knowablemagazine.org How cancer cells travel to new tissues and take hold
Understanding these astonishing migrations through the human body, known as metastases, could suggest novel treatments
In fairy tales, I think.
Welp. I'm happy to hear not every country is as big of a piece of shit as mine.
Ew. We don't want him.
Back in 2014, a woman with advanced cancer pushed Adrienne Boire’s scientific life in a whole new direction. The cancer, which had begun in the breast, had found its way into the patient’s spinal fluid, rendering the middle-aged mother of two unable to walk. “When did this happen?” she asked from her hospital bed. “Why are the cells growing there?”
Why, indeed. Why would cancer cells migrate to the spinal fluid, far from where they’d been birthed, and how did they manage to thrive in a liquid so strikingly poor in nutrients?
Boire, a physician-scientist at Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center in New York, decided that those questions deserved answers.
knowablemagazine.org How stress shapes cancer’s course
Studies show psychological strain can accelerate tumors — could beta blockers slow them down?
"Studies show psychological strain can accelerate tumors — could beta blockers slow them down?"
just an interesting read on correlation of stress and illness
Cats (or dogs or whatever pet), a weekly therapist, and lexapro are my coping mechanism. (edit: and a lot less IG/tiktok ect)
Meltdown of trust in weakly governed economies
Abstract
A well-functioning society requires well-functioning institutions that ensure prosperity, fair distribution of wealth, social participation, security, and informative media. Such institutions are built on a foundation of trust. However, while trust is essential for economic success and good governance, interconnected mechanisms inherent in weakly governed market economies tend to undermine the very trust on which such success depends. These mechanisms include the intrinsic tendency for inequality to grow, media to boost perceived unfairness, and self-interest to gain rewards at the expense of others. These mechanisms, if left unchecked, allow wealth concentration to result in state capture where institutions facilitate further wealth concentration instead of the promoting the common good. As a result, people may become alienated and untrusting of fellow citizens and of institutions. Several democracies now experience such dynamics, the United States being a prime example. W
This shit needs to be punishable with jail time. Data breaches would happen a lot less when leadership knows their asses are on the line with not keeping tech updated.
Female sex hormones exacerbate retinal neurodegeneration
Abstract
Neurodegenerative disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease and macular degeneration represent major sources of human suffering, yet factors influencing disease severity remain poorly understood. Sex has been implicated as one modifying factor. Here, we show that female sex is a risk factor for worsened outcomes in a model of retinal degeneration and that this susceptibility is caused by the presence of female-specific sex hormones. The adverse effect of female sex hormones was specific to diseased retinal neurons, and depletion of these hormones ameliorated this phenotypic effect, while reintroduction worsened rates of disease in females. Transcriptional analysis of retinas showed significant differences between genes involved in pyroptosis, inflammatory responses, and endoplasmic reticulum stress–induced apoptosis between males and females with retinal degeneration. These findings provide crucial insights into the pathogenesis of neurodegenerative diseases and how sex hormone
He needs a gofundme
www.aa.com.tr Suspect charged with federal arson in attack at Tesla dealership in US state of New Mexico
Jamison Wagner also accused of setting Republican Party headquarters on fire in arson spree - Anadolu Ajansı
HOUSTON, United States
Federal charges have been filed against a New Mexico man accused of going on an arson spree in that state which destroyed a Tesla dealership and the Republican Party headquarters.
Jamison Wagner, 40, is accused of setting ablaze a Tesla showroom in Albuquerque and the Republican Party of New Mexico (RPNM) headquarters in February and March.
Wagner was arrested April 12 after investigators linked surveillance footage of both locations to him, with his white Hyundai vehicle being identified at the scenes. They confiscated evidence from his home, including materials for homemade incendiary devices using glass containers and flammable liquid which were used to ignite the fires.
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Sorry for the double post. My VPN is a cunt.
Imagine being so enslaved that all your high earnings goes to some asshole aristocratic dictator and you have no fucking say at all. Just slave your ass away. Feels like a lot of the world is heading this direction.
cyberscoop.com The North Korea worker problem is bigger than you think
The yearslong scheme goes much deeper than contract work, extending to roles beyond traditional IT and sometimes granting the insider threat “keys to the kingdom,” DTEX President Mohan Koo said.
Financially motivated by salaries now, but what’s next?
