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Recommended Reading: The Black Panther returns
The Return of the Black Panther Ta-Nehisi Coates, The Atlantic Ta-Nehisi Coates is one of the most important voices of our time, and he went to work on a new Black Panther series of comic books for Marvel. Coates previews the first issue in the series of 11 chronicling adventures of what was the first black superhero portrayed in US mainstream comics when it debuted in the 1960s. Details on the making of the new comics alongside a collection of panels for the first issue make this piece a must-read.
Mini bioreactor makes life-saving drugs in the field
Paramedics and field medics can patch up some wounds on the spot, but they're usually stuck if they have to administer specialized drugs. What if you need medicine that health care workers don't have on hand? You might not have to rush back to the hospital in the future. Researchers have created tiny, microfluidic bioreactors that generate the proteins you need for medicine. At its heart are two very long (16 feet) channels wound into an extremely tight pattern, and divided by a customized, porous membrane -- one channel feeds chemicals, while the other hosts the reactions that produce your drug. You only have to shake the device to send protein from one side to the other and get the medicine you need.
Microsoft takes on the US government over data held overseas
Do you think that America's law enforcement agencies should have free access to the emails of your friends over in Ireland? It's the question that an appeals court is being asked to consider in a matter that has serious consequences for everyone in the world. The issue began when drug enforcement officials wanted to access to messages that were stored on a Microsoft server in Dublin. As far as Microsoft was concerned, that was a matter for the Irish government, but the g-people tried to hold the company's US arm accountable. Disturbingly, the US won the first two legal challenges, and now New York's 2nd circuit is about to hear to the appeal on behalf of Microsoft, with some cheering on from the rest of the technology industry.
Reddit rolls over to please Russia's authorities
Remember the tale of how Reddit managed to get itself banned in Russia because of a thread that promoted the growing of psychedelic mushrooms? A few days later and the site has returned, mostly because it rolled over and locally blocked the offending content to please the country's internet regulator, Roskomnadzor. The move has attracted criticism from the user who posted the piece originally, saying that the site shouldn't give in to the demands. The plea fell on deaf ears over at Reddit HQ, however, since the company is still suffering through an existential crisis about what forms of speech it will and won't allow.
FDA demands Kim Kardashian remove Instagram pill ad
The FDA sent Kim Kardashian a warning letter last week, demanding that she remove an Instagram post in which she endorsed a bottle of Diclegis morning sickness pills but failed to mention any of the potential side effects associated with the product. Kardashian is a paid promoter of the product, which is made by Duchesnay USA. Her post "misleadingly fails to provide material information about the consequences that may result from the use of the drug and suggests that it is safer than has been demonstrated," according to the FDA.
Russia bans all of Reddit over a single 'shroom thread
Russia's censoring spree continued on Wednesday when the government's internet agency, the Roskomnadzor, banned the entire Reddit website from Russian access -- all because of a single thread that discussed how to grow psilocybin (aka "magic") mushrooms titled, "Minimal and Reliable Methods for Growing Psilocybe". According to reports from Meduza, the ban came at the behest of Russia's Federal Drug Control Service, which felt that the content promoted discussion of these substances. The government had first sought to ban just the individual threads it found objectionable but, because Reddit uses HTTPS, the only way to eliminate of those threads was to nuke the entire site from orbit (it's the only way to make sure).
Electronic Sports League bans the same drugs as the Olympics
Sorry, everybody, but you can't get high and play Counter-Strike anymore, at least not in the Electronic Sports League. The fledgling pro gaming league announced on Reddit Wednesday that it is adopting the World Anti-Doping Agency's list of banned substances for its players. The league had announced it would ban performance enhancing drugs from competition after a team revealed that its members had consumed Adderall prior to a match in March to enhance their ability to focus.
