricorder XPrize challenged people to build a working handheld diagnostic tool.

The Heartland Virus is Widespread in the US in ticks.

Source: CDC, DOI: 10.3201/eid2110.150380; Modifications, Jason Tetro

Back in 2009, during the influenza pandemic, two people in Missouri came down with an illness. At first, this was thought to be a new incarnation of the viral flu but further testing revealed it was something new and very different. Because of the geographical location of the area, this new pathogen was called the Heartland virus.

In the lab, the virus was studied and found to be a member of the Phlebovirus genus. Its name comes from the initial transmission vector, phlebotomine sandflies and within this genus are nine official species. The most studied is Rift Valley Fever. It is predominantly found in Africa although outbreaks have occurred in Saudi Arabia and Yemen. Another important member of this group is the Toscana virus, which has been seen in several European countries.

Phleboviruses mainly affect animals but they can infect humans. In most cases, the symptoms are mild and akin to the flu although more serious symptoms can occur depending on the species. Rift Valley Fever can attack the liver and the eyes while Toscana virus can cause meningitis.

No matter the extent of the symptoms, infection begins with entry into the human body, usually through the skin by a sand fly bite although mosquitoes and ticks can also be carriers. Once in the blood, the virus causes a combination of symptoms such as nausea, fever, fatigue, vomiting, abdominal pain, and diarrhea. Eventually, most people will clear the infection once the immune system figures out how to kill it. Because it can’t be transmitted from human to human, infections are usually isolated and do not cause outbreaks like the flu.

While the nature of the viral pathogen had been discovered, the route of infection and also the severity of symptoms could only be learned from the patients themselves. The source of infection was a tick as both had a history of an encounter with the embedded insect. The onset of symptoms was about four days and both required some form of hospitalization. No treatment was given – primarily because the doctors had no idea of the nature of the pathogen – and both recovered within four to six weeks. The virus appeared to be less life-threatening than its Rift Valley Fever and Toscana relatives.

By the end of the ordeal, the Heartland virus, although a striking new addition to the list of pathogens worldwide, was considered to be a negligible threat in light of the current pandemic situation. But, after the all clear on the influenza front was called, researchers went back to explore the virus, the habitat, and more importantly, the risk to humans for infection.

While the search continued, other Heartland infections were confirmed. They were still relatively low in number – six over the course of 2012-2013. Based on the analysis, the virus seemed to spread during the summer months and was always associated with ticks. As for its virulence, all patients recovered suggesting the virus, while interesting, was still not a significant threat.

But then in 2013, the virus proved it can kill. The patient was not in the best of health and had several chronic conditions suggesting he was at a higher risk for a rather virulent infection. Yet no one expected the virus would be fatal.

There was also another troublesome fact regarding the death although this had nothing to do with physiology but instead geography. Though the first cases were found in Missouri, this man died in Tennessee. This meant the virus wasn’t local but potentially widespread in the US. The focus on Heartland was ramped up to learn as much as possible about the virus and its environmental prevalence.

To assess the geographical distribution of the virus, researchers went on a hunt. But, finding the virus in ticks wasn’t easy so they used another route involving sentinels, animals known to be infected with human pathogens. The list of animals included raccoons, horses, deer, dogs, possums, and birds. All of these species could possibly become infected and develop antibodies to fight the invasion.

In the meantime, another infection occurred in Oklahoma and like the Tennessee case, ended tragically. The list of infections was now up to ten and the prevalence of the virus increased to yet another State. This suggested the range of the virus could be far larger than anticipated meaning any surveillance would have to be widespread and involve much of the continental United States.

Last week, the data finally came out although the results are anything but heartwarming. Based on the information attained, the virus appears to be widespread across the Central and Eastern United States from Texas all the way up to Maine.

The team analyzed a five-year collection of blood samples from deer, raccoons, coyotes, and moose from 19 different States. The samples were taken back to the lab and serum was collected. The now antibody-rich fluid was added to cultures of cells and then exposed to the Heartland virus. If antibodies were present, the virus would be neutralized and the cells would be safe. If there were no antibodies, the cells would become infected and die.

When the results came back, animals from Missouri and Tennessee came back positive for antibodies as did eleven other States – Florida, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Kansas, Kentucky, Maine, New Hampshire, North Carolina, Texas, and Vermont (Oklahoma had not been tested). The results revealed a wide swath of risk across the Eastern half of the country. Moreover, based on some of the data, the virus may have been circulating for many years before the first human outbreak. This wasn’t confirmed however as massive genetic analysis on origin had yet to be done.

