Chicken Meat ‘Cultured’ from Chicken Cells
November 4th, 2018Via: Engadget:
You may know Just (formerly Hampton Creek) for its vegan cookie dough and mayo, but the company has also been working on cultured meat — real meat that’s made from animal cells rather than taken from an animal itself. While it’s not the only company doing so — there are actually quite a few — it could be the first to get a product on the market. Just CEO Josh Tetrick told Engadget earlier this year that his company would have either a chicken nugget, foie gras or sausage available by the end of 2018, and now it looks like Just is gearing up to release a chicken nugget. A cultured chicken nugget, that is.
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To make cultured chicken, you have to first collect some cells, and that can be done through a small, harmless biopsy from a live chicken, through a cell bank or even from a feather, among other means, Noyes told Munchies. In a video Just posted last year, the company said that when it used the feather method, it chose “the single best chicken that we could find,” — a chicken with clean feathers, a healthy comb and a nice wattle. However, Just’s first product won’t be produced from cells collected from a feather, said Noyes.
Russia Holding Record Amount of Physical Gold
November 4th, 2018Via: Russia Today:
The Central Bank of Russia bought over 92 tons of gold in the three months to the end of September breaking the Soviet peak of 2000 tons in gold reserves seen in 1941, according to a new report by the World Gold Council (WGC).
Russia reportedly purchased more gold than any other country in the world, followed by Turkey, Kazakhstan, and India, which bought 18.5 tons, 13.4 tons and 13.7 tons respectively.
That marks the highest quarterly net purchase since 1993, when the WGC started tracking the country’s data. Russia’s gold stockpile now accounts for 17 percent of the country’s overall foreign exchange reserves.
There’s Something Different About The Gut Microbes of Babies Born at Home
November 4th, 2018Via: ScienceAlert:
Compared to the babies born at home, the findings reveal that hospital-born infants had a lower diversity of gut flora, and this change persisted for the entire month.
“The reasons for the differences between infants born at home versus in hospitals are not known, but we speculate that common hospital interventions like early infant bathing and antibiotic eye prophylaxis or environmental factors – like the aseptic environment of the hospital – may be involved,” says senior author Maria Gloria Dominguez-Bello, a researcher in microbiota function at Rutgers University-New Brunswick.
These results suggest that babies born in hospitals are immediately exposed to less microbes and, therefore, have less diverse microbiomes in the first month of life.
Soros Partners With Mastercard To Hand Out Money To Migrants
November 4th, 2018Via: ZeroHedge:
Billionaire investor George Soros has repeatedly denied rumors that he is helping to finance the migrant caravans making their way up from Honduras and Guatemala through Mexico with the ultimate aim of reaching the US.
But that’s about to change, as the “Open Society” founder – who famously financed much of the opposition to Trump SCOTUS pick Brett Kavanaugh – is now partnering with Mastercard to hand out money (in the form of ‘investment capital’) to migrants, refugees and “others struggling within their communities worldwide,” according to Reuters. Through their partnership, Soros is effectively providing open financial support for migrants and refugees seeking to enter the US and Europe.
Analyst Estimates Bayer Could Have $800 Billion in Future Roundup Liability
November 4th, 2018Via: WakingTimes:
The judge decided to reduce the punitive damage award from the original total of $289 million following a verdict reached earlier this summer, down to $78.5 million. A decision which concerned jurors who decided on the higher award amount in order to send a clear message to Monsanto that they deserve to be punished for covering up the dangers of their herbicide.
The good news is that this ruling affirms the company’s liability for causing illness from their product, and opens the door for more lawsuits and stricter regulation of agrochemicals in the future. Ian Hilliker, an analyst at Jefferies LLC in London, estimated in a note to clients that based on a class action lawsuit involving 8,700 plaintiffs believed to have cancer as a result of glyphosate exposure, Monsanto’s liability could reach $800 billion dollars. To put this in perspective, the original Bayer-Monsanto buyout offer was $57 billion dollars. Clearly, this no longer looks like an “asset” to Bayer and its stockholders.
GM Electric Bicycles Unveiled
November 2nd, 2018Tesla might also do an electric bike.
Via: Electrek:
Today is a big day for car companies jumping on the electric bicycle bandwagon. First Elon Musk dropped a bombshell saying Tesla might build an electric bike, and now GM electric bicycles are on the horizon too.
GM gave a surprise announcement this morning where they revealed not one but two new electric bicycles.