Key Silk Road witness gets 2.5 years in jail
One of the reasons that Silk Road was so popular and dangerous was because it enabled people who would have otherwise never dealt drugs to become Scarface-like kingpins. That's the tale of Michael Duch, an IT consultant who has wound up being sentenced to two and a half years in prison for dealing heroin. Duch agreed to testify against the site's founder, Russ "Dread Pirate Roberts" Ulbricht in exchange for a lower sentence, and told the court how easy it was to make anything up to $70,000 a month from home.
Tiny brain implant delivers drugs with a remote control
An implant, the size of a human hair, can deliver drugs to the brain with the click of a button. A team of researchers from Washington University in St. Louis and the University of Illinois have demonstrated the wireless technology in mice. While a previous iteration of the device delivered LED to neurons that respond to light, the latest experiment successfully introduced pharmacological agents directly to the brain. A drug was first sent to one side of the brain that made a mouse move around in a circle. Next, shining a light onto cells that cue the release of dopamine rewarded the mice with happy feelings. When the rodents came around for more, the researchers used a remote control to interject with a drug that put a halt on the dopamine effect.
Top 'Counter-Strike' player admits eSports has a doping problem
Performance-enhancing drugs are nothing new to sports. When your physical abilities are the difference between victory and defeat, many athletes turn to banned substances to gain a crucial advantage. Now, it seems, the same practice is bleeding into eSports too. A top Counter-Strike: Global Offensive player has admitted that everyone in his former team, Cloud 9, were taking the psychostimulant Adderall during a professional tournament. In a video interview, Kory "Semphis" Friesen said: "The ESL (Electronic Sports League) comms were kinda funny in my opinion -- I don't even care, we were all on Adderall."
Scientists close to brewing morphine (or heroin) from sugar
Sugar is basically ubiquitous and it looks like it could be used to make morphine, which is a refined form of heroin. Recent research shows that a genetically modified strain of yeast, when exposed to sugar, could be used to ferment the opioid. Yes, essentially, you could homebrew your own scag. I know what you're thinking: "This sounds like madness." But there's some proof behind it. Researchers from the University of California Berkeley and Concordia University in Canada presented an almost complete means to turn glucose to morphine, while scientists from the University of Calgary supplied the missing piece that completes the process. The idea wasn't to flood the streets with home-made heroin. No, the plan is much more noble than that: to produce "cheaper, less addictive, safer and more-effective" painkillers, according to Nature.
Fingerprints will soon tell cops if suspects are on cocaine
A research team from the University of Surrey in the UK has reportedly developed a new, noninvasive drug test for cocaine that accurately detects its presence in your system through your fingerprints. Specifically, it looks for two common cocaine metabolites: benzoylecgonine and methylecgonine. These can be found in blood, sweat, and urine using a mass spectrometry technique known as Desorption Electrospray Ionisation (DESI). And since the metabolites dissipate from our sweat more quickly than in urine or blood (in which it can persist for up to a week), law enforcement will one day be able tell if a suspect is currently high as opposed to having been high a few nights before. What's more, "we can distinguish between cocaine having been touched," Melanie Bailey, the study's lead author, told Motherboard, "and cocaine having been ingested." Plus since the sweat sample is tied to your fingerprint, it'll be nearly impossible for someone to swap it out for a clean batch.
DEA approves MDMA study for the terminally ill
MDMA is widely used both on and off festival grounds. But the drug is quietly making a comeback as a therapeutic aid. Last week, the DEA approved a clinical trial that will use a combination of the psychedelic drug and psychotherapy to treat anxiety associated with terminal illnesses. Multidisciplinary Association for Psychedelic Studies (MAPS) has initiated the study as part of their on-going efforts to validate the effectiveness of MDMA in a scientific setting. This isn't the first time it's been used to assist psychotherapy. But if the study is successful, it will introduce a new use for the drug.