The information on the Heartland virus has greatly increased over the last six years and research has provided valuable insights. However, when it comes to prevention, there is little we can do. With such a widespread distribution, there is really no way to control the virus or its spread. The best option is to limit exposure to ticks and prevent them from gaining access to the skin. Not only will it help to prevent the virus from infecting, it can also help to keep other tickborne diseases away such as Lyme disease, tularemia, and spotted fever.

Android Robot

Pixabay

Google's event today will likely bring new Nexus phones for Android users

Apple has shown their hand, and now it’s Google’s turn. The search company’s fall event is rumored to bring Android fans new Nexus devices, an updated Chromecast and more. But where and when can you livestream Google’s fall event? We've got you covered below.

When

Google’s event will take place today, Tuesday, September 29 at 9 a.m. PT, 12 p.m. ET. For a full list of how your time zone matches up, you'll want to check here.

Where To Watch

Google will livestream its Nexus event on Youtube here. Tune in live to see the product announcements unfold or hit the link later to see the event after the fact. We'll add the video stream here once made available.

What To Expect

Nexus 6p

Android Police

Huawei could be bringing Google some of the latest Nexus devices

Google has kept quiet about what we will see announced today. But, as it tends to happen, details of many of Google’s products leaked on the web days ago. The possibility of the Nexus 5x and 6p being released is very likely. This is going to be the first refresh in nearly a year to Google's stock phone, following the release of the Nexus 6 in November 2014, which should make Android fans happy.

In addition to phones, the living room will see some love from Google as well. A new Chromecast announcement could also emerge today. 9to5Google reports a new design will make its way to Google’s HDMI dongle. The search company could also introduce Chromecast Audio—offering any speaker with a headphone jack Chromecast support.

Google’s fall event kicks off later today. We’ll be bringing you the news on all the announcements. Stay tuned!

A model of a protocell

Janet Iwasa, Szostak Laboratory, Harvard Medical School and Massachusetts General Hospital via National Science Foundation

Scientists have a pretty good theory for how life on Earth began: Meteorites that bombarded our planet brought simple carbon-based compounds called amino acids. Eventually, slowly, these chemicals combined to make cells, which were then able to replicate and become the increasingly complex forms of life that we have today. But researchers didn't quite understand the mechanisms through which the earliest life forms evolved; though these cells were able to replicate, they were not yet alive. Now a team of Japanese biologists has created artificial cells similar to those that might have first existed on Earth to better understand how they might have started to divide and evolve, according to a study published today in Nature Communications.

The researchers made a synthetic “protocell” made of DNA and proteins packaged inside lipids, which are fatty compounds meant to mimic the cell membrane. These spheres aren’t alive, but the DNA in them contains instructions to replicate under the right conditions. By changing the pH of the spheres’ environment, the researchers were able to trigger the cells to divide. But the hard part was replenishing the spheres’ supplies so that they could start the division process over again, as real cells do. To work around this, the researchers designed the newly split synthetic cells to combine with other cell-like structures nearby. It worked—the spheres had three successful generations in the lab.

What’s more, the researchers now think they understand the cyclic process by which their synthetic cells (and, thus, the protocells) might have divided: ingestion (the cells combine to replenish supplies), replication (the DNA is copied), maturity (the cells prepare to divide), and division (new cells split out from the parent).

The researchers' graphic of the protocell regeneration model.

Kensuke Kurihara et al, Nature Communications, 2015

The researchers believe that their model could mimic how the precursors for life formed and propagated—the cells would not have been self contained and would need to replenish their energy supplies before continuing to reproduce. The pH changes that brought on three of the four phase transitions could easily happen around hydrothermal vents, the study authors write. However, the study left some important questions unanswered. The researchers are still unsure about how protocells’ genes influence their physical characteristics, or phenotype, how evolution-driving mutations might have happened in them, and how fast they might have been able to replicate. They hope to create more sophisticated protocell models in the future to further investigate how the genes might have worked in these precursors to life.

John D. & Catherine T. MacArthur Foundation

MacArthur fellow Lorenz Studer at his lab bench

Every year the MacArthur Foundation gives out its famous "genius grants" to talented people whose work shows promise to make the future a better, more interesting place. This year the prize is a hefty $625,000 and has been given to artists, writers, activists and, of course, scientists. Meet some of the 2015 fellows:

Chemist William Dichtel: Creates porous polymers with an enormous surface area (on the scale of a football field per gram of polymer) which can be used for power storage and water purification.

