Anatomy of casino capitalism

Anatomy of casino capitalism

Jane D'Arista unravels the web of banking confidence schemes

Bio

Jane D'Arista is an economist with the Financial Markets Center in Philomont, VA. She is a Research Associate with the Political Economy Research Institute (PERI) and author of the masterful study of U.S. financial regulation, The Evolution of U.S. Finance. For more than thirty years, Jane D'Arista has been one of the country's most insightful analysts of financial markets and regulation.

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Birds swarming

Nature's Most Wicked-Looking Robot, the Bacteriophage

Nature's Most Wicked-Looking Robot, the Bacteriophage
I can't lie; I've been waiting for an excuse to post a picture of a bacteriophage*, the microscopic spider virus that lands on bacteria to inject its own DNA, for a long time. This Cyborg Life gives me an excuse.

Rather than attacking typical plant or animal cells, the bacteriophage uses bacteria as its host for replication. Highly specialized, the bacteriophage lands on a specific part of a specific bacteria, and just like a syringe with legs, injects its genetic material (which is stored in that big bulb on top).

It only takes minutes for viral mRNA to convince bacterial ribosomes to makes its own proteins, transforming the bacteria into a virus factory that, in some circumstances, will literally burst with its own product.

For those who believe that a benevolent supreme being created life, it would be only natural to believe that the bacteriophage was spawned from a equally powerful source of evil.

Of course, Man has long reimagined the bacteriophage as a tool for everything from antibiotic alternatives (see what's called phage therapy, a century old idea) to FDA-approved food sprays. While it's easy to consider nanobots as the future of Man's biological domination, sometimes using the machines that nature has already left lying around is the better bet.

Especially when they're this badass.


[Image 1, 2, 3, 4]

* The lead photo is technically a nano-scale model of a T4 bacteriophage. The gallery has real shots.

This week, Gizmodo is exploring the enhanced human future in a segment we call This Cyborg Life. It's about what happens when we treat our body less as a sacred object and more as what it is: Nature's ultimate machine.

Road Trains: Genius or guaranteed pile-up? – EU Infrastructure — What could possibly go wrong?

Road Trains: Genius or guaranteed pile-up? – EU Infrastructure — What could possibly go wrong?
The European Union has financed a study to look at how grouping vehicles into ‘platoons’ or ‘road trains’ on the continent’s motorways could cut fuel consumption, journey times and congestion.

The quite-frankly bizarre idea sees groups of cars linked together via wireless sensors, with a lead vehicle (driven by a ‘professional driver’ – whatever that means) leading the train. The ‘lead driver’ would monitor the status of the road train, allowing those in the other vehicles to sit back, sleep or read a book whilst they travel along motorways.

The EU’s study will be entirely focused on the system working with wireless sensors and up to eight vehicles ranging from your everyday family cars to buses and trains. In theory, these vehicles could be mixed and matched in a ‘road train’, but I’m not sure I’d want to be in between a truck and a bus with no control.

The preliminary report picked up by the BBC says that ‘road trains’ could cut fuel levels by up to 20 percent presumably due to most vehicles being in the lead’s slipstream.