23andMe plans to use your genetic data to create new drugs
For over a year now, 23andMe has been stuck in a regulatory quagmire with the US Food and Drug Administration (FDA). Although it's still able to sell its personal DNA kits, the company is effectively banned from offering health-related genetic tests in the US. A few weeks ago it was given the go-ahead for a single check, a rare disorder called Bloom syndrome, but it's only a small step towards the broader health reports it provided before. While it waits for wider FDA approval, 23andMe has decided to enter the drugs market. The company already works with major pharmaceutical firms including Pfizer and Genentech, but now it's prepared to go it alone. The startup has accrued a vast amount of health-related information from its users, so there's an obvious opportunity to apply that database to the field of medicine. Instead of just looking for health-related ailments, and offering users the results, 23andMe wants to go one step further and develop the cures too.
Eve the robot scientist discovers new drug candidate for malaria
Meet Eve: she's darn smart, can make the process of finding new drugs a lot faster and cheaper -- and she costs around $1 million. That's because Eve is a robotic scientist developed by researchers from the Universities of Aberystwyth and Cambridge, the same team who created her predecessor (you guessed it) Adam back in 2009. Since Eve was created specifically to automate the early stages of drug design, she's capable of scanning over 10,000 compounds a day, whereas humans obviously wouldn't be able to process as many in the same timeframe. As Professor Ross King from the University of Manchester (which Eve calls home) said: "Every industry now benefits from automation and science is no exception. Bringing in machine learning to make this process intelligent -- rather than just a 'brute force' approach -- could greatly speed up scientific progress and potentially reap huge rewards."
Daily Roundup: Apple Watch battery life, Russian combat bots and more!
One of the biggest complaints about smartwatches is their mediocre battery life. It sounds like the Apple Watch will be no different. In other news, internet activist Barrett Brown was sent to prison for five years and Russia showed off some "combat robots" that still have a lot to prove, fortunately. Catch up on today's top stories after the break.
FedEx charged with transporting drugs for illegal online pharmacies
Live animals. Hazardous waste. Used tires. Cash. These are all items that you can't ship via FedEx. Medication is accepted, however, as it poses no risk to the carrier -- or so it seemed. Today, FedEx was indicted in a US District Court, facing criminal charges for its role in providing logistics for illegal online pharmacies. Various US agencies have reportedly been warning FedEx to stop accepting such shipments for years, so as shocking as the charges may seem, they should come as no surprise to executives. If guilty, FedEx would have to hand over the $820 million or so it's earned by transporting drugs such as oxycodone and hydrocodone for black market distributers.
NY medical marijuana law could mean big bucks for vaporizer makers
New York is against second-hand smoke of any kind; even beneficiaries of the state's new medical marijuana law will need to avoid lighting up. Government restrictions do allow vaporizers, however, which got their (legal) start with tobacco and are about to become big business in NY. The handheld devices will play a key role in the treatment of medical marijuana recipients, who will be permitted to inhale the drug through vaporizers, but not by using cigarette paper and a lighter. You'll also be able to consume marijuana in food or through a concentrated liquid called a tincture, but there's no question that vaporizers will become more prolific as more New Yorkers get their hands on closely regulated prescriptions in the days and months to come.
Teeter toward death in existentially clever One Way Trip
One Way Trip demonstrates that if there's anything more terrifying than impending mortality, it's spending your final days in the sort of hallucinatory haze that would make Tim Leary posthumously jealous. One Way Trip, announced for PlayStation 4 and Vita, centers on a protagonist who has been part of a mass poisoning. Not only does this mystery poison kill people after only six hours, those inflicted spend their remaining moments hallucinating. Not just your pleasant colorful waves, or warm sensations of being one with the universe, but more worrying side effects, like watching as your character's arm transforms into a dolphin.
Study claims that virtual drug dealing cuts back on real violence
Few would say the FBI was doing something wrong by shutting down Silk Road's online black market, but new research suggests that there may have been a silver lining to the service's dark cloud. Researchers Judith Aldridge and David Decary-Hetu claim in a recent study that Silk Road was cutting back on violence. Since many of the sales were dealer-to-dealer rather than to customers, that supposedly reduced the chances for real-world confrontations -- you can't start a gun battle over prices when you're on the other side of the country.