Computational biologist John Novembre: Studies human evolutionary and genetic history, allowing for highly detailed ancestral tracing and disease pattern mapping.

Computer scientist Christopher Ré: Built an inference system that analyzes "dark data," which could be used in many fields and is currently used to get data about human trafficking from the dark web.

Neuroscientist Beth Stevens: Studies how brain connections form and change throughout life, giving insight into the development neurological diseases like Huntington's and Alzheimer's.

Stem cell biologist Lorenz Studer: Creates transplantable neurons that make dopamine from stem cells, which could provide a treatment for Parkinson's disease.

Inorganic chemist Peidong Yang: Studies semiconductor nanowires, which led to the creation of a synthetic "leaf" made of nanowires and bacteria that could make clean fuel.

Environmental engineer Kartik Chandran: Combines microbial ecology, molecular biology, and engineering to change wastewater into fertilizer and energy as well as pure water.

Congratulations to all, as well as to the fellows NOT in the hard sciences.

New Zealand's landmass covers an area of 103,363 square miles. But yesterday it announced that it was designating an area of ocean over two times that size as a protected ocean sanctuary.

The Kermadec Ocean Sanctuary will prohibit all fishing or mining within the sanctuary borders. The move is designed to protect not only ocean life (flip through our gallery above for a closer look) but also to protect the unique geology of the area.

The new sanctuary, which will go into effect next year, includes the second-deepest marine trench in the world (deeper than Mt. Everest is tall) and 50 underwater volcanos. It's also an important home to a wide variety of sea life, from fish, to birds, to whales and sea turtles.

The fishing industry isn't happy with the sudden restriction, but marine reserves are becoming more common, as scientists discover just how much human activity is impacting the oceans. Nearly half the population of the oceans disappeared in the past 45 years. Fortunately, governments like New Zealand's and the United States' are expanding existing marine reserves to preserve these areas for future generations.

Here is a video the Pew Charitable Trust put together highlighting the need to protect this area:

A retina with intermediate age-related macular degeneration

National Eye Institute, National Institutes of Health via Flickr

Last month, a 60-year-old woman in England received an experimental treatment to restore her vision, according to a press release from Moorfields Eye Hospital in England where the surgery took place. She and the other nine patients who will undergo the procedure over the next 18 months have age-related macular degeneration (AMD), a condition in which parts of the retina deteriorate over time; as part of the trial, the 10 patients will receive implanted patches of embryonic stem cells to help restore their retinal function.

AMD affects 15 million Americans, mostly over the age of 65. There are several forms of AMD, but these patients have a form in which leaky blood vessels damage the most sensitive part of the retina, leading to a sudden loss of vision.

In this study, surgeons will implant patches of embryonic stem cells in the damaged area of the retina. The theory is that the stem cells will develop into retinal cells, taking the place of the damaged cells that are causing the vision loss. The researchers will monitor each patient for a year after the operation to check for side effects of the treatment and to test its efficacy.

This isn’t thefirst time stem cells have been used to repair retinal tissue, and with only 10 patients it’s a rather small sample size. But if the trial goes well, the researchers hope that similar procedures can be done in the future on people with this and other types of AMD. There’s no word on how long the treatment might work, or how much the procedure might cost if it became widely available, the BBC reports--it might be more expensive than the current treatments of vitamins, laser surgery or injections. If it works better than these treatments, though, the stem cell treatment might help millions of people all over the world regain their sight.

BGI

For $1600, this little piggy could go home with you

So-called "teacup pigs" are marketed as cute, conveniently sized pets, but when they grow up, their owners are often surprised when they balloon to their adult weight of hundreds of pounds. Now, scientists at BGI in Shenzhen, China are using cutting-edge genetic manipulations to create micropigs that may actually stay tiny and adorable.

They originally created the pigs as lab animals to study human diseases, but on September 23, BGI announced that it would start selling the pigs as pets. The micropigs will only weigh about 30 pounds as adults. BGI priced these pint-sized pets at $1,600.

To make a micropig, scientists started with the already miniature pig species called Bama. Bama pigs weigh 70-100 pounds instead of upwards of 200 pounds, the weight of a normal farm pig. Pigs are closer to humans physiologically than rats or other lab animals, making them ideal candidates to test medication on. Bama pigs and (and now micropigs) are a better option because they take up less space, cost less to feed and keep, and are generally more manageable than full-sized hogs.

