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Humanized Yeast: Scientists Create Yeast With Important Human Genes

Delft University of Technology scientists have created baker’s yeast with human muscle genes.

Human muscle genes were successfully inserted into the DNA of baker’s yeast by biotechnologist Pascale Daran-Lapujade and her team at Delft University of Technology. For the first time, scientists have effectively inserted a crucial human characteristic into a yeast cell. Their research was recently published in the journal Cell Reports.

Daran-Lapujade’s lab introduced a characteristic to yeast cells that is regulated by a collection of 10 genes that humans cannot live without; they carry the blueprint for a process known as a metabolic pathway, which breaks down sugar to gather energy and produce cellular building blocks within muscle cells. Because this mechanism is involved in many disorders, including cancer, the modified yeast could be used in medical studies.

“Now that we understand the full process, medical scientists can use this humanized yeast model as a tool for drug screening and cancer research,” Daran-Lapujade says.

Humans and yeast are similar

According to Daran-Lapujade, there are a lot of similarities between yeast and a human being: “It seems weird since yeast lives as single cells and humans consist of a substantially more complex system, but the cells operate in a very similar way.”

As a result, scientists often transfer human genes into yeast. Because yeast removes all other interactions that may exist in the human body, it creates a clean environment in which researchers can analyze a single process.

“As compared to human cells or tissues, yeast is a fantastic organism for its simplicity to grow and its genetic accessibility: its DNA can be easily modified to address fundamental questions,” Daran-Lapujade explains. “Many pivotal discoveries such as the cell division cycle, were elucidated thanks to yeast.”

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Gabbard Lights Up Harris for ‘Hypocrisy’ of Defending Brittney Griner and Not Americans Locked Up at Home for Marijuana Violations

Former Democratic presidential candidate Tulsi Gabbard blasted Vice President Kamala Harris regarding her “hypocrisy” of vehemently defending Brittney Griner but not standing up for Americans locked up at home for marijuana violations – including those who were prosecuted by the former California attorney general.

On Thursday, Vice President Harris condemned Russia for sentencing Griner to nine years in prison for possessing a cannabis vape pen at an airport near Moscow earlier this year.

“With today’s sentencing, Russia continues its wrongful detention of Brittney Griner. She should be released immediately,” Harris wrote on Twitter. “@POTUS and I, and our entire Administration, are working every day to reunite Brittney, as well as Paul Whelan, with loved ones who miss each of them dearly.”

Gabbard told Fox News host Will Cain, “Another note of hypocrisy coming from Kamala Harris and this administration, as you mentioned during her illustrious record as attorney general in California…she kept prisoners in prison longer than their sentences to use them as free slave labor yet at the same time these very same people are condemning other countries for doing the exact same thing. It doesn’t make any sense.”

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Alex Jones and the Right to Offend

On Dec. 14, 2012, a mass shooting at Sandy Hook Elementary School in Newtown, Connecticut resulted in the deaths of 20 children and six staffers.  Alex Jones, a controversial far-right talk show host, called the Sandy Hook massacre a U.S. government hoax, staged using crisis actors, to serve as a pretext for gun control.  Parents of one of the slain children filed a defamation suit against Jones, claiming that followers of Jones had harassed them and sent them death threats for years in the false belief that they were lying about their son’s death.

Jones’s defense was his right to free speech and that he was not responsible for the harassment.  He lost.  The jury awarded the parents $45.2 million in punitive damages on top of $4.1 million in compensatory damages — another example of outrageous damage verdicts that plague the legal system.

Freedom of speech is coming under attack from all directions.  The primary assault is based on the existence of a new “right”: the right not to be offended.  It is claimed by many on the left that the right not to be offended is more important than the right to free expression.

Our colleges and universities have fallen victim to this new “right.”  The feelings of students often constitute sufficient justification for campus censorship.  If a conservative speaker offends some of the students, that speaker can be denied a platform.  “The belief that free speech rights don’t include the right to speak offensively is now firmly entrenched on campuses and enforced by repressive speech or harassment codes,” wrote attorney Wendy Kaminer in The Atlantic.

