Author: The Conversation

Do-it-yourself (DIY) and at-home labs gained popularity through movies and TV shows like Breaking Bad. DIY labs are increasingly influential and may change lives — the OpenInsulin project, for example, is looking for DIY ways to produce insulin and reduce its price to US$7 from US$300. This impact will likely become even more prevalent in the new post-pandemic normal. Innovation has moved from corporate research and development labs into the private kitchens, bathrooms and basements around the world. Innovators are not big names often affiliated to universities or think tanks, but may be your neighbour. Informal experimentation DIY labs today are not limited…

TikTok, the made-in-China, video-sharing platform beloved by youth and influencers alike, is suddenly everywhere in our new world of COVID-19 lockdowns and social distancing. The platform’s growth has been tremendous, but this has come at a cost: it has come under increasing scrutiny from politicians in the US and allies like Australia over concerns about potential breaches of data security and the platform’s perceived ties to the Chinese government. The Trump administration is now considering banning the platform – and Australia may well follow suit. The controversies surrounding TikTok are centred around its Chinese origins, and its potential connections or compliance with the Chinese Communist Party and…

Red Dead Redemption 2, released in October 2018, spent more than seven years in development (sometimes in controversial working conditions). The sheer scale of the thing is overawing. Depending how you play there’s 80 plus hours of game-play, held together by a 2,000 page script for the main story alone.

Gravity can be a real downer when you are trying to grow organs. That’s why experiments in space are so valuable. They have revealed a new perspective into biological sciences, including insights into making human tissues. Gravity influences cellular behavior by impacting how protein and genes interact inside the cells, creating tissue that is polarized, a fundamental step for natural organ development. Unfortunately, gravity is against us when we try to reproduce complex three dimensional tissues in the lab for medical transplantation. This is difficult because of the intrinsic limitations of bio-reactors used on Earth. I am a stem cell biologist…

In case 2020 wasn’t dystopian enough, hackers on July 15 hijacked the Twitter accounts of former President Barack Obama, presidential hopeful Joe Biden, Elon Musk, Jeff Bezos, Kim Kardashian and Apple, among others. Each hijacked account posted a similar fake message. The high-profile individual or company wanted to philanthropically give back to the community during COVID-19 and would double any donations made to a bitcoin wallet, identical messages said. The donations followed. The hack on the surface may appear to be a run-of-the-mill financial scam. But the breach has chilling implications for democracy. Serious political implications As a scholar of internet governance and…

Users typically encounter videos on health conditions through keyword searches on YouTube. YouTube then provides links to authenticated medical information, such as the top-ranked results. Several of these are produced by reputable health organizations.

On July 14, a new Mars-bound spacecraft launched from Japan. While several Mars missions are planned to launch over the next month, what makes this different is who’s launching it: the United Arab Emirates. Though new to space exploration, the UAE has set high goals for the probe, named Hope. The mission aims to further study the climate of Mars, but Omran Sharaf, mission lead, also says, “It’s a means for a bigger goal: to expedite the development in our educational sector, academic sector.” With space exploration usually pursued by actors like the United States, Russia, China, the European Space Agency and…

Millions of working parents have spent months largely trapped in their homes with their children. Many are trying to get their jobs done remotely in the constant presence of their kids, and they are desperate for some peace and quiet.

After a preliminary investigation, Twitter said it believed the incident was “a coordinated social engineering attack by people who successfully targeted some of our employees with access to internal systems and tools”.

The World Health Organisation reported more than 230,000 new COVID-19 cases on Sunday — the world’s largest daily increase during the pandemic. The surge has forced governments in many places across the world to order new lockdowns. This includes Melbourne, which is back in a six-week lockdown after a second wave of new cases exceeded the city’s first peak in late March. But Melbourne’s not the only city to suffer a second wave of the pandemic. Cities including Beijing and Leicester had lifted COVID-19 restrictions, only to re-enforce them when new outbreaks occurred. So how have other cities gone about their second lockdown, and have the…