Strangers Raise $54K for Terminally Ill 22-Year-Old Mom

upsider admin on June 26, 2024

A Northern Irishwoman faced a heart-wrenching reality when, just after celebrating her daughter Raeya’s first birthday, she received devastating news. Rachel Burns, only 22 years old, learned she had an advanced-stage brain tumor with a rare and aggressive mutation, leaving her with approximately four months to live.

Despite the grim prognosis, Rachel wasted no time. With the support of her partner, she launched a GoFundMe campaign to raise funds for an experimental treatment in Germany known as ONC201. This treatment, discovered in recent years, aims to induce tumor cell death through a specific genetic pathway.

The response was overwhelming. Within 24 hours, the campaign had raised £30,000, and support continued to pour in, bringing the total to £48,000 of their £60,000 goal within days. Rachel expressed profound gratitude for the outpouring of kindness from both local communities and strangers alike, highlighting how it had injected a glimmer of hope into their challenging situation.

Reflecting on the journey ahead, Rachel shared, “Belfast is a small place, but the generosity from people all over has been incredible. This support gives me hope that I can cherish more time with my family.” She also extended heartfelt thanks to everyone who had contributed to the fundraiser.

For those who wish to support Rachel and her family during this critical time, donations can be made through their GoFundMe page.

Game-Changing Cancer Test (test)

upsider admin on April 19, 2024

An ongoing human study on an experimental cancer test suggests that analyzing blood proteins, instead of tumor DNA, may accurately detect up to 18 early-stage cancers. The US biotech firm, Novelna, presented trial results involving 440 individuals with 18 different cancers, using blood plasma samples from each patient and 44 healthy donors.

The Novelna team achieved high sensitivity and specificity by analyzing trace proteins in the blood. The test, which also considers sex-specific proteins, identified 93% of male and 84% of female cancers at stage I with 99% specificity. The researchers proposed the test as a foundation for a cost-effective, accurate, multi-cancer screening on a population-wide scale, covering major human organs.

Acknowledging the trial’s small size, the team stresses the need for larger trials to confirm accuracy. Despite this, they highlighted the significance of detecting low-level proteins in blood samples for early tumor identification. Implementing such tests could improve survival rates, especially for cancers like breast cancer, and contribute to global efforts in combating the substantial impact of cancer, which currently accounts for one in every six deaths worldwide.

Novelna also anticipates that the test will be much cheaper than current option, with the estimated cost to be below $100.

Related articles: How to Cut Your Risk of Prostate Cancer by a Third and a Saliva Test for Breast Cancer

New Sora AI is Shocking

upsider admin on February 26, 2024

OpenAI’s new text-to-video ai tool, Sora, is absolutely shocking. Text-to-video ai is not brand new, but Sora brings it to a whole new level. (examples down below)

To use Sora, you input a text prompt and Sora generates a video to match your instructions. These videos can be realistic, animated, or any number of combinations you can come up with.

Unlike previous text-to-video ai tools, Sora is capable of creating video clips up to 60 seconds long. In the past, most were very short clips and were generally very fake and unnatural looking.

Sora is not available for public use yet. However, it is expected to become available in the not too distant future.

While it is always a little bit frightening when technology moves at such a fast pace. Many of the main stream ai tools have guardrails in place to stop illegal and exploitative content. This does not always stop bad actors, but thankfully it does help.

What we can all do is promote good and ethical uses of all new technologies.

What Are Some of the Upsides?
There are some very exciting potential uses for this new ai. One of the biggest is for small film, music, and content creators.

Sora can give all of these people the opportunity to create clips or scenes that they would not have the financial means to create otherwise. This could be particularly impactful for people that make content involving Sci-Fi or Fantasy elements. (It is quite difficult to find stock footage of a dragon after all).

It will also give greater ability for people in less fortunate financial situations to be able to realize their artistic visions. This will hopefully make it easier for these people to enter into the film, artistic, and content creation sectors.

It is important to remember that the demo content released was selected by OpenAI for demonstration purposes. We do not know how heavily curated this content was. Once the tool is released to the public we will begin to understand the actual impact it will have.

Below are some of the demos OpenAI released.

If you want to see Sora OpenAI’s full gallery, you can find it on their website here.

Artemis IV: Establishing the Gateway to Mars (Part 4 of 5)

upsider admin on February 18, 2024

Introducing the Lunar Gateway
Artemis IV will have 4 crew members and represents a critical step in the Artemis program, focused on the deployment of the International Habitation module (I-Hab) to the Lunar Gateway. The Gateway is a new space station that will serve as a multi-purpose outpost orbiting the Moon. This mission, targeted for 2027, is instrumental in establishing the Lunar Gateway with its pivotal role in achieving a sustainable human presence in lunar orbit.

The Importance of the Lunar Gateway
The Lunar Gateway is an innovative space station project that will orbit the Moon, providing living quarters, research facilities, and support for both robotic and human missions. The I-Hab module, is the part of the Gateway that will offer the living and working space for astronauts, enabling longer missions and serving as a hub for science, exploration, and partnerships across nations.

Unlike the continuously inhabited International Space Station, the Gateway will be occupied intermittently, serving as a vital hub for deep space exploration. The addition of the I-Hab module, with its living and research spaces, is crucial for extending human presence in lunar orbit and beyond.

I find the idea of Astronauts living in a space station so far away from earth both incredibly fascinating while also very frightening. It will be amazing to hear from the astronauts what that experience is like!

Ocean Photograph of the Year

upsider admin on February 5, 2024

The Ocean Photographer of the Year 2023 competition, organized by Oceanographic Magazine, showcased a stunning array of underwater photography, highlighting the beauty and diversity of ocean life.

Jialing Cai, a marine biologist and amateur photographer, claimed the top honor as the Ocean Photographer of the Year with her mesmerizing image of a paper nautilus adrift on a piece of debris in the Philippines. This image, captured during a blackwater dive following a volcanic eruption, has a serene and almost fairytale-like quality amidst the natural disaster’s aftermath.

The competition also had several other categories, such as the Wildlife and Ocean Portfolio award.

These winning images, along with others, will be featured in a five-month-long exhibition at the Australian National Maritime Museum, offering a unique opportunity to view these incredible works in person.

Luckily for us, we can view them by going to their online gallery. You can see each category winner, as well as the 2nd and 3rd place contestants. They are all absolutely amazing, as you can probably tell from the image up top