The problem is spreading to the mainstream.  In the 2010 case of Nurre v. Whitehead, the U.S. Supreme Court upheld lower court rulings that school authorities can deny students’ rights to free speech just to keep other students from being offended.  The courts are “allowing schools the discretion to let an offended minority control a cowed majority,” constitutional attorney John W. Whitehead wrote in the Huffington Post.  “There is no way to completely avoid giving offense,” he said.  “At some time or other, someone is going to take offense at something someone else says or does.  It’s inevitable.  Such politically correct thinking has resulted in a host of inane actions, from the Easter Bunny being renamed ‘Peter Rabbit’ to Christmas Concerts being dubbed ‘Winter’ Concerts.”

In a democratic republic, there can be no right not to be offended.  If anyone can prohibit another person’s speech because it’s offensive, there is no limit to the restrictions that can be placed on free expression.  As the late author Christopher Hitchens said, “[f]reedom of speech must include the license to offend.”

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Billionaires, Hollywood Celebrities Join Call to End Public Plane Tracking After ‘Climate Criminal’ Backlash

Billionaires, Hollywood celebrities, and climate activists share fame, fortune, and a profile they work hard to control. All of which is why so many are calling on a public company not to track their flights and expose their carbon footprints.

AFP reports flight-following websites and Twitter accounts that offer real-time views of air traffic are on the end of regular pushback ranging from complaints to gear seizures by those who would rather their movements are not in the public domain.

One U.S.-based group alone gets dozens of “requests” each year to stop posting aircraft flight movements, according to its organiser, Dan Streufert.

“We have not removed anything so far. This is all public information. And I don’t want to be the arbiter of who’s right and who’s wrong,” added Streufert, founder of flight tracking site ADS-B Exchange which can track any flight from a private individual to a politician, star, activist or member of Royalty.

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Despite Strict Gun Control, California Had The Most Active Shooter Incidents In 2021: FBI

In a report issued by the FBI, California ranked first for the most active shooter incidents in 2021. The state has been in the top spot in three of the past five years.

According to the study, a total of 61 active shooter incidents occurred across 30 states last year with 103 people killed and 140 wounded. This is up from 40 incidents and 38 killed in 2020.

California had 6 incidents that claimed the lives of 19 people with 9 wounded. Texas and Georgia each had 5.

California, which has some of the strictest gun laws, saw 0.015 shootings per 100,000 people. Texas, which has very unrestrictive state gun laws, had nearly the same at 0.0167 per 100,000 people. Georgia had 0.045 per 100,000 people.

Criminal attorney Arash Hashemi told NTD, a sister outlet of The Epoch Times, that in his opinion there’s no easy answer to how gun laws should be handled.

“We need both sides to sit down and listen to what’s going on. I know one side says we need to ban guns, one side said there would be no regulation. But there needs to be a meeting of the minds in the middle,” Hashemi said.

California is moving ahead to implement more gun restrictions. The new state Senate Bill 918, which is currently on its way through the legislature, would ban the carrying of guns in most public areas, regardless of whether someone has a carry license or not.

However Hashemi suggested a slightly different approach. He said the Second Amendment can’t be violated, but he thinks certain people should be restricted from owning a firearm.

“I think California needs to implement these background checks but at the same time make sure they don’t infringe on people’s rights to bear arms,” Hashemi said.

He said vetting gun buyers for red flags like mental illness or psychiatric medication is important.

He added that the importance of the Second Amendment is to give the civilians of the United States a check on the government.

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Congressional staffer spent his off-hours pretending to be an FBI agent

This story from the Daily Beast about a congressional staffer impersonating an FBI agent is just crazy. In 2020 a couple of Secret Service agents in Washington, DC noticed what appeared to be an unmarked police car but something about the license plate looked off. It turned out it wasn’t a real undercover police car, it had just been made to look that way by a congressional staffer named Sterling Carter:

According to D.C. court documents, Carter had tricked out the otherwise boring sedan with blue emergency lights, a laptop computer mount on the front dashboard, a spotlight near the driver’s side view mirror, and even a barrier separating the front half from the back half—ready to transport detainees.

Carter, who was standing near his parked car, was wearing a black T-shirt that read “federal agent,” a police duty belt, a Glock pistol, extra ammunition, handcuffs, a radio, and an earpiece. That was enough to convince passersby, who kept thanking him for his service, according to court records.

