All posts by Paul Raven

Blog

Microfluidic diagnostic chips are (almost) child’s play

1 Comment

Pity us poor Brits and our ox-bow lake of eighties pop-culture – until today I had no idea what Shrinky Dinks were. But now I know… and I also know that code 6 polystyrene sheets (which is what Shrinky Dinks are made of) can be used to make single-run prototypes of microfluidic diagnostic chips, thanks to the innovative thinking of one Michelle Kine:

… she whipped up a channel design in AutoCAD, printed it out on Shrinky Dink material using a laser printer, and stuck the result in a toaster oven. As the plastic shrank, the ink particles on its surface clumped together, forming tiny ridges. That was exactly the effect Khine wanted. When she poured a flexible polymer known as PDMS onto the surface of the cooled Shrinky Dink, the ink ridges created tiny channels in the surface of the polymer as it hardened. She pulled the PDMS away from the Shrinky Dink mold, and voilà: a finished microfluidic device that cost less than a fast-food meal.

[…]

She hastens to point out that Shrinky Dink microfluidics isn’t perfect–minute ink splatters from the printer, for instance, can give rise to slight irregularities in the finished channels.

Still, glitches like these don’t pose a problem for most applications. And Khine has already found a way around a more serious difficulty: PDMS can absorb proteins, throwing off the results of sensitive tests. She has begun to make chips directly out of the Shrinky Dinks by etching the design into the plastic using syringe tips. As the plastic shrinks, the channels become narrower and deeper–perfect for microfluidics. She can even make three-dimensional chips by melting several etched Shrinky Dinks together. The whole process, from design to finished chip, takes only minutes.

Kudos, Miss Kine. Even if you’re not a microfluidics researcher, this is an impressive example of finding cheap methods for making high-tech devices – the sort of favela-budget hack that takes a technology from university laboratories to the potting sheds of the globe. I wonder what the garage biohacker crowd will make of Kine’s innovation? And what might be the next lab-grade technology to be reproduced at a fragment of the normal price using off-the-shelf stuff from the supermarket? [via BoingBoing]

Blog

Genome sequencing for <$5000

digital rendering of DNAThe title says it all, really; Californian biotech company Complete Genomics has announced publicly that it has…

… sequenced three human genomes for an average cost of $4,400. The most recently sequenced genome–which happens to be that of genomics pioneer George Church–cost just $1,500 in chemicals, the cheapest published yet. [via FuturePundit]

“So what?” you might be thinking. Well, for a start, cheaper genome sequencing will pay off fast for the medical field, as it’ll give them more data to study; also, lowering the price to “consumer” levels (albeit the sort of consumer who doesn’t flinch at the idea of laying out a few thousand bucks for a bunch of data that they themselves don’t have the training to do anything with) opens up a whole raft of potential applications, both medical and otherwise.

Other experts are downplaying Complete Genomics’ announcement, however, because the “reagent cost” of the sequencing doesn’t tell the full story:

Calculating the cost of sequencing a human genome is a tricky business–price estimates can vary depending on what’s included in the calculation. One common measure is the cost of the chemicals used, and this is what Complete Genomics used. However, this measure doesn’t incorporate the cost of the machines that do the sequencing, the human labor, or the computational effort required to assemble raw sequence information into a whole genome. “What’s important is not just the reagent costs, but also the cost of analyzing the sequence,” says Jeff Schloss, program director for technology development at the National Human Genome Research Center, in Bethesda, MD. “It’s unclear how computational costs for this method compare to some of the others.”

My guess would be that CG doesn’t really care about that, though. It looks like they’re taking a leaf from the Web2.0 playbook by rolling out the service at the lowest cost possible in order to get a good toe-hold in an emerging market: make sequencing available, and then watch your early-adopter users to see what people will actually use it for. That said, the $5,000 sequence isn’t available to the general public just yet, but I doubt it’ll be long before it is… and I doubt CG will be the only player on the field by that point, either. [image by ynse]

Blog

Detroit: the new frontier?

1 Comment

Heidelberg community art project, DetroitLast time we mentioned Detroit here, it was in the less-than-cheerful terms of it becoming a growth region for private security patrols, and the web is full of similar stories charting the Motor City’s decline in lucid hand-wringing detail. But what if they’re ignoring the positives in favour of those apocalyptic headlines and photos?

