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astrobiologists, working with oncologists in the US, have suggested that cancer resembles ancient forms of life that flourished between 600 million and 1 billion years ago.

Read more about what this discovery means for cancer research.

The genes that controlled the behaviour of these early multicellular organisms still reside within our own cells, managed by more recent genes that keep them in check.It's when these newer controlling genes fail that the older mechanisms take over, and the cell reverts to its earlier behaviours and grows out of control.

I kicked off a recent episode of the Rationally Speaking podcast on the topic of transhumanism by defining it as “the idea that we should be pursuing science and technology to improve the human condition, modifying our bodies and our minds to make us smarter, healthier, happier, and potentially longer-lived.”

Massimo understandably expressed some skepticism about why there needs to be a transhumanist movement at all, given how incontestable their mission statement seems to be. As he rhetorically asked, “Is transhumanism more than just the idea that we should be using technologies to improve the human condition? Because that seems a pretty uncontroversial point.” Later in the episode, referring to things such as radical life extension and modifications of our minds and genomes, Massimo said, “I don't think these are things that one can necessarily have objections to in principle.”

There are a surprising number of people whose reaction, when they are presented with the possibility of making humanity much healthier, smarter and longer-lived, is not “That would be great,” nor “That would be great, but it's infeasible,” nor even “That would be great, but it's too risky.” Their reaction is, “That would be terrible.”

Research, in any field of science, is not the risk-free business that might easily be supposed from the confident promises of scientific spokesmen or the daily reports of new advances.

Basic research, the attempt to understand the fundamental principles of science, is so risky, in fact, that only the federal government is willing to keep pouring money into it. It is a venture that produces far fewer hits than misses.

Even the pharmaceutical industry, a major beneficiary of biomedical research, does not like to invest too heavily in basic science. Rather, it lets private venture capital support the small biotechnology companies that first try to bring new findings to market, and then buys up the few winners of this harsh winnowing process.

If work by a team of undergraduates at the University of Cambridge pans out, bioluminescent trees could one day be giving our streets this dreamlike look. The students have taken the first step on this road by developing genetic tools that allow bioluminescence traits to be easily transferred into an organism.

Nature is full of glow-in-the-dark critters, but their shine is feeble - far too weak to read by, for example. To boost this light, the team, who were participating in the annual International Genetically Engineered Machines competition (iGEM), modified genetic material from fireflies and the luminescent marine bacterium Vibrio fischeri to boost the production and activity of light-yielding enzymes. They then made further modifications to create genetic components or "BioBricks" that can be inserted into a genome.

So are glowing trees coming soon to a street near you? It's unlikely, says Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, a designer and artist who advised the Cambridge team. "We already have light bulbs," she says. "We're not going to spend our money and time engineering a replacement for something that works very well." However, she adds that "bio-light" has a distinctive allure. "There's something much more visceral about a living light. If you have to feed the light and look after it, then it becomes more precious."

1. Distributed cocreation moves into the mainstreamIn the past few years, the ability to organise communities of Web participants to develop, market, and support products and services has moved from the margins of business practice to the mainstream. Wikipedia and a handful of open-source software developers were the pioneers. But in signs of the steady march forward, 70 per cent of the executives we recently surveyed said that their companies regularly created value through Web communities. Similarly, more than 68m bloggers post reviews and recommendations about products and services.

for every success in tapping communities to create value, there are still many failures. Some companies neglect the up-front research needed to identify potential participants who have the right skill sets and will be motivated to participate over the longer term. Since cocreation is a two-way process, companies must also provide feedback to stimulate continuing participation and commitment. Getting incentives right is important as well: cocreators often value reputation more than money. Finally, an organisation must gain a high level of trust within a Web community to earn the engagement of top participants.

2. Making the network the organisation In earlier research, we noted that the Web was starting to force open the boundaries of organisations, allowing nonemployees to offer their expertise in novel ways. We called this phenomenon "tapping into a world of talent." Now many companies are pushing substantially beyond that starting point, building and managing flexible networks that extend across internal and often even external borders. The recession underscored the value of such flexibility in managing volatility. We believe that the more porous, networked organisations of the future will need to organise work around critical tasks rather than molding it to constraints imposed by corporate structures.

one day he took one of these – finding a mathematical proof about the properties of multidimensional objects – and put his thoughts on his blog. How would other people go about solving this conundrum? Would somebody else have any useful insights? Would mathematicians, notoriously competitive, be prepared to collaborate? "It was an experiment," he admits. "I thought it would be interesting to try."He called it the Polymath Project and it rapidly took on a life of its own. Within days, readers, including high-ranking academics, had chipped in vital pieces of information or new ideas. In just a few weeks, the number of contributors had reached more than 40 and a result was on the horizon. Since then, the joint effort has led to several papers published in journals under the collective pseudonym DHJ Polymath. It was an astonishing and unexpected result.

"If you set out to solve a problem, there's no guarantee you will succeed," says Gowers. "But different people have different aptitudes and they know different tricks… it turned out their combined efforts can be much quicker."

There are many interpretations of what open science means, with different motivations across different disciplines. Some are driven by the backlash against corporate-funded science, with its profit-driven research agenda. Others are internet radicals who take the "information wants to be free" slogan literally. Others want to make important discoveries more likely to happen. But for all their differences, the ambition remains roughly the same: to try and revolutionise the way research is performed by unlocking it and making it more public.

In America, children under 16 can be prescribed hormone 'blockers' to prevent the onset of puberty, with a view to then follow with hormone treatment to become their new gender. This film follows the American experience.

Using incorrect gender terms in such program as Bodyshock feels to me like almost mocking the whole idea of it. It seems disrespectful to those who decided to tell their stories, and to all others who have been born in bodies which do not reflect their actual gender

Bodyshock SHOULD be using the correct terms for thes children - Josie and Kyla should be refurred to as she and her, not he and his. Chris should be reffured to as he. Getting the gender terms wrong on a program about sex changes only reinforces the publics perceptions that it is okay to refure to transsexual people by the gender they were born as, and it's not.

LONDON - Scientific advances including techniques allowing patients to grow new joints inside their own bodies will allow the elderly to remain active well beyond their 100th birthdays, researchers claim. British scientists are working on a system which should allow the elderly to buy body parts "off the shelf" and even regenerate their own damaged joints and hearts. Their ultimate aim is to fix up the body with customised replacement parts grown to order. They have already carried out human trials on heart valves which are still working four years after they were transplanted. At the University of Leeds, Britain's biggest bioengineering unit and the world leader in artificial joint replacement research is coordinating a project that aims to give people 50 active years after the age of 50."It is the rise of the bionic pensioner," said Professor Christina Doyle, whose company is working with the university to develop the new technologies. "The idea is when something wears out, your surgeon can buy a replacement off the shelf or, more accurately, in a bag."The university is spending £50 million ($114 million) over the next five years on the new project. The main thrust of the research centres on a method of tissue and medical engineering which the university is at the forefront of developing. Led by the immunologist Professor Eileen Ingham, they are pioneering a technique of stripping the living cells from donor human and animal parts, leaving just the collagen or elastin "scaffold" of the tissue. These "biological shells", which could be for knee, ankle or hip ligaments, as well as blood vessels and heart valves, are then transplanted into the patient whose own body then invades them replacing the removed cells with their own. The technique, which could be available within five years, effectively removes the need for anti-rejection drugs. It is similar to the recently developed system of using stem cells to regrow organs outside the body, but costs about a tenth of the price.