From Science.org: “In 2016, when the U.S. Congress unleashed a flood of new funding for Alzheimer’s disease research, the National Institute on Aging (NIA) tapped veteran brain researcher Eliezer Masliah as a key leader for the effort. He took the helm at the agency’s Division of Neuroscience, whose budget—$2.6 billion in the last fiscal year—dwarfs the rest of NIA combined. His roughly 800 research papers, many on how those conditions damage synapses, the junctions between neurons, have made him one of the most cited scientists in his field. However, a Science investigation has now found that scores of his lab studies are riddled with apparently falsified images used to show the presence of proteins and micrographs of brain tissue. Numerous images seem to have been inappropriately reused within and across papers, sometimes published years apart in different journals, describing divergent experimental conditions.”
A Lego fan has made a working version of a Turing machine out of Lego
From The Register: “A working Turing Machine was submitted to Lego Ideas, consisting of approximately 2,900 parts and a bucketload of extreme cleverness. The original machine was devised by mathematician Alan Turing in 1936. Turing’s idea was a hypothetical system that could simulate any computer algorithm. The design consisted of an infinitely long tape with symbols that could be moved left and right, a ‘head’ that could read the symbols and overwrite them with new ones, a finite control that described the machine’s state, and a table to link each combination of state and symbol to an instruction for what to do next. The Lego builder first came across the concept a few years ago and, despite it being an abstract model, decided to attempt making one. In addition to the constraints of making the device, there was also the challenge of fitting into the limits imposed by Lego Ideas. At the time of submission, this was 3,000 parts.”
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This 1925 Phantom is the world’s rarest Rolls Royce but no one knows who it was built for
From Vintages: “Custom coachbuilding of the 1920s and 1930s was the ultimate form of self-expression for the rich and famous. Whether it was a Waterhouse-bodied Packard, a Figoni & Falaschi-bodied Delahaye or a Murphy-bodied Duesenberg, the affluent could essentially own a one-of-a-kind vehicle. In the early 1930s very few designers had considered (or dared) to modify the traditional Rolls-Royce vertical grill but that alteration became essential to Jonckheere achieving a more streamlined profile for the Phantom’s new body. Bullet-shaped headlights, flowing fenders, and a long vertical tailfin down the boot lid finish off the sleek contours. Jonckheere went with unique, large round doors which operate flawlessly but did present an issue for operating windows. Unfortunately a few years later, the records were destroyed in a fire and it remains unknown who commissioned or designed this one-off masterpiece.”
Lost biblical plant with medicinal properties resurrected from 1,000-year-old seed
From CNN: “Botanists have grown a long-lost tree species from a 1,000-year-old seed found in a cave in the Judean Desert in the 1980s. The researchers involved in the project say they believe the tree species, which is thought to be extinct today, could have been the source of a healing balm mentioned in the Bible and other ancient texts. Unearthed during an archaeological dig in the lower Wadi el-Makkuk region north of Jerusalem, the ancient seed was determined to be in pristine condition. The team, led by Dr. Sarah Sallon, a physician who founded the Louis L. Borick Natural Medicine Research Center at Hadassah University Medical Center in Jerusalem, planted the seed to further investigate more than a dozen years ago. Sallon said it was possible that the tree could be the source of the biblical “tsori,” a medicinal plant extract associated with the historical region of Gilead north of the Dead Sea in the Jordan Rift Valley.”
Fat Bear Week delayed after a contestant killed one of the other bears
From NPR: “Fat Bear Week, a celebration of brown bears’ survival instincts, brought a grisly reminder of the animals’ predatory nature when a male bear, 469, killed a female, 402, at Katmai National Park & Preserve in Alaska. The unsettling scene was captured by a popular live webcam that follows the bears on the Brooks River. The deadly fight took place around 9:30 a.m. in Alaska, as organizers prepared to kick off Fat Bear Week, the competition that lets fans crown the bear who successfully added the most weight as they prepare for their annual hibernation cycle. As viewers watched online, the two bears engaged in a lengthy and violent fight in deep water at the river’s mouth — a clash that ended with one bear dying, and the other dragging her body ashore.”
Soccer fans try to help their team find the goal
Acknowledgements: I find a lot of these links myself, but I also get some from other newsletters that I rely on as “serendipity engines,” such as The Morning News from Rosecrans Baldwin and Andrew Womack, Jodi Ettenberg’s Curious About Everything, Dan Lewis’s Now I Know, Robert Cottrell and Caroline Crampton’s The Browser, Clive Thompson’s Linkfest, Noah Brier and Colin Nagy’s Why Is This Interesting, Maria Popova’s The Marginalian, Sheehan Quirke AKA The Cultural Tutor, the Smithsonian magazine, and JSTOR Daily. If you come across something interesting that you think should be included here, please feel free to email me at mathew @ mathewingram dot com