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SCIENCE UPDATE
US scientists create bacteria-eating virus
US researchers said they have created an artificial bacteria-eating virus — in just 14 days and from synthetic genes.
The Phi-X174 bacteriophage was developed from its genetic code. It took the scientists just 14 days to make the artificial virus — against several years for other methods — according to the National Academy of Sciences.
The breakthrough could be the first step on a long path toward helping fight certain incurable diseases or gobbling up toxic waste, according to the experts. It could also help create organisms that can live in extreme conditions such as radioactivity and intense pollution.
The work was led by Craig Venter, the head of the Institute for Biological Energy Alternatives (IBEA), who has also been closely involved in work on mapping the human genome sequence.
Scientists had previously built a poliovirus from parts of other living things in stages that can take months or years. However, Venter’s team began “from scratch” — using commercially available products.
They also used off-the-shelf techniques that scientists have been developing for 30 years.
In order to achieve such rapid results, scientists adapted a technique that produces a double-stranded copy of an individual gene sequence. The technique is used to decode DNA for forensic identification of criminals as well as for medical purposes.
This polymerase chain reaction technique took 14 days to create an identical DNA of the virus.
The virus is not capable of attacking human cells, scientists were quick to point out.
“The potential for this research to revolutionize our future is enormous,” US Secretary of Energy Spencer Abraham said in a statement.
“Researchers have made an exciting scientific advance that may speed our ability to develop biology-based solutions for some of our most pressing energy and environmental challenges.
“With this advance it is easier to imagine — in the not-too-distant future — a colony of specially designed microbes living within the emission-control system of a coal-fired plant, consuming its pollution and its carbon dioxide, or employing microbes to radically reduce water pollution or to reduce the toxic effects of radioactive waste,” he said.
The Department of Energy said it backed Venter’s team with three million dollars. The department gave another nine million dollars in April.
The IBEA is based in Rockville, Maryland, just outside Washington. Venter founded IBEA and is its president. It began the virus project in 2002.
After working on mapping the human genome, Venter said his next aim was to create a new form of synthetic life.
His goal is to develop a synthetic genome that is the first step toward the creation of efficient and profitable biological sources of energy, according to Venter, who formerly headed the Celera Genomics research firm, also in Rockville.
A closer look at Jupiter
Nasa released a new close-up portrait of Jupiter, calling it the most detailed color picture ever taken of the giant planet, photographed by a space probe six million miles (10 million kilometres) away.
“The imaging team wanted very much to take the ultimate picture of Jupiter. The one that would show Jupiter in all its intricate and glorious complexity, the one that would really knock your socks off,” said Carolyn Porco, the imaging team leader at the Space Science Institute in Boulder, Colorado.
The picture is actually a mosaic of 27 different images, taken from nine different positions and in three colors by the Cassini spacecraft on December 29, 2000, NASA said in a statement.
The National Aeronautics and Space Administration edited the pictures into one global image that captured details as small as 60 kilometers (35 miles) wide.
Solar flare ‘reproduced’ in lab
Scientists have simulated a solar flare in the lab, recreating the super-heated cloud of electrically-charged gas seen on the Sun known as a plasma.
It was part of an initiative to develop fusion power — the nuclear energy that keeps the Sun shining.
The plasma in the lab behaved like a miniature version of a solar flare.
Scientists hope they can create a flare at low energies in the lab, to enable them to study the explosive events that take place on the Sun’s surface.
The work was carried out at the Culham Science Centre near Oxford, by scientists working on the Mega Amp Spherical Tokomak (Mast) project.
A tokomak is a magnetic bottle designed to confine a plasma.
The tokomak was invented by the Russians. In it, two magnetic fields are combined to hold the plasma.
The world’s largest tokamak is called Jet, the Joint European Torus. It is also at Culham.
Using Jet, scientists have heated plasma to 300 million degrees — more than is needed to achieve fusion ignition. But magnetic confinement is easier if the plasma is kept small.
Mast keeps the plasma in a tighter configuration that is more energy efficient. — Dawn ScienceDotcom Report
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