Aaron M Renn at New Geography makes the point that the city’s administration seems unwilling to face up to the extent of the problem, but also highlights the pioneering atmosphere that Detroit’s “urban prairie” is nurturing. The withering of local government leaves spaces of opportunity for innovative approaches to low-budget living to take root… and while the living ain’t easy, the make-do attitude of the American pioneer spirit seems to be making a return [via Warren Ellis].

Urban agriculture projects are gathering pace; out-of-town artists are moving in, attracted by the low housing prices and the blank-canvas vibe of a city that’s been all but abandoned by consumerism. [image by jessicareeder]

In most cities, municipal government can’t stop drug dealing and violence, but it can keep people with creative ideas out. Not in Detroit. In Detroit, if you want to do something, you just go do it. Maybe someone will eventually get around to shutting you down, or maybe not. It’s a sort of anarchy in a good way as well as a bad one. Perhaps that overstates the case. You can’t do anything, but it is certainly easier to make things happen there than in most places because the hand of government weighs less heavily.

What’s more, the fact that government is so weak has provoked some amazing reactions from the people who live there. In Chicago, every day there is some protest at City Hall by a group from some area of the city demanding something. Not in Detroit. The people in Detroit know that they are on their own, and if they want something done they have to do it themselves. Nobody from the city is coming to help them. And they’ve found some very creative ways to deal with the challenges that result.

Imagine for a moment that this trend continues – might Detroit become some sort of independent city-state, a mildly anarchic rough-and-ready town where the price of freedom is a willingness to work hard for yourself and with your neighbours? How many more cities in the Western world might go the same way as manufacturing becomes increasingly outsourced overseas and/or roboticised? How will national governments react to these places – will they abandon them to the whims of their new residents, or struggle to control them in the face of diminishing tax revenues and the spiralling costs of law enforcement?

I’m not naive enough to imagine Detroit becoming some sort of hippie utopia, but I think it has the potential to become a new type of post-industrial city – but that will depend on a lot of different factors. Should the government be involving itself more closely in these early stages, or will a hands-off wait-and-see approach prove more effective?

Blog

Designer drugs develop faster than designer legislation

1 Comment

pillsI’m not sure whether I’m supposed to be proud or ashamed of this one, but apparently Britain has been declared the “designer drugs capital of Europe” by the EU drug agency. [image by Greencolander]

This new generation of online “head shops” is at the centre of a rapidly growing market in highly potent synthetic drugs, such as Spice, that mimic the effects of illegal substances such as cannabis and ecstasy.

European drug agency officials are also alarmed by the way the online retailers are reacting to moves to ban individual “legal highs” by rapidly marketing alternatives. Officials say it is like trying to hit a moving target.

Well, d’uh – do you really expect them to just sit there in the firing line waiting to be picked off? I think what we’re seeing here is something like a singularity for the recreational chemicals industry, whereby the legal machinery of the countries that most want to control such substances moves too slowly to control the exponentially faster response to market demand. It’s a whack-a-mole gig – knock one substance into the ground, and two more pop up to replace it.

I’d hardly be the first to suggest that perhaps this rapid response in the balance of supply and demand is the first nail in the coffin lid of attempts to banish recreational drug-taking, but given the UK government’s laughable unwillingness to heed the suggestions of the drug policy advisors that it appointed, I’m not going to be the first voice they ignore, either.

But I think it’s safe to say that drugs – designer or otherwise – are not going to go away any time soon, legislation or otherwise. So what’s a beleaguered incumbent government to do – quietly admit defeat and lose the vote of the hand-wringing middle classes, or pour away time and resources doing a King Canute impersonation?

Is there anyone among Futurismic‘s readership who can say with a straight face that more restrictive legislation will prevent drug abuse, in the UK or anywhere else? If so, tell us how and why in the comments. Feel free to suggest new alternatives to legislation, as well.

Blog

The Anonymous Hunters: corporate critics and whistleblowers beware

1 Comment

Have you ever bad-mouthed a big company in an internet comments thread? If so, the Wragge and Co. law firm of Birmingham, UK may be hot on your tail (provided the comment is vitriolic enough to provoke the company to spend money, one assumes) – they’ve just announced a new legal “task force” for tracking down the identities of nefarious anonymous commenters [via TechDirt].

The Cyber Tracing team at Wragge & Co was set up to deal with what the law firm said was a rising problem with people making anonymous statements that defamed companies, and people sharing confidential information online.

And Wragge boasted the new team would ensure there was