A BGI technician holds a micropig

BGI

The researchers cloned pigs from Bama fetus cells. But first they used a gene-editing process called TALENs to shut down growth hormone receptor genes. If cells don’t have this receptor, they don’t get the message to grow, and the pig ends up stunted. The scientists then bred these pigs with normal Bama pigs, to prevent potential health problems. They are already being used to study gut microbiomes.

A few words of caution before you place your order: The company set the price to test market demand, but there’s no word on when pet pigs might be shipped out or how expensive they will eventually be. The pigs have been healthy so far, but cloned animals have been known to have health problems, and pigs still naturally root and dig, which can be a problem in an apartment.

And if you wait, you could have an even cooler genetically modified pet! BGI scientists toldNature they are reportedly working on ways to customize your pig's coat colors and patterns.

The depths of the ocean hold all sorts of bright and wonderful surprises, though perhaps none have as much of a glow as the hawksbill turtle spotted by marine biologist David Gruber off the Solomon Islands this summer. Gruber was studying biofluorescence in sea creatures, looking for animals that emit absorbed light in such a way that they seem to glow. He'd already found a lot of fascinating animals to study, and then a glowing red and green saucer swam by. It was a hawksbill turtle with a brightly lit shell, the first biofluorescent reptile ever seen. Check out National Geographic's video of the discovery above. Since then, the team has observed other fluorescent hawkbills as well.

Hawksbill turtles are one of the animals protected by New Zealand's new ocean sanctuary that was also announced this week. Hawksbill turtles are an endangered species, and researchers like Gruber are just starting to learn more about them. They aren't sure exactly how or why the animals fluoresce.

Watch the forum live at 8:10 a.m. at www.whitehouse.gov/live

The US Federal Government is reaffirming its commitment to both open government and open science, as it announces new policies on citizen science and crowdsourcing today. The announcement will be discussed at a forum on citizen science.

The forum is a joint effort between the Office of Science and Technology Policy (OSTP) and the Domestic Policy Council. Entitled "Open Science and Innovation: Of the People, By the People, For the People," the forum will bring together senior administration officials, federal agencies, academic researchers, and non-profit organizations to discuss how citizen science can be used to support federal agency missions and achieve broader societal benefits.

In a memorandum from John P. Holdren, Director of the OSTP, the executive office seeks to encourage ". . . the use, where appropriate, of citizen science and crowdsourcing by federal agencies."

Specifically, the OSTP is asking each agency to select a dedicated coordinator for citizen science and crowdsourcing projects within 60 days. Agencies are also being asked to catalogue their existing projects and list them in a public database of federal citizen science and crowdsourcing projects within 180 days. The goal of the database is "to make these projects easier for the public to discover, to help improve collaboration within and across agencies, and to reveal opportunities for new projects."

The memo coincides with the launch of a Federal Crowdsourcing and Citizen Science Toolkit. The kit contains information on best practices for setting up a citizen science project, a resource library, and links to relevant law and policy. The toolkit is publically accessible at https://crowdsourcing-toolkit.sites.usa.gov/.

Momentum Building

In an exclusive interview with Popular Science, Jenn Gustetic, Assistant Director for Open Innovation at the White House, said that the memo and the forum are the result of a groundswell of support across the government for using citizen science as another tool to improve innovation.

"A number of agencies have been experimenting with citizen science and crowdsourcing for a few years, but there has been some uncertainty about the clearest path," she said. "Early adopters have been wondering, is this viable? Is this worth the resources? But it has become clear that we've now got a big community of passionate and dedicated federal employees, a great group of connected people, and some big success stories and we want to build on that momentum." Gustetic cites the more than two dozen case studies provided in the toolkit, many of which have not been previously released.

But What About The Data?

Gustetic acknowledges that citizen science is not without its skeptics. "A big point of concern for many is data quality," she explained. "In many ways, this memo and forum will be a way to address that head on."

Gustetic said that the memo outlines three key guiding principles for agencies engaging in citizen science and crowdsourcing. "We want data quality to be of paramount importance in the design and execution of projects from the outset," she said. "We also believe that openness is critical, and it should be the default position, to spur innovation. And we would also like to see public participants as valued partners who deserve some kind of recognition."

The memo and especially the toolkit are designed to help agencies design good projects from day one, and these resources should also prevent agencies from having to reinvent the wheel, she added.

Citizen Science Gaining Importance Worldwide

With other regions around the world moving quickly to adopt citizen science and crowdsourcing methodology, Gustetic noted that it is important that the US foster similar developments at home.