For now, North Korean technical workers are focused on attaining employment, doing those jobs, and sending the money they earn back to Pyongyang.
North Korean technical workers generate hundreds of millions of dollars for the North Korean regime, according to Unit 42.
A respectable a responsible thing to do.
therecord.media Lab provider for Planned Parenthood discloses breach affecting 1.6 million people
The breach affecting Laboratory Services Cooperative involves sensitive information about medical care, as well as bank account details.
"A lab company providing services to some Planned Parenthood centers disclosed a data breach on Friday impacting about 1.6 million people.
Laboratory Services Cooperative (LSC) said it initially discovered the cyberattack on October 27 and began an investigation that was completed in February.
The stolen data includes medical information like dates of service, diagnosis, treatments, lab results, treatment locations and the details of the care provided alongside personal information like health insurance numbers, bank account details, payment cards, Social Security numbers, IDs and more. "
The controlled opposition doing its job
I'm really looking forward to stories where ice are getting shot
Oooo good tip
Beheadings of wealthy need to become the norm
Is Southwest basically the Walmart of airlines?
I didn't?
Copilot and Gemini are the worst for AI imo. Microsoft's AI is antisemitic af (in terms of being nothing but zionist regurgitating trash) and it just up and decides to stop talking to you for no reason. Unreliable and racist LLM. And then Gemini I hear isn't any better. Not that any are great but bottom of the barrel def goes to Microsoft.
edit: Hmm I see .zip is all for predatory AI. Thanks for the downvotes.
What if you don't have the app and just use it through your browser? Same shit probably.
Name every border fuck by given and sur name. We need to track these assholes and their families so they don't get to slip away from history.
The sole goal of the republican party and its voters is to kill anyone and anything in their way of power.
Hatefulness
Do monthly reoccurring donations for them!
‘The Great Educator, Sadly, Is Going to Be These Viruses’: CounterSpin interview with Paul Offit on RFK Jr. and measles
fair.org ‘The Great Educator, Sadly, Is Going to Be These Viruses’: CounterSpin interview with Paul Offit on RFK Jr. and measles
"We've eliminated the memory of measles. I think people don't remember how sick that virus can make you."
Janine Jackson: Trump-appointed Health and Human Services Secretary Robert F. Kennedy is colorful, which is a problem when someone is a public hazard. Because now that Kennedy is in a position of power, we need journalists to move past anecdote to ideas—ideas that are informing actions that shape not just his reputation, but all of our lives.
Our guest suggests we could begin with a core false notion that lies in back of much of Kennedy’s program.
Paul Offit is director of the Vaccine Education Center, and professor of pediatrics in the Division of Infectious Diseases at Children’s Hospital of Philadelphia. He joins us now by phone from Philly. Welcome to CounterSpin, Paul Offit.
Paul Offit: Thank you.
JJ: The context for our conversation is the first measles death in the US in a decade, in Texas, where we understand they have reported, and this news is fresh, some 400 cases of measles, just between January and March, while the national number for 2024 was 285. This is a trage
www.newscientist.com Cannibal spiders have strange trick to stop their siblings eating them
A spider species eat their siblings as soon as they die but tolerate each other when they are alive, suggesting a mysterious signal helps them to determine when to dine on a nest mate
A spider species eat their siblings as soon as they die but tolerate each other when they are alive, suggesting a mysterious signal helps them to determine when to dine on a nest mate
www.theguardian.com FDA to suspend quality-control program for food testing due to staff cuts
The FDA labs that test food to prevent illness have been affected by wider health and human services staff cuts
The Food and Drug Administration (FDA) is suspending a quality-control program for its food-testing laboratories as a result of staff cuts at the Department of Health and Human Services (HHS), according to an internal email seen by Reuters.
The proficiency testing program of the FDA’s Food Emergency Response Network is designed to ensure consistency and accuracy across the agency’s network of about 170 labs that test food for pathogens and contaminants to prevent food-borne illness.
The firing and departure of as many as 20,000 HHS employees has upended public health research and disrupted the agency’s work on areas like bird flu and drug reviews. Donald Trump hopes to slash as much as $40bn from HHS.
Locked
www.semafor.com Trump officials sought to stiffen president’s spine against Meta
A firebrand outside ally joined the FTC chairman and assistant attorney general for a high-stakes Oval Office meeting.