The two Secret Service agents tried to get closer but Carter seemed to be trying to avoid them. When they ran the license plate for his car, it came up blank. At that point they called a Joint Operations Center and uniformed Secret Service agents on bicycles were sent to confront Carter.

When five bicycle cops with the Secret Service approached him, Carter simply said he was “FBI,” according to a police report. His baseball cap and facemask made it difficult to identify his face, the police report said. When they asked him for credentials, he said he didn’t have them on him, then flipped on his emergency lights and sped away. One agent pedaled as hard as he could on an electric bike through several D.C. streets, but gave up after a few blocks for “officer safety reasons,” the report says.

An investigation was opened involving the Capitol Police, the Secret Service and the FBI. One Secret Service agent recognized the shirt the suspect was wearing and traced it back to a single shop in Florida. After receiving a list of everyone who’d bought that particular shirt, he narrowed it down to one person who lived in the DC area and matched the description of the suspect: Sterling Carter. Several weeks later, the investigators learned that Carter was a congressional staffer who worked for Rep. Brad Schneider, a Democrat from Illinois.

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Top Taiwan Defense Official In Charge Of Missile Production Found Dead In Hotel

A senior Taiwanese official who was in charge of supervising the island nation’s massive ramp up of missile production has been found dead in a hotel room in a southern part of the country.

Ou Yang Li-hsing, deputy head of Taiwan defense ministry’s research and development unit, was found dead Saturday morning, according to state media.

Ou Yang, 57, was on an official trip to the southern county of Pingtung when he died.

Ou Yang was overseeing the military-owned National Chung-Shan Institute of Science and Technology’s work in doubling its production of missiles to 500 per year as the island nation prepares for a possible invasion in the coming years from Communist China.

After news broke of his death, reports said that he had officially died of a heart attack and that he had a history of heart problems.

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Possible serial killer targeting Muslim men in New Mexico

Police in Albuquerque, New Mexico, are investigating a possible serial killer case involving three young Muslim men who were shot to death within a 5-mile radius over the past nine months.

Each slaying was an ambush outside during evening hours, and it doesn’t appear that the men knew each other. Police are working with the FBI and are open to the idea that these could be hate crime killings, the Albuquerque Journal reported.

“While we won’t go into all the specifics of why we think that, there’s one strong commonality in all victims: the race and religion,” Deputy Cmdr. Kyle Hartsock with the Albuquerque Police Department said Thursday. “We are taking this very seriously. We want the public’s help in identifying this cowardly individual.”

All three men reportedly were immigrants who worked hard to make better lives for themselves in America. One man wanted to bring his fiancee to Albuquerque from Pakistan and start a family.

“We can’t call it a [hate crime] until we have someone identified and really know what their intention is in doing this,” Hartsock said. “And we don’t know enough yet to clearly say that — but that could change.”

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‘Hellfire Missiles’: US Military Fired Upon UFO That Looked Like ‘F*cking Jellyfish,’ Filmmaker Says

While the Pentagon tries to gain new insights into the nature of the unidentified aerial phenomena (UAPs), as UFOs are referred to today, US documentary filmmaker and ufologist Jeremy Corbell has alleged that one such object recently came under fire from troops on Earth.

During his appearance on the Joe Rogan Experience podcast, Corbell claimed that the “increased frequency” of UFO over “active warzones” has led to the creation of rules “about whether to fire or not” on these objects.

According to Corbell, the documents he has been “exposed to” suggest that any object that looks like it could be carrying a payload, thus posing a potential threat, is to be fired at.

“And there’s been such an increased frequency since 2021 that it has been pushed up to kind of a critical where they are, like, ‘okay, these things are in our airspace, we could have collisions,’” he said. “But more importantly, we see other countries firing on these – Russia, Syria. We know it is not their assets. So the question is, whose are these?”

Corbell also claimed that he has images of one object that “we fired on” – likely referring to the US military by “we” – which he described as looking like a “f*cking jellyfish.”

“It is stiff, about the size of, like, a big coffee table – that’s the one at least that we fired on recently,” he said.

Earlier in the conversation, when Rogan asked him what he meant by “firing,” Corbell promptly replied “Hellfire missiles.”

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