"We see these tools as feeding into the overall drive to stimulate innovation in America," Gustetic said.

Beyond the timelines stated in the memo, the US government's role in citizen science initiatives is still under discussion. "We'll be finding out from the community of users as to how we can help by streamlining policy and procedure. We want to help practitioners use these tools as they would other tools, to ensure good use of taxpayer dollars."

Gustetic said that it was really notable that the toolkit on citizen science and crowdsourcing was itself a crowdsourced project.

"We convened teams to create the toolkit," she explained. "We had developers, UX designers, subject matter experts . . . more than 125 people across more than 20 agencies. I'm very impressed and very proud of how that happened."

Chandra Clarke is a Webby Honoree-winning blogger, a successful entrepreneur, and an author. Her book Be the Change: Saving the World with Citizen Science is available at Amazon. You can connect with her on Twitter @chandraclarke.

Tesla Motors debuted its newest, quirkiest, and most outrageous product yet last night at its factory in Fremont, California. The long-awaited Model X SUV is a 7-seater with exotic “falcon-wing” doors, a pair of electric motors (in the all-wheel-drive P90D edition) that crank out a combined 762 horsepower—making it capable of whipping a Porsche 911 Turbo’s butt at the drag strip any day, incidentally—full hands-off autopilot on highways, and a “bioweapon defense mode”: an air filter that’s ten times larger than average.

Seriously, what is Elon Musk drinking over there? To roll out a production vehicle with the sort of inspired lunacy we saw last night takes some industrial-strength determination, which Musk obviously has to spare. Can you imagine anyone at GM, Ford, BMW—or wherever—insisting with a straight face that they need not only that probably pointless bioweapons feature in case of an apocalypse (granted, it’s at least somewhat tongue-in-cheek) but also the largest curved windshield ever installed in a consumer vehicle, fully automatic front doors that open when you approach and close themselves once you’re inside (only the rear doors open skyward), and enough twist to haul 5,000 pounds worth of Airstream through a zombie wasteland—all in a fully electric SUV with a 250-mile range? Any CEO caught championing any one of those features amid the other requirements of a practical and reasonably affordable car would be shown the door faster than VW honcho Martin Winterkorn.

But here it is, the Model X. The laundry list of superlatives is extraordinary: It’s the first EV that can tow 5K; the quickest-accelerating production SUV by a large margin (0-60 in 3.2 seconds with the “Ludicrous Mode” option); it has the lowest center-of-gravity—and therefore lowest rollover risk—of any SUV, due to its flat-panel battery placement beneath the seats; it’s expected (by Tesla) to be rated as the safest SUV once government crash-testing is complete; and it’s the most aerodynamic SUV ever, with an impressive .24 coefficient of drag.

930 lb-ft of torque will launch you like a rocket from every stoplight.

That’s a lot of really focused engineering, and the performance numbers suggest it will be a crazy ride, with a top speed of 155 mph and 930 lb-ft of torque launching you like a rocket from every stoplight. Drivers will have to exercise serious restraint in order to see the 250 mile range from launch version’s 90kWh battery, but it’s there for them if they need it. Indeed, real-world driving will be revealing—not only of the Model X’s drive and handling characteristics, but also its usability.

The rear falcon doors certainly seem like they’ll ease entry and egress, beyond just looking cool, but how well will the hypersonic sensors intended to prevent contact with obstructions work? I’ll be curious to see how the fairly streamlined seats perform on long road trips, particularly in the middle row. Also, will that panoramic windshield, which arcs elegantly straight up above the front passengers’ heads before meeting the roof, offering a “helicopter-like” view, also offer helicopter-like glare on sunny days? Sure it’s tinted, but not fully. I have an equally tinted moonroof on my own car, and frequently want it just closed to minimize glare. What about privacy? Will that windshield make it like driving a fishbowl down the street? Finally, that autonomous Autopilot mode, which will take over the driving for you on highways, even passing cars with a flick of the turn-signal stalk. How’s that going to actually play out in the real world?

Overall, there’s a lot to admire here, and we’ll unpack the Model X more once we get behind the wheel for a full drive. But there’s also a lot to admire about the will, imagination, and playfulness we’re seeing again and again from Tesla’s creator, Elon Musk. You have to hand it to him, he’s making shit happen. One thing, though: That biodefense mode—exactly how far does Musk think we’re going to get in an electric SUV during the apocalypse? A range of 250 miles is great, but you can’t siphon electricity from other cars as easily as you can gasoline. Better get on those solar-powered Superchargers stat, Elon.