Last Tuesday afternoon, just six days after Mark Zuckerberg’s third meeting with Donald Trump this year, the Meta CEO’s key antagonists in the federal government arrived in the Oval Office.
The visitors were Andrew Ferguson, the chairman of the Federal Trade Commission, which is suing Meta in a trial that begins today; and Gail Slater, the assistant attorney general who is responsible for the Justice Department’s anti-trust enforcement.
Ferguson and Slater were there, a person familiar with the meeting said, to stiffen Trump’s spine against a relentless wave of lobbying from Meta. The social media giant has pushed the president to settle a lawsuit that began in his first term, and continued through the Biden years, which seeks to force the company to divest Instagram and Whatsapp. (The FTC is an independent agency, but both Meta and many of its foes have prepared for Trump to shape the handling of the lawsuit.)
rollcall.com Rep. Josh Harder on why Democrats should be angrier at the status quo - Roll Call
“We need to think about the root causes of why people are so frustrated by their government,” the California Democrat says.
summary:
"Democratic Rep. Josh Harder argues that Democrats must become the party most angry at the status quo to regain voter trust and electoral success. He emphasizes that the party currently faces a serious disconnect with many voters, who see Democrats as elitist and out of touch with everyday concerns. Harder criticizes the influence of far-left groups within the party, which push extreme positions such as decriminalizing border crossings and Medicare for All, that are unpopular even among the groups they claim to represent. He warns that candidates who align too closely with these far-left demands risk alienating moderate and swing voters, which contributed to Vice President Kamala Harris's poor performance in the 2024 election. Harder calls for Democrats to abandon these extreme pledges, reconnect with pragmatic voters, and focus on policies that can win broad support rather than ideological purity. He stresses the need for boldness and a break from outdated practices to rebu
www.hrw.org Why We Need a ‘Human Rights Economy’
Several human rights groups have collaborated on a working paper which details how governments should set human rights as guideposts against which economic policies can be assessed
Since 2020, the five richest men in the world have doubled their fortunes while almost five billion people have become poorer. A growing sense of economic injustice and insecurity is contributing to the rise of authoritarian movements around the world. Meanwhile, the world is set to blast past global heating targets. But this is not inevitable. What if, instead, economic decisions were made with people and the planet at the center?
This is the idea behind the concept of a human rights economy, which means putting rights at the heart of economic policymaking. The concept draws from the work of human rights scholars and organizations around the world, while supporting transformative economic approaches emerging from other movements, including climate justice, gender justice, and decolonization.
www.contemporaryobgyn.net US maternal mortality rates surge 28% from 2018 to 2022
A new study reveals a sharp rise in preventable pregnancy-related deaths across the United States, with significant racial, age, and state-level disparities.
An increase in pregnancy-related deaths has been observed in the United States between 2018 and 2022, according to a recent study published in JAMA Network Open.
In 2015, the US maternal mortality rate was 26.4 per 100,000 live births, but Maternal Mortality Review Committees have reported that over 80% of deaths caused by pregnancy are preventable. These mortalities often occur with significant disparities, including a 2- to 3-fold increase in maternal mortality prevalence among non-Hispanic Black patients vs White patients.
“Given the increasing median age at childbirth and the decreasing number of live births observed annually, a more detailed characterization of the current US pregnancy-related death rates with age-standardized estimates would help guide tailored interventions necessary to reduce avoidable pregnancy-related deaths,” wrote investigators.
www.contemporaryobgyn.net Mitchell Creinin, MD, reports estetrol pill eases menstrual symptoms
A phase 3 analysis shows that estetrol with drospirenone significantly reduces menstrual pain, mood swings, and other menstrual symptoms, offering clear benefits for both new and switching contraceptive users.
A phase 3 analysis shows that estetrol with drospirenone significantly reduces menstrual pain, mood swings, and other menstrual symptoms, offering clear benefits for both new and switching contraceptive users.
www.scmp.com Microsoft shutters AI lab in Shanghai, continuing China retreat
The IoT & AI Insider Lab in the Zhangjiang hi-tech zone likely closed in January or February, nearby workers say.
Microsoft has closed its IoT & AI Insider Lab in Shanghai’s Zhangjiang hi-tech zone, marking the latest sign of the US tech giant’s retreat from China amid rising geopolitical tensions.