The US’ largest vehicle manufacturer apparently wants in on the electric bicycle game.
According to the Director of General Motors Urban Mobility Solutions, Hannah Parish:
“As an avid cyclist and urban commuter, I know how great it feels to get where I’m going easily and to show up sweat-free. We blended electrification engineering know-how, design talents and automotive-grade testing with great minds from the bike industry to create our e-bikes.”
The bikes and motors were developed in-house by GM’s electric vehicle team, including some of the engineers responsible for the Chevy Bolt.
Chinese-Style ‘Digital Authoritarianism’ Grows Globally
November 2nd, 2018Via: AFP:
Governments worldwide are stepping up use of online tools, in many cases inspired by China’s model, to suppress dissent and tighten their grip on power, a human rights watchdog study found Thursday.
The annual Freedom House study of 65 countries found global internet freedom declined for the eighth consecutive year in 2018, amid a rise in what the group called “digital authoritarianism.”
Migrant Caravan: Trump Suggests Immigrants Could be Shot if They Throw Rocks at Military
November 2nd, 2018Update: Trump Backtracks on Suggestion U.S. Troops Could Fire on Migrants
The U.S. could choose from a vast arsenal of nonlethal weaponry (including sonic and directed energy weapons) to use in this situation if necessary. I didn’t understand Trump’s decision to escalate to a lethal response right away.
In any event…
Via: Reuters:
President Donald Trump on Friday backtracked from his suggestion a day earlier that American troops sent to the U.S. border with Mexico would be free to fire on migrants who throw rocks at them, saying that rock-throwers would only be arrested.
“They won’t have to fire. What I don’t want is I don’t want these people throwing rocks,” Trump told reporters outside the White House. “If they do that with us, they’re going to be arrested for a long time.”
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Via: USA Today:
President Donald Trump said members of the U.S. military sent to the southern border to keep out thousands in a migrant caravan would “fight back” if immigrants throw stones and suggested soldiers might open fire on the group because there’s “not much difference” between a rock or gun.
In an address from the White House Thursday, just days before the midterm elections, Trump announced his administration was preparing to change the country’s asylum practices and took on the thousands of migrants fleeing the dangers in Central America and heading toward the U.S. in hopes of claiming asylum.
He pointed to reports of a clash between authorities and the caravan as they moved across the Guatemalan border to Mexico. Mexico authorities said migrants attacked its agents with rocks, glass bottles and fireworks when they broke through a gate on the Mexican end but were pushed back, according to the Associated Press. It’s unclear whether any Mexican authorities were injured but Guatemalan officers were hurt.
Trump said the U.S. military wouldn’t accept bottles or stones being thrown at them.
“They want to throw rocks at our military, our military fights back,” the president told reporters. “I told them to consider it a rifle. When they throw rocks like what they did to the Mexican military and police I say consider it a rifle.”
Japan Moving to Allow Foreign Blue-Collar Workers
November 1st, 2018I guess the nappy changing robots weren’t going to come fast enough.
Via: Reuters:
Prime Minister Shinzo Abe’s cabinet approved draft legislation on Friday to open the door to more overseas blue-collar workers in sectors grappling with labor shortages, a controversial policy shift in immigration-shy Japan.
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Immigration has long been taboo as many Japanese prize ethnic homogeneity, but the reality of an ageing, shrinking population is challenging such views.
Despite misgivings in Abe’s Liberal Democratic Party (LDP), parliament is likely to adopt the revisions in the face of intense pressure from businesses battling the tightest labor market in decades, although opposition parties could delay.
New Migrant Caravan Departs El Salvador for U.S.
October 31st, 2018Via: Reuters:
About 2,000 migrants set off on foot from El Salvador’s capital on Wednesday, the latest of several groups of Central Americans heading to the United States, even as U.S. President Donald Trump increased pressure to halt their flow.
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Mexico’s Interior Minister Alfonso Navarrete on Wednesday put the size of the first caravan at 2,800 to 3,000, below the government’s previous estimate of about 3,500. Participants in the caravan have put the number significantly higher.
Dozens of the men, women and children in that caravan told Reuters they were abandoning their homelands to seek asylum from a mixture of poverty, violence and corruption.
“We’re now in an unprecedented situation in the country,” Navarrete told reporters in Mexico City. “This is not merely a caravan … it’s a migratory exodus.”
Related: 15,000 troops Could be Sent to U.S. Border
