Many believe that it is impossible to create anything new, because all the best has long been created. However, the greatest minds of the planet easily refute such a theory, tirelessly making revolutionary discoveries, and every year improve the scientific achievements of their predecessors. From the abundance of revolutionary works, on which researchers can work for decades, the top 10 are selected annually, which makes it possible for their authors to receive worldwide recognition. We invite you to immerse yourself in the mysterious world of science for a while and get acquainted with the main scientific discoveries of 2014, which managed to amaze even the most captious critics.
Each year, the editors of Science magazine choose one scientific achievement as Breakthrough of the Year. Previous winners have been the discovery of the Higgs boson, cancer immunotherapy, and the first quantum machine. The editor-in-chief of the journal, Marcia McNutt, says that the opinion of the editors of Science is subjective, and after a few years, perhaps the main scientific achievement - 2014, will be called a discovery that did not receive his attention at all. But nevertheless, Science, along with Nature, is the most authoritative scientific periodical in the world, so we present you their top 10.
1. Rosetta mission to comet Churyumov-Gerasimenko
Although many of the public only learned of this ambitious project through the "sexist" shirt scandal, that doesn't detract from its significance. The spacecraft flew 6.5 billion km in ten years, performed 4 gravitational maneuvers around the Earth and Mars in order to enter the comet's orbit, land on it and obtain a lot of information necessary to solve a number of questions about the solar system.
2. How birds appeared
Several independent research groups have analyzed the emergence of birds during dinosaur evolution. From tyrannosaurus to swallow is a big evolutionary step. Scientists examined the fossils found over the past 20 years and found out the following. Features characteristic of birds (for example, plumage) have already been repeatedly observed in dinosaurs - only they were not used for flight. The bones gradually became thinner, the size of the bodies - smaller. New species appeared and were able to survive.
3. Using young blood to fight old age
The idea is not new, because the sacred meaning of young blood has been attached since ancient times. Historians report that in 1492, Pope Innocent VIII, trying to improve his health, died after a blood transfusion from three young boys. And 150 years ago, researchers stitched the skins of two mice together to combine their blood circulation. In the 2000s, blood stem cells began to be actively studied. Then it was discovered that when the blood circulations of the old and young mice were connected (animals, you have a great mission, but bad karma ...), the muscle stem cells of the old mouse began to better restore muscle tissue. Published in 2014, work reinforced the belief that something in young blood could reverse the signs of aging. One research team studied GDF11 isolated from a young mouse. It revealed, that in the old mouse it strengthened the heart and caused the growth of neurons in the brain. And another group reported that this factor improved the spatial memory of the aging mouse. Now researchers are smoothly moving from long-suffering mice to humans, transfusing young donor plasma into old people. All with one goal - the fight against Alzheimer's disease.
4. Robots working in cooperation
Thanks to this scientific achievement, software has been created that allows robots to act in cooperation with others, but completely without human influence. One of the groups managed to organize a thousand robots the size of a five-kopeck coin in such a way that they independently form letters, primitive shapes, and so on. The second, third and fourth did the same, only with different sets. All without human control - the robots relied on information from the environment.
5. A chip that mimics the brain of
The human brain is 100 billion cells connected by 100 trillion synapses. Created by the IBM team, the ThrueNorth chip contains 5.4 billion transistors, which are interconnected by 256 million synapses. Specialists plan to combine them into more complex systems.
6. Cells for the treatment of diabetes
Researchers have managed to obtain pancreatic beta cells that produce insulin from stem cells in the laboratory.
7. The world's oldest rock painting
Scientists have found that prehistoric graffiti on the island of Sulawesi (Indonesia) is at least 40,000 years old - the same age as European examples of cave art. This discovery could rewrite the history of a key stage in the development of the human mind.
8. Manipulating memories with light
Optogenetics is a young science that allows you to influence the nerve cells in the brain using a beam of light. So scientists managed to change the positive coloring of memories in mice to negative, and vice versa.
9. Cubesat miniature satellites
Ten years ago, these 10 cm cubes were just teaching aids at the university. Now, assembled by the hundreds and launched into space, they are capable of observing the earth's surface, which are sometimes inaccessible even to large satellites. And they are much cheaper.
10. A bit of genetic creativity: two new letters in the genetic alphabet
Originally there were four: A, T, G and C. The four amino acids (adenine, thymine, guanine and cytosine) that code for DNA. But in the artificial version of Escherichia coli, there are two more: X and Y. They were added by researchers from California, creating DNA that does not exist in nature. Funny moment: the editors invited readers to vote on their own, making up a similar rating. As a result, number 1 in the ranking of major scientific achievements, according to readers, was the genetic alphabet of artificial Escherichia coli. But the Rosetta mission dropped to 3rd place.
Source estet-portal.com
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