The Shanghai lab, meant to help with domestic development of the Internet of Things (IoT) and artificial intelligence (AI) technologies, closed earlier this year, according to people who work in the Zhangjiang AI Island area.
The lab was dark and unoccupied during a recent visit by the South China Morning Post, with the logo removed and office equipment cleared out.
The area houses the offices of several Big Tech firms, including German chipmaker Infineon Technologies and Chinese internet search giant Baidu.
www.scmp.com Flying taxis: China clears way for first companies to begin offering services
Chinese regulators have for the first time granted companies approval to operate autonomous passenger drones.
China has taken a major step towards creating a commercial flying taxi industry, after regulators granted the country’s first-ever approvals for two companies to operate autonomous passenger drones.
The two companies – Nasdaq-listed EHang Holdings and Hefei Hey Airlines – obtained air operator certificates from the Civil Aviation Administration of China (CAAC) on Saturday, according to state-run news agency Xinhua. The move means that both companies are cleared to use unmanned aerial vehicles to offer commercial passenger services, including urban sightseeing tours.
The air operator certificate was the final regulatory hurdle both companies’ passenger drones needed to clear before being put into operation, given that they had already obtained the type certificate, production certificate and airworthiness certificate, according to a report by Citic Securities.
“We reckon that low-altitude tourism will be the beginning of this new business,” the report st
www.scmp.com US sanctions Hong Kong police chief, 5 others, for ‘freedoms’ abuse
Raymond Siu Chak-yee, who retires on Tuesday, is among officials alleged to undercut Hongkongers’ rights or commit transnational repression.
The US imposed sanctions on Hong Kong’s departing police chief and five other officials on Monday, saying they had undermined the semi-autonomous city’s “protected rights and freedoms”, and warned of additional visa restrictions for Chinese officials blocking “reciprocal access” to Tibet.
The sanctions against Hong Kong Police Commissioner Raymond Siu Chak-yee and other high-ranking officials announced on Monday will freeze any assets they have in the US and restrict any financial transactions with them under US law. The sanctions were imposed on Chiu a day before he retires on Tuesday.
Citing an executive order signed by President Donald Trump during his first term, US Secretary of State Marco Rubio said the move showed “the Trump administration’s commitment to hold to account those responsible for depriving people in Hong Kong of protected rights and freedoms or who commit acts of transnational repression on US soil”.
asia.nikkei.com Tokyo Gas to buy Texas shale stake from Chevron
Deal expected in April as Japanese utility turns to natural gas trading
https://archive.ph/XkENe#selection-2745.0-2767.217
TOKYO -- Tokyo Gas has decided to acquire part of a shale gas development in Texas from U.S. oil major Chevron, Nikkei has learned, as the Japanese energy company looks to expand profit through trading. The deal, estimated at tens of billions of yen (10 billion yen equals $66.6 million), is expected as early as April. Tokyo Gas will use the natural gas it extracts from the development to trade on the market, as well as supply the fuel to power plants and other customers. Because natural gas produces about half the carbon dioxide at fossil fuel plants compared with coal, Tokyo Gas anticipates that demand will continue to rise. The enthusiasm for shale gas expressed by U.S. President Donald Trump also was a factor. At the end of 2023, Tokyo Gas bought Rockcliff Energy, a Texas-based shale gas developer, for around 400 billion yen. The Japanese utility will acquire a new interest close to Rockcliff and reduce the costs of laying pipe
www.scmp.com OpenAI to build open AI model amid competition from Meta and DeepSeek
Announcement marks a strategic shift by OpenAI, which until now has been a fierce defender of closed, proprietary models.
Artificial intelligence powerhouse OpenAI, the creator of ChatGPT, on Monday announced it is building a more open generative AI model as it faces growing competition in the open-source space from Chinese rival DeepSeek and Meta.
The announcement marks a strategic shift by OpenAI, which until now has been a fierce defender of closed, proprietary models that do not allow developers to modify the basic technology to make AI more adapted to their goals.
OpenAI and defenders of closed models - which include Google - have often decried open models as more risky and vulnerable to nefarious uses by bad actors or foreign adversaries.
OpenAI’s embrace of closed models has also been a bone of contention in its battles with former investor Elon Musk, the world’s wealthiest person, who has called on OpenAI to honour the spirit of the company’s name and “return to the open-source, safety-focused force for good it once was”.
Putting pressure on OpenAI, many large companies and governments ha